Glenn

Photograph the existing stands (or use photos already taken) and then add text and /or drawings to complete the package. The idea is to make a variety of stands, with construction details, available to everyone. This way the end user can choose what would work best for them in their situation. Let's split the anvil stands into the following catagories: * Light - intended for traveling, demos etc * Medium - intended for either traveling or use in one location * Heavy - intended to stay in one location and generally not to travel.

Both drawing and a physical stand would be best. That way we know the drawings work . If we get several offers for just design drawings, I may ask someone to build the stand if their interested, or may just make a drawings only catagory. Keep the questions coming so we can better define the rules.

The Hofi chisel is Tungsten not Titanium. BP1003

Thomas, let me respectfully rephrase your example. Jim and others jump out of airplanes all the time. With the proper training, most people can do it safely, and live. An unfortunate few get killed by the sudden stop when things go wrong, or safety is lax. I tried to limit my search to only zinc so the results would be specific to the problem. There are many more blacksmithing hazards, Heavy Metal Posioning being a nasty one. Like jumping out of an airplane, people work with heavy metals on a daily basis, but take the proper safety precautions to avoid that sudden stop. The following is the extended excerp from one of the references. Please read the entire article by clicking on the link. eMedicine Specialties > Emergency Medicine > Toxicology June 28, 2006

eMedicine Specialties > Emergency Medicine > Toxicology June 28, 2006

(Don't tell Alan about the "archives" button at the bottom of the Forum page. With all the reading material there, it will take him another year or so to catch up. )

Ear plugs come in a variety of shapes, sizes and materials. Wal-Mart has them in the sporting goods or gun section, any sporting goods store, any welding supply store, any place that sells safety equiptment etc. For a couple of dollars you get several sets in a blister pack, or packaged for individual use. Keep a couple of spare sets in the glove box of the vehicle you use to travel to hammer ins. Sometimes those anvils can be rough on the ears.

Stephan, I have moved your posts from the "Prayer List" usually reserved for those in need of prayer, to the "introduce yourself" section where the post would make more sense. To go out into the world from "Galway, Ireland, a blacksmith dessert" to seek out other blacksmiths and to find a forum called I Forge Iron is inspirational. Then in just over 6 hours to have blacksmith from New Jersey USA, to put you in touch with another blacksmith in YOUR HOME TOWN IN IRELAND is beyond belief. Just goes to show I Forge Iron is bringing blacksmiths together world wide. Welcome to the forum. Glenn

More information on Fume feaver is available at: MILLS WELDING & SPECIALTY GASES WEB SITE - Safety Tips (dead link) There is also another thread on the I Forge Iron site called PPW-Fume Fever. Both are very much worth reviewing. This thread was started (including a photo) as zinc once again tried to sneek up and take me by surprise. First experience I had with zinc took 3-4 days to recover, and it was very much a learning experience. I read up on zinc, fume feaver, heavy metal poisioning and etc and thought I knew enough to avoid the hazards. The 2nd time (yes it got me again) I recognized the zinc, but not in time. It took 2-3 days to recover from only a light exposure. I do not play the zinc game, if it is zinc I try to avoid it. But avoiding the problem does not mean the problem does not exist. It means you must always be aware of the problems related to zinc. This was the reason for this thread, zinc once again showed up in a very unlikely place. This does not mean you must avoid zinc or working with the material, just that it is a life threatening danger and you must treat it as such. Keep the suggestions coming as the new blacksmith may have no knowledge on the subject and we need to have the information on the site he can use as a reference. Fume Fever Zinc oxide fumes cause a flu-like illness called Metal Fume Fever. Symptoms of Metal Fume Fever include headache, fever, chills, muscle aches, thirst, nausea, vomiting, chest soreness, fatigue, gastrointestinal pain, weakness, and tiredness. Other elements, such as copper and magnesium, may cause similar effects. If you encounter these symptoms, contact a physician and have a medical examination / evaluation. A google search on Zinc, fume fever, heavy metal poison, etc. will provide more information.

BP0170 Toxicology is on file.

Frank this was definately zinc, galvanized coated, but old enough that you could not tell by looking. The welding flared the zinc and little white threqds were floating everywhere in the air. I left the area holding my breath. Question was to start a discussion for the blacksmiths that had not encountered such things before. Photos help identify the problem.

Coal smoke in a mine usually means there was an explosion somewhere. I am sure you mean coal dust. Black lung is an industry and occupational hazzard from inhalation of coal dust. Many times we stand too close to the dragon breath of a gasser, or the warm exhause (for lack of a better term) from a coke fire. Both contain nasty things. You can reduce the smoke from a coal fire by simply poking a hole in the top of the dome of coal and letting the smoke burn. Nothing beats a good chimney to get any smoke or fumes 20 feet into the air and out of your face. The lungs were designed to operate with clean air. Anything other than clean air is dangerous to your health.

