JimDawdy

Interesting article with nice pictures on the forging of new armor for the Vatican's Swiss Guard, by a family of Austrian blacksmiths that has been in existence since the year 1350 (that kind of tradition just boggles my mind).

http://photoblog.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/22/16641319-beefing-up-security-blacksmiths-forge-new-suit-of-armor-for-bulkier-vatican-guards?lite

The blacksmiths are Schmiede Schmidberger, http://www.schmiede-schmidberger.at/schmidberger/index.htm

Nice little photoessay of a blacksmith in Russia making a candlestick holder.

From the website "English Russia":

http://englishrussia...nds/#more-98677

No handling holes and a thick heel---definitely cast something!

What does the spark test say about the base and face?

Casting looks too rough for most of the "name brand" cast steel anvils.

Trenton's tend to have much thinner heels, handling holes and the pellet indent in the base

I hope it was cheap! did you do the ball bearing test on if before you bought it or was the face painted too?

(I live in Lemitar; but with taking off a week and a half to go to Quad-State I couldn't make it to the auction---anything good?)

I also expect to see some of the mexican re-casts of "good" anvils to start showing up cleaned up and masquerading as the originals sometime...

definitely looks cast iron, the cast pasting line is a dead give away under the horn. also the pitting on the sides and bottom is pitting from the casting, not rust pitting

Picked up this anvil at a farm auction in Socorro, NM for $140. It had at least three layers of paint on it (talk about a painted lady!), but didn't appear to be cast iron (there were a couple of Mexican cast iron anvils for sale....pretty awful looking).

I managed to get the majority of the paint off, but cannot find any makers marks. There appears to be a large defect on one side- maybe from a cutting torch?

Any idea who made this anvil? Looks a bit like some Trentons, and I understand that defective anvils were sometimes sold unmarked. It weighs around 150lbs.


Jim

If the clay gets old, you can also make up some lead bar stock fairly easily (probably using the clay for a mold to pour your led into!). She should be able to shape the lead without too much difficulty.

Just be sure to have her wear gloves when handling the lead, and wash thoroughly afterwards.

ASM International is having a class "Metallurgy for the Non Metallurgist" in Beechwood, Ohio Sep. 13-17.
Cost is $1,989

http://www.asminternational.org/portal/site/www/AsmStore/ProductDetails/?vgnextoid=62c0b2a3bc249210VgnVCM100000621e010aRCRD

(No affiliation with this organization, just thought it might be of interest to some on the forum)

I think I can help shed some light on this- one of the benefits of marrying a girl from Kazakhstan

Here is a link to a video (in Russian, unfortunately) and some pictures of his shop in Bukhara. He has apparently turned it into a bit of a blacksmithing museum- which, if you have ever spent any time in Central Asia, is pretty amazing. However, according to the text in the link, Shokir Kamalov is the 6th generation of blacksmiths in his family and is considered a Master Smith, having many certificates for his accomplishments.


http://stan.tv/news/3860/?REID=dlf2r6pps03mog16g4egm3d420
Click on the small box with a word that looks like BHDEO200 for some video from a documentary of Kamalov, which shows that amazing forge in action.


Jim

I had to share this discovery with everyone.
I'm still stunned by how beautiful this forge is.

This picture is of Shokir Kamalov, a master smith in Bukhara, and his forge.
I found out about this from one of my wife's craft magazines.
This master blacksmith is famous for his hand crafted bird-shaped scissors.
A forge space like that can't be anything but INSPIRING.
I'm in complete forge-envy.

Ok, caveat- I Is A Rank Amateur, with virtually no experience blacksmithing.

However, thanks to some help from Pep Gomez, I did get my Centaur Forge (an older, custom job, but basically exactly the same as on their web page) lit (yeah!) and I noticed that the 3 feet of 8" chimney pipe I stuck on the hood DID draw quite a bit of smoke.

There was still a lot of smoke escaping from under the hood, esp. with the blower going. But in my inexperienced opinion, the chimney and hood combo did help.

Hood seems virtually useless without some sort of chimney.

does anyone have experience on how well the hoods that centaur forge sells work?

do they draw ok?

thanks

rb

Looks Russian.

http://www.anvilfire.com/21centbs/products/ru_anvil/index.php

I bought a brand new cast steel anvil on ebay.com.au. It arrived during this week and I just finished making a stand out of 8"x2".
It has a very nice ring.
The hardy hole is 22mm and the pritchel hole is 20 mm cast through. I had to strip the paint off the beak which I did with a flap disk in my baby grinder.
I am very happy.

Yes, I emailed the owner about that anvil, but never received a reply. Was going to drive up to ABQ and get it if still available.

SWABA demo's the entire NM State Fair in Albuquerque during daylight hours on the Street of Yesteryear. If you visit the fair please stop by and say Hi!

I don't know which days I will be there yet; but there is always a *great* crew doing stuff.

Is there any smithing stuff you are on the look out for? Albq CraigsList just had a russian cast steel anvil for $50 recently and I find stuff on a semi regular basis.

Thomas
President SWABA

Hi Thomas

I would like to, but I work at the Fire Dept until 2pm on Saturday. However I plan to attend the demonstration in September at Ben LoBue's.

Jim; will you be attending the SWABA meeting this Saturday in Las Cruces? Great place to meet some of the local smiths!

http://www.swaba-abana-chapter.org/

I lived in Romania for a couple of years, and still maintain a lot of close ties with friends there. A search of google led me to a photojournal essay on Romanian blacksmiths "Of Iron and Men | Portrayals of Romanian blacksmiths"
by photographer Sorin Onisor.

The photography is outstanding.

Check out the pictures at

http://www.photojournale.com/categories.php?cat_id=119

Hello the forum.

38 year old paramedic living in Deming, NM. I'll be attending the Gunter's school in Moriarty in August. Slowly converting a garage and old brick barbecue set up into a forge/workshop!

Regards
Jim