ThomasPowers

Find someone else watching and solicit questions from them---particularly if there are kids there. Howdy; I know that this rope looks like it's there to protect me from y'all; but did you have a question about what I'm doing or blacksmithing? Or start explaining what you are doing to someone and ignore the bore.

More like duck than chicken! Making renaissance cooking tools for someone researching renaissance cooking can result in some very nice meals. (The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi, 1570, has nice woodcuts of cooking equipment in it)

I've eaten peacock a couple of times on campouts but never built one before

Hay Budden. they have a quite distinctive "hourglass" indentation on the bottom

Going to visit my wife; working a 14 hour day, spending too much time on the computer...the usual

Yes, lower temper temp suggested. also note that you can get to a mirror polish just with silicon carbide paper and a block of wood. It just takes a long time.

Length of work life is also a factor---remember that when Social Security was set up in the USA 65 was more of a stretch goal and if you made that the number of years after that tended to be pretty low. Of course they also started earlier in olden times. For the pictorial sources I suggested you would have to come up with a way of estimating weights, assuming that the artists had a pretty good take on relative sizes. Anything in Richardson's "Practical Blacksmithing" on hammer weights; my copy seems to be at my other house. (along with a couple of early 1900's books I can check but maybe too late for your paper. Farm Shop Practice, Mack M. Jones, 1939 states "A blacksmiths hand hammer weighing 1 1/2 or 2 lb. and another weighing 3 or 3 1/2 lb. will handle all ordinary work very satisfactorily." pg 203 (it also states that a 100 to 125 lb. anvil is good and "Anvils are of two general grades: cast iron and steel. Steel anvils are much better and should be used if they can be afforded."

If it takes a straight edge to see the sway then it will not be an issue for almost all types of forging and an advantage to some---straightening knives is easier with just a tad bit of sway. For a lot of ornamental work even fairly massive sway is no problem. However it is a negotiating tool to try to get a better price. Unfortunately it does drive some folks to do foolish things like mill the face of their anvil which can destroy it's usefulness far more than a bit of sway does!

Ask them what the bottom looks like would probably be the fastest way to narrow it down as to which brand; but the ball bearing test is the key; far better a no name with good bounce than top brand with no bounce (usually due to surviving a fire or welding or machining by a previous owner)

What does the bottom look like? Have you done the ball bearing test? Any discernable writing on the sides?

So if you edit your profile you can put in a *general* location; see mine for example---I have 2 locations!

About 5 miles right over thataway they have a pile of them... Don't know what COUNTRY you are in so I can't make good suggestions for YOUR situation. When I lived in Arkansas, USA, we used to get them from food processing plants----you want to be sure that what was previously in them won't be toxic! When I lived in Ohio, USA, there was a company around Columbus that would buy them, "flame clean them" and then re-sell them. Here in Texas/New Mexico I would go to one of the many "We buy scrap" places for one. (And be careful to choose one that didn't have pesticides or *bad* chemicals in it's previous life.)

I never use water with my charcoal forge---but then it's tweaked to burn charcoal and not set up as a coal forge burning charcoal---sort of like trying to use diesel in a gas engine! I don't have charcoal spread all over the forge to catch fire. I have a trough between large firebricks that I add charcoal to as needed. I also use as little air as possible; definitely hand cranked or bellows! Look at how a wash tub forge is set up; or the asian one Weygers shows in his book

I suggest you look into meehanite then as it's a type of cast iron used extensively for brake drums

Meehanite was common for brake drums

312 *should* be the weight and as an American anvil it's NOT in CWT; so 312 pounds.

You could probably tig up a blade out of razor blades; though I'd be very quiet about it to avoid the neighbors finding out and arranging for a long state sponsored holiday in a room with padded walls... And like was mentioned I'd weld on any blades with definite pre and post heats done. Seems it would be a lot harder than forge welding.

Look at the size of hammers in "the Forgers" by Goya IIRC. Sledges for large work could be quite heavy. Hammers for small work could range all over the place. Look in De Re Metallica and in the Hausbuchs cf http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/index.php?do=page&mo=8 I'll take a look at what Monxon mentions Anything in Diderot's Enclyclopedia? There was a source I unfortunately didn't get nailed down and now can't locate that was on iron age smith graves durch den Alpen IIRC, (in German of course) that would be interesting and of course Shire Books "Egyptian Metalworking and Tools"

We were just worried about the mad man part---most of us work with steel from 1500 degF to 2300 degF on a regular basis---but molten steel scares us! You drop a yellow hot piece of steel and it politely heads toward the ground allowing you to get out of the way. Molten steel can not only splash but *ANY* water around can cause it to chase you down the hall! Hyperbole I know but I do know of people who spent months in the hospital after a single drop of sweat fell into a mold they were getting ready to pour. (and steel is on the upper end of HOT for hobby melting) Market for Large chunks of tool steel is there too, just not as big, though hammer head stock of known alloy will find buyers! (Harder to ship too so delivery/sales at a conference is a help)

Lots of buffalo hunters carried kitchen knives back in the day.

HOWEVER: if you do have access to a lot of tool steels at very good prices, there is an active market re-selling to blacksmiths either on-line or at conferences! I generally buy knife, (1095, O-1) or tooling (H13, S7) grade steel every time I get to a conference. I once advised a fellow who had access to S-1, (broken pharmaceutical punches). To take a 5 gallon bucket or two to a conference and sell them for WAY MORE THAN SCRAP! He did very well as they were a good alloy in a very easily worked size and shape---I've used several to make tools from myself.

Your basic understanding is fairly wrong to start with. Such steels can have good properties or worse than normal properties depending on alloying, heat treatment, design and handling. Historically they were used to deal with problems with plain steels of those historic periods. Steels have improved a lot in the last 1000 years. (think of comparing a chariot with a modern battle tank...even a chariot built with modern components). Unfortunately a LOT of HYPE is out there trying to convince people to buy things for other reasons than reality. I suggest you learn what makes a good knife and then apply that to specific pattern welded and monosteel blades and select the ones that best suit your use cases---of which "being pretty" is a valid component.

where's the woodstove?

Anybody in your neck of the woods used natural gas forced air furnaces? Over here many of the high efficiency ones use a blower for exhaust. When they get junked it's usually not the blower that was bad and you can get a used one from a HVAC company's bone pile if you are persuasive...

drop a dome headed bolt in the excess bolt hole put a washer and nut on the bottom and git on down the road! A telephone doesn't burn any gas; perhaps they will extend service out where you are soon---I have it in rural NM and make a lot of use of it as the "big city" is close to 100 miles away and so I don't want to make a trip till I know it will be a successful trip.