Background: There was a question in the chat room last night about building a light weight, but sturdy, well balanced anvil stand. With 8-10 blacksmiths present.....well....ideas were posted faster than you could take notes. Blacksmiths enjoy a good challenge. The Contest - Design an anvil stand: So, for the next 87 days (contest entries have to be in by December 31, 2007) the challenge is to design and build an anvil stand. * The anvil stand MUST be stable and not tip over under normal use. *Construction materials are of your choice, concrete, wood, steel, whatever, but should be accessible to others. *The design should incorporate a way to (easily) change the working height of the anvil so it can be used by different blacksmiths or strikers. * All entries should provide a list of materials, dimensions, and any additional information that is necessary or available so a person can build that stand. Shop drawings are fine. Photos are encouraged. *It is expected that the design will be anvil specific and adjustments will need to be made by the builder for different size and weight anvils the builder will use. One design does not have to fit all anvils. * This does not have to be a new design, if you have the perfect anvil stand already, show us how you built it. * If you use an idea from somewhere, please give credit as to who and where that idea came from. (If you don't recall, that ok too.) * Multiple entries are encouraged, but one design per entry. One design with variation on a theme is still one design. Three different designs should be three different entries. * Two or more blacksmiths working on one design is acceptable and encouraged as long credit is given to everyone. * All entries may be used on the I Forge Iron site and for any site purposes, including blueprints. For now, post your entries right here as a reply to this thread. Photos should be "attached" to the post or posted in the I Forge Iron Gallery and then the Gallery URL used in the forum. Get creative, use up some of that scrap you have in storage, and design the anvil stand that will become a classic. Depending on the entries, we may have to divide this into categories, such as portable stands and stationary stands. We could give extra points for simplest design, most creative design, ugliest, or whatever. We are open for suggestions. Post them here or contact me directly. The idea is to have some fun with this. I can even see a anvil stand incorporating multiple suggestions. Progress reports and open discussions are encouraged. Enter early and often.

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0330 Car Parts by Glenn Conner This is a wrench for removing the radiator fan on an automobile. You insert a 1/2" drive ratchet handle into the square hole and then the wrench onto the nut between the fan and the engine block. Usually jamming the fan and turning the wrench is enough to break loose the nut. Then just spin the fan off the shaft while holding the wrench steady. In talking with the mechanic, it was a cumbersome system. I ask if a rigid handle would do as well and his eye sparkled. He said "YES !! Can you do that?" Well being a blacksmith I just welded a 22" handle onto his wrench. He met me at the car the next time I visited. Had the whole fan assembly from a car and wanted to know if I could make a new wrench to fit. I ask if he broke the old one. No, this was a different car with a different size nut to hold the fan. Doesn't have to be pretty, just so it works. I found a piece of 1/4" x 1" flat bar and cut it to 3" in length. Welded them together in a "U" shape. Welded the remainder in place as a handle. Fits well enough to get the job done. View full article

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0328 Hold Down Clamp by J.W.Bennett (JWBIRONWORKS) I have been having trouble positioning and holding on to work while I try to stamp my touch mark into it. I came up with this hold down clamp. Start with a piece of 2x2x1/4 angle iron approx 5 1/4" long, a piece of 3/4x1/4 flat stock 20" long and a piece of scrap 5 1/2" long to use as the back. I used 2 pieces of 3/4x1/2 flat stock 5 1/2" long because it was on top of the pile. Cut the 3/4x1/4 into the following lengths 1 - 12" and 4 - 2" making a total of 5 pieces of 3/4x1/4. Using the 12" piece as a spacer lay the other four pieces out evenly across one outside flat of the angle iron. Tack weld The 4 pieces into place(do not weld the 12" piece). If the two outermost pieces should overhang it makes it easier to weld up. Making sure that the 12" piece will slide in and out of the slots you just made place the Backing plate(S) on top of the 4 pieces you just tacked in place and weld it on. If what you have now resembles this... The bottom of the jig. The back of the jig. Then weld on the sides and top and bottom. Take the 12" piece of 3/4"x1/4" and 3 1/2" from one end bend it 90 degrees, you should end up with an L shaped piece like this. On the long side of the L shape come down approx. 1" and drill a 3/8" hole. Slide the L bracket into one of the slots on the angle, Place it in the vise and your ready to try it out. Use a small C clamp to apply the pressure. The flat of the angle iron makes a good backer to stamp or chisel. Clamping a rose stem. Once you are done working with it, use the hole in the L bracket to hang it on the wall. When finished just hang it on the wall. View full article

