It's hard to answer that without knowing a little more about your setup and approach, but:

1) One of the most important things on a twist is that you'll waste material (from cold shuts, etc.) if you're twisting a square bar. Round off those corners as much as you can, and you'll have better luck.

2) I'm sure there are lots of good ways to twist using a forge. Personally, I've always done it with an oxy/acetylene torch (heater/rosebud tip). I'll work on one 2" section at a time, feathering the heat out somewhat from there so that I'm not straining against cold material. I find that you can control things really well that way; you won't get any cold shuts because you're only twisting where the steel is hottest, and you can control your twist rate really carefully (e.g. 1, 2, or 3 twists per 2" section).

Those are my suggestions to you.

Zack

Yes, if it is difficult to twist, it's not hot enough. Go back into the forge, by all means. Get the section you want to twist hot and quickly get to a vise and twist it. Never keep twisting on it after the heat gets lower than a low yellow heat. In other words, work it in the yellow range. If it squeels or grunts, it might be too late.

Hi Charles,

Here is something I recently come up with for a rod twisting device. I mounted a small drill press vice on one side of my forge. The rod goes through the forge and is twisted hot, in the forge. I forged the end of the rod to a 1/2" square. I use 1/2" drive extensions mounted to a cordless drill to do the twisting. I can reach into the hot forge with the extension to start the twisting in the end of the rod.

One thing I found interesting; when twisting the rod, you can feel it start to resist the twisting. Kind of like it is work hardening. If you stop the twisting for a couple of seconds, it softens and is easier to twist again.

My drill battery was getting low in this video. I was having to turn it by hand some.

[media] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HbGtPgbcEQ [/media]

Thanks to all for the info, I will put it to good use.

Charles, the geometry of what you are twisting comes into play as well.

I forge to square - then forge the corners flat to make it octagonal, and then forge that to almost round.

Twist.

When round, there seem to be fewer edges to fold over on themselves.

Maybe do a little grinding to smooth off the twisted bar.

Then, forge the twisted bar at a welding heat and smooth off the twisting "threads" when forging.

Forge square.

Then forge flat.

Everything has to be done at a welding heat until you start getting back to a flat bar.

It just ain't easy.

I pretty much do the same thing that Karl does. Once the billet starts to look round I go to half round swages, top and bottom, and get a fairly even and round bar prior to twisting. In the end, I still have to do some grinding depending on how tight the twists.

Dan