marcusb

Any portable band sawmill's in your area? They could square that up for you in a few seconds time on the mill.

I have found two things to help greatly with charcoal, Pile it deep and use less air than you think you need.

Flat pulley with slack belt worked well for most other hammers of the era.

In my neck of the woods, to get a rigger to show up its 2k plus....... Have any neighbors that farm? If they have a 50 hp or better tractor with a loader it would handle it. Drain the sand out, hook it above the balance point, and off to the trailer. Its not like we are talking 10 tons here.

480 CFM for the 1500 pounder at 80 psi. According to my 4th edition pocket reference

IIRC the Late Great Grant Sarver started out with one. There might be some nuggets of info in his posts.

Sure is, Nice Williams and White I pulled out of aluminum plant back in July.

He's being generous, it is a Fisher.......

I have worked on concrete, dirt, sand, wood and crushed stone. Concrete kills the body, sand kills the machines, wood (not end grain) burns, dirt can be messy.I have found crushed stone to be a great compromise. That's what I have now, and love it. Only drawback is you cannot move heavy objects around as easily, but that can be overcome with overhead lifting options or in my case, a tractor with a lifting boom. I have poured concrete under my hammer, and as a vise base etc. Very economical and low maintenance. Just my solution over the years, I hope you find yours, good luck.

My wife was taking pictures of our son playing in the snow, so I convinced her to take a picture of my next hammer project as it takes up space in my driveway. Anyone else have a project setting around waiting for warmer weather?

From the shop

add to this most forged anvils are not all that level to start with, we might be on to something! A little vibration and that scale just slides right off! To make it go farther down the rabbit hole, did they make them crooked to facilitate the scale sliding off or...was it the loose tolerance of steam hammers and eyeball measurements. The world may never know.......

I have also read this passage and gave it some thought and experiment. I tried it and found no real migration of scale. Only thing I did not try was heavy striking, and I think that is were this would actually have some benefit. English pattern anvils are pretty much tuning forks, and the harder you hit them the more they vibrate.I think anvils have it pretty easy compared to the old days . Now days we use a 2 pound hammer on a 300 pound anvil etc. I suspect this is why the scale did not migrate much when I tried it. My "test" was with 300 and 500 pound forged steel anvils but only with 4 pound or lighter hammer. On a related note, I use a blacker in my shop. The anvil is cast and has no ring, just a dull thud. I have found if I have the power turned up much and its not tightly clamped at the base, it will jump if forging in the center, and rock if using the hardy tools. Makes the scales move around for sure, although its concerning to see a 500 pound anvil bouncing off its base!