stuartthesmith2

I took some pics in my shop this week, of my anvils. The larger one is my 700 lb. Hay Budden. The smaller pic is of my 400lb. Fisher. Having never been abused, both of these anvils are in excellent shape, even though I have been pounding steel on them since the 1970's. ENJOY! The pic of the fisher also shows the tail end of my 300 lb. Peter Wright.

dragon, because the turbine at the top of my stovepipes is 12 inches in diameter, and the 45 foot high stovepipe is also 12 inches in diameter(my shop is in the basement of a huge cowbarn), a turbine that big draws the living daylights out of smoke, even though the pipes rise 45 feet high. After two right angle bends of this 12 inch pipe reach my cowl, believe it or not, the front of the cowl is approximately 30 inches above the forge, and it still draws like a vaccuum. "drawability" of a forge-cowl-stovepipe setup seems to be solely contingent upon how big the turbine is at the top of the pipes. Make absolutely sure that the turbine rises at least 3 feet over the peak of the roof. If you want, next week, I can take pictures of my stovepipes going up the side of my barn. One more thing.....my stovepipes are held by brackets up the side of my barn which have 8 inches of clearance from the side of the wooden barn, because they draw so well, the stovepipes get HOT!!!!!!!!!!! This precludes the pipes getting so hot that they catch your barnboards on fire.

the original rheostats on buffalo and champion forges are extremely hard to come by. I have an extra rheostat for my large champion forge, but I dare not sell it for fear that the one I am currently using might fail on me. If you want, I acquire numerous blacksmith tools, which I restore as a sideline to my tool forging business, and can find you a rheostat for your forge if I beat the bushes hard enough. As far as the cowl is concerned, I made an humongous error when my last cowl burned out from decades of use. I tossed the old cowl, without cutting a piece of cardboard as a pattern to make a new one. Big mistake! I went to my local junkyard, and cut my hands to shreds while trial-and-erroring a new cowl out of sheet metal and a pair of tinsnips, along with a pop riveter. I had to do this, after talking to that guy on ebay who sells cowls, when he told me that there is no easy way to ship a large cowl. I actually cut my hands so badly making my new cowl, that I had cuts on the BACKS of both hands! When this new one that I made eventually burns out in about a decade, trust me, I will save the pieces, to use them as a pattern for the next cowl! Let me let you in on a little secret I discovered. It is an old chinese trick to make your cowl draw ALL the smoke out of your shop. Conventional cowls, attached to a smokestack, sometimes do not draw all the smoke. After going to a chinese restaurant, and seeing their vent hoods, I had an epiphany. They afix a turbine to the top of the ventpipes. When the wind blows, these turbines catch the wind like a sail on a ship, creating a vortex in your stovepipe, which sucks the smoke right out!. In my shop, with two giant forges, one cannnot sniff ONE IOTA of smoke in my shop. With turbines afixxed atop both vent pipes, both of my forges draw like a vaccuum cleaner, keeping my shop smoke free!

because I manufacture tools, I have a manufacturer's rep who I pay a percentage to, while he markets the tools that I make. This saves a lot of time and energy marketing my business.

decent boston craigslist anvil My link

fair to middling anvil for sale on craigslist joplin missouri at a reasonable price My link

there is a live auction this week in lexington, ohio, run by gebhardt auction service which has a 157 pound NICE hay budden

york pennsylvania craigslist excellent looking deal My link

interesting anvil ad on del rio texas craigslist My link

beautiful looking what appears to be a peter wright in wausau, wisconsen on craigslist My link

nice looking craigslist triphammer in rochester new york My link

nice looking craigslist hay budden in atlanta My link

I recently thinned my "herd", as a favor to another member of IFI. I had a similar decision to make. Because I prefer hay buddens to peter wrights, I ended up vending a very nice peter wright to someone who needed it. Decisions, decisions!

I "test drove" an iron kiss at a PABA forge-in, nice hammer!

nice looking bargain anvil in roanoke, va on craigslist My link

this is on atlanta craigslist, it looks like a hay budden, not perfect but a bargainMy link

Nice anvils, my friend!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A 1899 110 pound Trenton with the name stamped upside down: A 1925 Soderfors weighing 135 pounds.

CONGRATULATIONS! I know the thrill of the hunt, I have a 700 lb hay budden and a story about purchasing it as big as the anvil!

some guy named steve in taunton, massachusetts has on craigslist a 300 lb peter wright in fair to middling condition for the cheap price of 300 dollars...My link

albany, new york craiglist....nice looking anvil at a bargain priceMy link

some guy on craigslist has three anvils for sale......in saint louis... My link

this is an EMERGENCY..............some guy in cleveland has a nice looking 118 pound anvil on ebay for fifty bucks............he has to get rid of it by monday, because he is moving..............this is on cleveland craigslist!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

there is a lil giant trip hammer for sale today, a fifty pounder, in des moines, iowa for 2K. this is a craigslist listing

For the western contingent of smiths, there is an excellent Fairbanks 200 lb hammer for sale on craigslist in salt lake city,utah. It is listed under "powerhammers". For one thousand dollars, it is an excellent deal. I used a fairbanks for five years while serving my apprenticeship, it is a tough, hard hitting hammer!

I test drove one of his iron kiss hammers at a meeting of PABA(pennsylvania artist blacksmith) meeting. That hammer is EXCELLENT!