ThomasPowers

Most stuff from that era came with at least a Q&D coating to avoid rusting during shipment. Have to see if Postman wrote anything about it as I no longer have access ton the fellow who used to work in the anvil manufacturers in Columbus OH---I moved 1500 miles away and I believe he died in the intervening 20 years...

Good price for your needs GRAB IT NOW! I like the bike chain drive idea too

If you don't have much retained austentite you don't get much from it; though some folks do it for the "hype".

Rather do 2000 reps with a hammer than 25 reps with a set of weights myself---the bending jigs is a good use!

Mount it at the proper height for you. Now walk straddling it from the horn end. Still want a sharp pointed horn? Make a hardy tool for small items, you'll want it higher anyway!

That was our joke---it rained every day we were in Wales; but as the train crossed over into England the sun broke through the clouds and was nice for our one day in London prepping to fly back to the states...

Where? (You might add your general location to your profile so if some smith closer stumbles across this site they can see that they should get in touch with you.)

So forged any of that yet?

It's a bit light for a main shop anvil; but an excellent size for one that will travel to demos, get moved around, etc. Not knowing what type of smithing you plan to do makes asking us rather like me asking you "Should I buy the Prius or the pickup truck"? If you plan to do large things like gates you probably will want a larger anvil sometime in the future. For most regular sized knives that would do you for a long time. For small ornamental work it would be fine; for toolmaking it's a bit on the light size...etc and usw! You are in an area that anvils are more expensive in. That is a good brand anvil in quite good condition, (barring the results of the ball bearing test and tapping to see if any hidden flaws exist.) Can you get any basic tools thrown in on the deal? A hardy and a couple of pairs of tongs and a decent hammer to get you started would make the price more tempting...A leg vise would *really* make it sound better! I must admit that until recently I had more hours on my 93# anvil than I did on my 515# anvil as the small one went to lots of day long demos; where as I only got a couple of hours a week on the big one between making a living and the honey-do's...

Lots of gaps there how are you overlapping the links? Jump cutting or manually afterwards. I am sure you know this already but both those examples are 90 degrees rotated from how they should be in a shirt. When I did my shirt back in 1980 I made up a bunch of closed rings and strung them on a piece of wire and then everywhere they overlapped I put in the next link---a lot easier and faster than working the other ends where you have to fiddle and think.

Oh come on Frank; Lottawatta Road is right by Lake Eufaula (as Eufaula in you getta wet!) I used to work in the oilpatch in OK and one branch of my family is from there---Got a cousin, Guy Barefoot, still out there (actually got a slew of relations, Altus, Muskogee,... . Anyway WELCOME! Come on in the Heat is *fine*! OK is where I started forging back in 1981.

Now *that's* an idea; however unless you are doing large work you may not want that thing kicking that much heat into your shop 8/10ths of the year in OK---might be nice in the dead of winter.

Yup the indents are for mounting the swageblock vertically. That's a true beauty---gussy it up (red, black, dark green,...) and paint the letters in gold! Didn't get to my stand last night as my student was more interested in forging. Now for a tale of woe---out at a VoTech on the east side of OKC they were using a swageblock stand to mount their anvil too---with the swage block still in place! To make it easier to move around someone had torched the interior out of the swageblock leaving only a couple of inch rim around the outside edges. Saw this back in the early 1980's when they were doing some machining work for me.

Why I want closed screened boxes to store my stuff in. They are quite common out here---last spider round up my daughter did she counted over 30 of them just around the outside of our house and their webs are all over my shop---I try to never put my hand where I can't see it without a glove on, (and beat out the gloves before donning.)

Will it work for what you want it to do? Don't ask us without telling us "what you want it to do". It looks to be in good shape. It does look like it's missing one set of speed up gears; You could make a pulley set up fairly easily to mount in that top hole and drive the lower shaft if you are the tinkering sort. Definitely a point to negotiate a high price downward as it's not complete and original---you can see the wear tracing of the top part around the hole!

They are just butted

And looks so period for medieval work!

Most anvil forgers cleaned up the steam hammer marks on the underside of the heel but Arm and Hammer did not and so that's one way to recognize them if the stampings are gone. (BTW made in Columbus OH)

Almost always cast iron---casting steel is several times more expensive than casting iron so if they are cast it's pretty certain it's CI. Uses: weights for tool stands, gluing weights, toys for kids... not a lot of smithing uses for cast iron.

Don't think my 515# Fisher will fit on the stand I have; why-for you use a runt fluidsteel?

My project at work has both centers in Germany and in Chile; I can order a beer in either place!

Sand cast is the traditional method and used even to this day for many CI items. In the 1990's Patrick got us a tour of the steel casting company in Columbus OH and they were doing arc melting and casting steel into sand molds.

If the hot spot in your firepot is inside the pot then you need a smaller firepot or more coal and air blast to get the fire up over the top so you can stick steel in horizontally. In General you want a deep pile of coal so that all of the oxygen is consumed before it gets to the work. Many beginners work in a way too shallow fire. At times people will bend a piece to get a certain area into the hot spot especially if the piece is odd shaped and large for the forge being used. If you have access to firebrick you can try to place a layer of it in the bottom of your current firepot using wood ashes as a loose mortar and move your tuyere to the top of the layer of brick and see if that helps. If it does you may want to track down some fireclay and make the change permanent. So far your English is fine; much better than my Spanish and German!

You can always ask a refrigeration repair place about scrap pieces of silver brazing rods as they use them as of the last time I consulted one. I have this heavy set of brazing tongs but will probably never use them. Frank; getting rid of stuff??? Just remember that I am *down hill* of you!!!!!!

In general it depends on the type of work you are doing---welding up 1x1" x 6" billets is most efficiently done in a different sized firepot than working 2" round stock which is different than working 1/4" sq stock, etc. When I teach pattern welding I always have the students start with a billet sized for their forge so they can learn the process before they have to deal with multiple welding heats over a piece longer than their forge's hot spot for example. Solid fuel is a bit more forgiving in that you can heap it high, blow it strongly and stick bigger things into the resultant hot spot. I've been known to take a pickaxe and dig a large trench forge in the back yard for certain projects or make a micro forge for others. You can also stack fire bricks to downsize the fire; but then have to be more careful about over blowing it. Commercial firepots are a compromise and even then you could buy anything from a table top farriers forge that will fit entirely in a ruck sack to a "RR forge" 4' on a side with a firebrick lined bed. I've also read of 19th century shipbuilding where they would build a huge coke fire on the floor of the factory to heat up big chunks of iron they were going to weld together as part of the ship's frame. So can you describe exactly what you are trying to do, with exactly what and how it seems to be failing in your opinion?