VaughnT

Using that bucket as a stand was absolutely brilliant. Little things like that really make my day because I would have probably spent a week just trying to fabricate a light-holding stand for the project!

It'd be great to help them set up a smithy so they could make and refurbish a lot of their own stuff. Maybe design some kind of hand-forged dove trap to save wear and tear on the trigger finger??? :D

Sounds like a good score. All you need to do is fix that mounting bracket and make up a quickie spring, and that vise will be good as new.

Good to see Philip getting some air time. I thought it was hilarious that he asked her what her name was! The neat thing about Philip's work is that it wasn't extremely complicated. If you look at the individual pieces, you occasionally run into a sharp 90º bend but most of his work was curves and scrolls set into a body that was just straight bars. It's very inspirational to know that you don't have to do complicated works (and have all that skill and tooling) to have your work appreciated.

Arkie, he was hammering into the channel on the side of his railroad track anvil. He used that one bit of track for a marking table, cutting table, anvil, and swage block!

Here's a great video on how a guy in Haiti is able to cut, punch, shape and rivet.... to end up with a large stove. Very post-apocalyptic. Of course, Haiti has never been pre-apocalyptic. Minimal skills/experience needed and the short video amply demonstrates how every movement needs to be done. With a better smithing shop than they have, you should be able to knock out a similar stove in under a day.

I've seen them called 'farrier vises", but I don't know if that's the main idea behind the design. They are great for hot work that requires a fast clamping so you don't lose much heat. I've love to have one. If it works well and all the parts are there, it would definitely be worth $100 or so.

Deivi, there's no way to tell what alloy your 'found' springs are made from. They'll be a high-carbon steel, but that's all you can assume unless you want to send a sample off for testing. Springs on leg vises don't need to be high-carbon. Mild steel works fine. You can cold-bend mild steel without any worries in this application because you aren't bending far. No need for tempering anything.

Great find. Just about the only anvil I'd ever retire my Fisher for......

Nice design. Certainly stout enough to get the job done!

You don't need to remove the anvil from the stump to move the whole contraption in and out of the shop. You can buy a cheap hand-truck from Lowe's or Home Depot for around $20, and probably get one cheaper at a yard sale. Hand-trucks come in mighty handy for a lot of other things, too. Or, you can turn your stump into a hand-truck by making a removable wheel/axle set up that can be quickly mounted to the bottom on one side. Firmly fixe a piece of 1/2" black pipe to the stump so you can slide an axle through it. Screw the wheels onto the end of the axle, or cotter pin them in place. A similar pipe attached higher on the stump will hold the handle extensions. It's been done a lot and there are a bunch of pictures of it on the net. This example is very simple, though I would have used much larger wheels and placed them so they are on the sides of the stump. Gotta use what you got, though. A 200lb anvil/stump GVWR is easy as pie to move with a hand-truck, and I'm an old man! With the Anvil firmly fixed to the stump with some silicone and spikes, you could roll her all over the place and not worry a bit about it. Don't overthink the problem.

I wouldn't bother with the chain and lags. Chain around the waist gets in the way when you're doing a bend sometimes, and just adds more to the whole system. Instead, allow the silicone to do its thing. It will silence the anvil like you won't believe, but it will also glue it into place rather well. I actually used masonry adhesive because that's what I had. A good beginner project would be to forge a few simple, but elegant, spikes that will hold the anvil in position and look good doing it.

Frog, I saw a mirror similar to what you've come up with, though a lot smaller and mass-produced. The thing I thought was neat was that they etched designs into the bevel. The design didn't stand out and take over the look, but it was still a neat accent. I think a mirror of that size will come in very handy around the house. What type of support mechanism are you considering? I'm thinking a simple nail in the wall might not be enough. Maybe a cleat?

I would dearly love to get one of those beauties with the stepped feet and angled side face. I don't have any use for yet another anvil, but those babies are just so incredibly "anvil-ish" that I want one! They look like something you'd find in a dwarven smithy.

I was thinking the same thing. You'd need some kind of blower on the chimney to get the smoke going, and probably to keep the smoke going. I don't see the natural draft of a chimney being good enough to get the smoke moving down that first part of the exhaust. I'm guessing you could tie into your forge blower if you use one with enough horsepower to spare and wanted to fab up a junction that was adjustable.

Yep. Never hang the triangle from anything but soft cord. Leather works well, but rots fast. I prefer gutted parachute cord in a brown color because it looks like leather, but lasts.

Patrick, had the same thing happen to me a few years ago. The only thing I could figure I was doing, was bringing the sledge down overtop of the hardy hole instead of half-hammer blows around the perimeter. This directed all of the energy into driving the metal down the hole, extruding it unintentionally. Rounded edges on the hardy hole only helped the process. You obviously need to hit directly over the hardy hole, but I've found that judicious use of a straight peen to move the metal sideways, as well as half-hammer blows, makes for a big difference in the amount of extrusion.

Anyone have an idea how many CFM your blower would need to make a downdraft hood work well? You couldn't just hook it to a standard chimney, could you?

That's a really nice set up you have, Randy. A lot of folks thing the fire pot is a necessity, but it sure isn't. It's helpful in a lot of ways, but not having a fire pot is equally nice because you can change the shape and size of the fire with a few bricks. Love the wheels!

Ausfire, have you checked the selection over at oldworldanvils.com? The guy's got a stellar reputation and more than a few beauties in the stable. He imports them from europe, so he's familiar with packaging anvils for overseas travel. Just a thought.

Does it have to be HB or PW? Fisher makes a mighty good anvil - not that I'm biased or anything! :D I'll keep my eyes peeled for ya.

Regular ol' nails make great rivets and you can get them in a variety of sizes. There was a video around here somewhere that showed some Haitian (?) guys using them to fab cooking stands. Can't get much cheaper than a box of nails, and then you only have to cut them to length and peen the one end. Copper and brass work plenty well. The reaction between the two metals is super slow and certainly nothing I'd worry about. Even in an humid environment, you're probably looking at 50 years of solid service.

100 miles north of you.... and you don't consider that right next door? How much more local do you expect them to get? Go get it!

I'd go with plain steel bolts and spray paint them with brass metal paint. Anodizing the bolts will also work and is easy to do. It's just reversing the polarity on your electrolysis rust removal set-up. Blacksmithbolt.com sells square head machine bolts for a dollar ten a piece. Wouldn't be too pricey even with the cost of a can of spray paint. If you go with the bolt-head showing, it will look like the ring is bolted to the wall.

Another option is to cut a v-notch into the jaws so you can hold square stock. This allows you to reach around the head of a railroad spike without taking up a lot of room on the shank.