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0327 Belt Grinder by Gerald Franklin This is my take on a shop built belt grinder (2”X72”) inspired by the one done by Hollis Wooldridge (See IFI Blueprint 215). The mount is a piece of scrap 10” channel and the upright is 2”X4”X ¼” tubing. The 2hp motor is wired for 220v. The contact wheel is an 8” caster and the idler pulley is a pair of salvaged 1” wide bearings scrounged from a local electric motor re-build shop. Total cost was about $110, which includes a new motor and electrical materials. > Does it have a tracking adjustment and is there a picture of that? There is no tracking adjustment per se. Everything is lined up with the drive pulley which I machined with a 1 degree crown in the middle. > What Kind of Platten is used ? The platten will be in place for Phase II. It will be a piece of 2" angle bolted to the upright. Phase II also includes a shield around the idler pulley. I need to get that in place before OSHA shuts me down (grin). View full article

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0324 Find the Radius of a Circle by Jim Carothers, Glenn Conner This is the standard set up for a circle where R= radius, L = cord length, H= maximum distance from L to the arc To find R (radius of the circle) divide the length of the cord squared by 8 times the maxumin height from the cord to the arc then add 1/2 the maxumin height from the cord to the arc. I like the old time formula, 1/2 L² + H² divided by H = diameter. Irnsrgn View full article

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0322 Making a Nail Header by Glenn Conner, Illustration by Duck I want a nail just like Grandpa used to make. Draw a square taper on a piece of round stock the size you want to use for making the nail. The same photo but without all the heat. You can see where the stock was placed on the edge of the anvil for half blows with the hammer to form a shoulder where the taper starts to form. Pick up the nearest jig that has a piece of pipe to aid in forming a dome for the header. This was a jig for forming loops, but it will work for our purposes. Get a piece of 3/8" x 2" or 1/2" by 2" flat bar and bring it up to temperature. Lay it over the pipe and with a the ball side of a ball pein hammer, create a depression in the metal, by holding the ball pein in place and striking it with another hammer. I have a dead soft hammer for this purpose. Striking two hardened hammer faces together can cause them to chip and throw that chip like shrapnel. Take another heat and use your square taper as a punch, drift a hole in the dome from the bottom or inside. Now with another heat flatten the top of the dome slightly and drive the square taper up to the shoulder you created earlier. This looks a bit rough as the header was pushed into being made quickly. Just a little care in centering the header before each blow will result in a much more pleasant appearance. This will create a hourglass of sorts inside the metal. The top part of the hourglass will grab on to the stock as it is driven into the hole so the head can be formed. The bottom of the hourglass will not make contact with the metal so it can be easily removed from the header. I use a letter punch or touch mark to make an impression in the top of the header at this point. Here you can see the letter at the edge of the header. As the head of the nail is formed, the initial will be pressed into the metal "marking" each nail you make with that header. Yes the finish is rough, but this header was made very quickly, with little care as to alignment when placed back onto the pipe for the next hammer impact. More care in alignment produces a very nice header, or you can clean it up with a grinder.. The finished header. The plan was to weld a handle onto the header so it could be easily held and controlled. With the help of my son as a striker, this header produced it's first nail in less than an hour from a cold start at the forge. The nail on the left is from 3/8" stock, the nail on the right if from 1/4" round stock. This is where the Blueprint would normally come to a close, but since we are among friends, I will show a photo of the header after the last nail was made. Yes, it shattered !! But I got the one nail made in that header that was required for this Blueprint. Upon reflection, I ask where the metal came from for this header. It was from that stack of drops on the far end of the work table, was the reply. Those were the pieces of leaf spring I had cut for use as plates for hardie tools. And in the haste to get the header made and a nail produced, the header was quenched from a nice low orange color directly into cold water. I have made headers from mild steel and let them cool naturally with no problems. Have two that I have used for several years now. So, choose your steel wisely and choose your quench, if a quench is even needed. I lost an hours work on this one by the wrong choice of materials. But I did get ONE nail made before it failed. View full article

Why not pull the head off the hammer and use it as a "negative" die to form the end of your drift?

