ThomasPowers

Yes those are leftover from forge welding the top to the bottom. You can wirebrush the face and get to work or wire brush the entire thing and gussy it up (and then probably wipe the body down with boiled linseed oil to act as a long term rust preventer) In general I don't mess with the body of my anvils; but they have been pretty nicly patinated rather than loose rust or covered with crud.. Nothing wrong with polishing it up and gold plating it if that is what *YOU* want---as long as you leave the face clear so you can work on it...

Hardening means to make more brittle as well. In general more brittle is NOT something you want an I beam to be! If you are making knives you should know about hardenable alloys and that most steel is not hardenable. Your I beam is not hardenable. You could hard face it with expensive welding rods---but may be able to *buy* an anvil for the cost of that in materials and time. Keep your eye open for a solid chunk of steel to use!

They are expensive *now* I bought them used and cheap...also remember a lot of places have the "I'm trolling for the person that has jut gotta have this book at any price" prices and you can find other copies cheaper---sometimes by a *factor* of 10!

Ahhhhhhhhgh, I feel a spasm coming on! $5 he must be *made* of money! Actually I took a bucket of ballpeens to quad-state last time I went and dumped them on a bit of canvas with a $3 choice sign and a can for the money---sold 23 of them paid for quite a bit of messed up top tools for conversion to bottom tooling for my larger anvils. Got another bucket full of US$1 ball peens...every once and a while I will go to $2 if they are handmade, very large or *special*

Yes paint on the face will preclude the ball bearing test working. How it is mounted on the base might quiet it down. You won't be able to get a good ring with a heavy layer of paint either as like the ball bearing the face paint will squish rather than the face dealing with the energy. Without stripping the paint you are looking at a pig in a poke!

I don't know what "testing it with a file" will show about hardenability Even very high carbon steels are fileable if they are annealed and are often sold that way to make machining them easier.

"Antique Iron, Survey of American and English forms 15th-19th centuries" Herbert, Peter and Nancy Schiffer has about a dozen pages of latches.

"Good thermal cycling, proper temperature control (both in the quench and the temper cycles) and good geometry are the most important factors." Worth repeating!

Why I said the market was neither deep nor wide---not a lot of people using real wrought and that's a size that cuts most of them off and not a lot of deep pockets. At $180 I'd forge weld up a stack of smaller stuff and get bragging rights for doing it thataway too! As for why it was on the farm---maybe picked up to weight implements and was probably originally from the *old* industrial base in the NE USA.

If you are used to working mild steel, spring will be a surprise as it is harder under the hammer and you do have to pay attention to not getting it too hot or forging it too cold. Why I tell folks that "practicing" making blades with mild steel isn't! I suggest that people just starting on knife forging take a good auto coilspring and have it cut down opposing sides to produce a dozen "(" pieces and then they can forge a dozen blades from the same exact steel and learn how it works and then learn how to heat treat it and TEST the results.

which in case the link is removed is #134 under the i-forge section at anvilfire.com Which books do you have? As I recall there is a number of latches in the big "Early American Wrought Iron" Sonn I'll check when I get home tonight.

I think I can see the grain which is not very fine; but that could be just not seeing the break just the top of it. Can you post a picture of the break not the side of the knife? Did you normalize?

I have noticed that some people automatically discount rebound where there is no ring---did the bounce test on two anvils with very close results and they rated the loud one as harder even when it was slightly less in the objective test results. Having a bunch of different anvils helps this kind of testing.

got a smile as I considered "longer blades" as they get quite long at times, I'd love to see Charles wearing a claymore sideways in back... I sheath as they will be used: cross draw, straightdraw, did a few wrist sheathes...when I was lacking in feck I used to carry a nato model BCK using an ace bandage to hold it on the forearm when travelling in "iffy" places. Now I tend to avoid such travel and such hassels Tom Maringer had a neat clamshell kydex shoulder rig for his vorpal knives.

You can buy fireclay at masonry supply places and find mix recipes on the net. When I've clayed I've used creek clay mixed with sand and ashes, rammed it in and gone back with a mallet as it dried closing up cracks. Nowadays I generally use adobe as I have that to hand. For my current coal forge I don't clay as it's an all steel construction and so doesn't crack like cast iron.

A differential temper will give you a blade with a harder edge than spine. A differential hardening will give you an edge harder than a spine and the spine may be softer than you get drawing BUT THEY BOTH HAVE AN EDGE HARDER THAN THE SPINE---A SIMPLE HARDNESS TEST ACROSS THE BLADE SHOWS THIS QUITE WELL!

You don't want to mix coal and cooking over an open fire; but working with wood/coals you can do both. I generally separate the two as having the fire further away is a lot less smoky and I just transfer hot coals to the forging area; but as mentioned you can work with a campfire and just have a section on the side with the air blast that you rake hot coals over to. The keyhole mentioned is a good idea and if building a chimney put the "fire" by it and the "forge" away from it as a charcoal forge does not make smoke but a fire does!

if your charcoal is smoking you don't have fully charred charcoal---often sold that way for cooking where they want a "smoke" flavour---especially mesquite charcoal. Fully charred charcoal does not smoke.

They may be trying to hunt down someone who still remembers the "old days"! I once ran across a fellow who had worked at one of the anvil makers in Columbus OH, USA right at the end---he mentioned that when they shut down there was a line of anvils along the top of the bank of the river next to it-----I hiked in to take a look to see if any had made it down to the riverbed; but didn't find any. Did find a dozen or so of the large natural sandstone grinding wheels they used and used to roll down into the river when they got too small----3-4' diameter and 1' thick being too small...

What's the grain like in your breaks? What are you quenching it in? What temperature are you quenching it at? All stages of heat treat affect the toughness of a blade.

Well the bottom level for WI seems to be about US$1 a pound. In more easily worked sizes I've seen it go for up to $6 per pound---but I've always considered that excessive as I usually buy mine at 20 cents a pound at the scrap yard. Might check out places like http://www.oldglobewood.com/real-wrought-iron.html to see how they are pricing it As I recall they were starting out high for the small stuff and getting a lot cheaper for the big stuff. I don't consider a chop saw as "efficient" for cutting 3.5" rod; a horizontal bandsaw where you could set it and leave it and it would turn itself off at the end of the cut is efficient! I might be interested in a chunk to make some early medieval anvils from depending on price.

I doubt a cage will be high carbon; it's only used where it's absolutely needed; best it might be would be a chrome moly medium carbon and quite likely mild steel.

Howdy; I started smithing back when i lived in OKC---and look where it's gotten me today! I've heard a lot of good things about the Salt Fork group; we used to carpool to meetings back in Ohio; more fun and less money when it was a 2 hour drive...they might be able to hook you up with someone in your area.

Might communicate with the company and ask.

so about 33 pounds a foot for 3.5" rod and will fit in a USPS flat rate box. Do you have an efficient method of cutting it?