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0320 Stop the Anvil's Ring by Glenn Conner Put the anvil on the traditional wood stump and it allows it to ring. This Peter Wright has been heard at 4 city blocks during the summer. Who knows how far the ring would travel during the cold dense air of fall or winter. There are several ways to reduce or deaden the ring of an anvil. We will cover some of the ways in this Blueprint. Wrap the waist of the anvil with a couple of wraps of loose chain. Put a magnet on the anvil. Put a carrage bolt into the prichel hole. Jay Close Some say putting caulk between the anvil and the anvil stand will deaden the ring. Others say sand till deaden the ring. Anywhere from an inch to several inches will do. I think it is just the sweetest sound. From a distance it's like a musical magnet and will never fail to draw me nearer. I say long live the anvil's ring and bad karma to those who want to deaden the song. Ear plugs deaden an anvil's ring...let the rest of us enjoy. Strine I found to kill the ring is to cut strips of 1 x 1/8 strips drill a hole in each end and place them on the feet then bolt them down. The same goes for a metal stand.. Hotforge101 Put a lead sheet under the anvil, roofing lead is ideal. Even a wet rag hanging on the horn will also deaden the ring . Now if you want it to sound like a church bell on the other hand, put cork sheating under it and awaight the croud of egar sight seers. It is good for attracting attention for demos or shows ect Sam Boyd I've heard hang some heavy scrap from the horn with a leather strap. Instead of a stump make a box out of heavy lumber and fill it with sand to within 2" or so of the top and set the anvil on the sand. Use some light tin, make a form around the top of the stump and pour lead into it to a depth of about a 1/2" to 1" and after it cools set the anvil on top of it. The sand first two are the ones I've heard of the most, with vering degrees of success. I've only heard of the lead from over at Keenjunk when it was still going. Richard B. Jensen I have my mousehole anvil mounted on a section of well weathered utility power pole set 20+ inches in the floor of my shop which is about 10" of packed roadmix limestone (fine stuff) over clay. The anvil sets on a 1/8" sheet of lead and is secured with long lag bolts with washers. I really don't mind the anvil ring but out of consideration for those that do mind I tried the lead sheet! It works! It could be the combination of the not so hard stump--the anvil being secure and the lead. The ring is minimal, compared to the portable stand I use it on. Jerry Carroll I use the ring deadener in the IForgeIron.com blueprint for the European style anvil. For my London pattern anvil, I use a gasket cut from an asphault shingle that is placed between the anvil and the anvil stand so that the anvil sits on the softer surface of the shingle. It deadens the ring and also levels the anvil up since the bottom of the anvil isn't exactly true and will rock on a steel plate stand without the shingle gasket. Gerald Franklin Aha this one I can answer, at least a little. For the most part Its been chains wrapped around the base part of the anvil, with a spike wedged in for tension and rubber mats either under the base of the Anvil itself or the wooden post the anvil sits on. I saw both of those types of sound deadener in Holland. Otherwise the vices are just clamped to the base as per normal, ie nails bent over or spikes. The ringing of the anvils isn't a major issue from what I can ascertain, in fact I think some of the lads like it. Plus the Anvils themselves aren't bad as far as ringing goes. I've seen Peddinghaus and a LOT of Kholswa anvils so far, will probably see more now that i'm IN Sweden. lol. As to the ringing signals, if thats not a micky take its somthing that I'll HAVE to ask the next smith I come across. I've a feeling that its somthing not many Europeans will know about, but might be wrong. I shall certainly ask, like you say an amusing tale to tell them if nothing else! Ian View full article

Welcome to the forum. There is a blacksmith's location map link on the opening page of I Forge Iron.com

IForgeIron Blueprints Copyright 2002 - 2011 IFORGEIRON, All rights reserved BP0318 Tripods by Glenn Conner The tripod was shown to me by Bill Epps, and you can not loose the pieces. Make a closed loop at the end of each of the 3 legs. Make a hook with a loop on one end the same size as the loops on the legs. Now connect the 3 legs and the hook with a ring. I have built these from 3//8" round to 1" square stock. View full article

What is the white stuff that appeared when the pipe was welded to the flat bar? What did one pipe have it and not the other? Yes, I know the answer, but someone has to ask the question.

As a teenager, I was helping my Uncle work on metal. He allowed me to use a industrial size wire bursh on a angle grinder type tool. The tool was extremely heavy and had maybe a 9" wire wheel attached. I do not remember ever seeing a grinding disc on that tool, so I assume at this point it was a wire wheel only tool. There was never a guard on the tool, we knew to be careful and were careful when it was used. Till the day my right hand holding the tool slid a bit too far foward and that wire wheel devoured the flesh on the second joint of my thumb. Still am reminded that you do not trust any wire wheel every time I look at the scar. Flat (non cupped) wire wheels do a good job on objects with contours but are not to be trusted on flat metal. Flat (non cupped) wire wheels WILL GRAB onto metal in one direction, but will slide on metal when you turn and face the other direction. This is especially true when you wire brush edges of objects. Make sure which is which and your truned the proper direction. Cup wheels do well on flat metal but not so well on objects with shape. As the wheels wear down, they start throwing wires. Like sparks from the grinder, these wire darts can travel a surprising distance. Be careful what is downrange of your work.