ThomasPowers

Piker! I drive out to Quad-State from New Mexico fairly regularly---with no cruise control or air conditioning! (about 1500 miles each way). Of course I stop by the grandkids in AR and OH on the way...

I'd weld on a couple of side spacers and then put an extension to make it a saddle for your anvil and skip the chains---perhaps a could of big wing bolts to hold it to the anvil; but I'd more likely run a piece back to the hardy hole leaving it over the sweet spot but keeping it from moving back and forth with the side extensions covering the other axis. But yes, I'd like one too ifn I could afford it!

You are in an area where they are fairly common; try for them out in NM where the population density was *WAY* less back in the heyday of smithing!

One of the neat things about the cole drill is that *you* can apply much more pressure on it that a standard drill. A common demo is to drill a hole in a leafspring---at the original temper! I used mine to drill 1/2" holes in 1/2" steel when setting up a post vise stand

May I suggest you actually look at how they did decorate their axes and do that! The Mammen Axe is probably the most famous example. I don't recall any "Norse" axes having the exact shape of yours---the gullet notch in particular, can you share with us the one it was based on?

May I suggest you find a nice automotive coil spring for FREE and use it instead of the rebar? Much nicer steel to work with. From your drawings I assume you want to be able to fuller down the center of long objects (blades?). I would take a nice length of round stock from a straightened spring, bend double a bit closer to one end than the other. Forge the bent section to fit your hardy Then bend the bottom piece to sit flat on the anvil face Then make a 90 degree turn a ways out from the hardy and still flat on the anvil face. Space the top piece with a gap over the bottom piece but with the same configuration Round the ends of the bent 90 pieces so they won't make marks in use. The longer they are away from the hardy the "bouncier" they are for both good---easy to hammer and bad---more prone to offsets Normalize the entire thing. However by asking this question it seems like you are wanting to jump to more complex smithing without getting the basics in. Much more frustrating and *slower* way to learn stuff as the simple mistakes keep cropping up to mess up the more complex stuff that has their own issues you should be able to concentrate on.

Postman has documented over 200 different English Anvil makers, many of which produced anvils that look quite similar. (Often due to the makers having originally worked for Mousehole or Peter Wright before starting their own companies...) So What you most want to check is face thickness and rebound and lack of defects. The face thickness you should be able to eyeball and as long as there is an appreciable amount you are good to go (say 3/8" minimum) Rebound is best judged by the ball bearing test described over at anvilfire.com Finally the best check for hidden defects for that *style* of anvil construction is to "ring the anvil" by tapping it with a light hammer. If it has a thud instead of a ring there is a hidden crack or face delamination---may not be a deal killer; but would you pay top price for a used car with a blown engine?

That's rather top dollar; but for an anvil in top condition with a stand. Do you need an anvil in top condition? Do you have the cash to hand? *Bargain* most dealers have a built in cushion and will haggle. Note that sometimes it's a better deal to add in more stuff than to reduce the price---or some mix of the two. A dealer might be happier to move the stuff out of their shop to give room for other stuff. However sometimes a deal cannot be made. Walking away is NOT a sign of failure! Note that anvil prices can vary as much as 50% by location and you have not told us where you are!

Good Deal for a great anvil! Now get to hammering!

Well I pointed out to my student that propane ran about as much as attending the local $5 movie theater---about $2 an hour and while he was working on his project I made 6 tentstakes from scrounged stock that I sell for $2 a piece and so paid for the gas 2x over. Most of the basic blacksmithing tools last forever and their costs can be amortized over decades. It's the consumables you have to pony up for on a regular basis!

no, but take a ballpeen hammer and see if a "normal" blow leaves a dent. If not it probably hasn't been un-tempered. That anvil should ring as well. If it doesn't then there is the possibility of a hidden crack or face delamination. (Not all anvils ring; but the ones that do should when tested!) BTW you seem to be confusing the rust and dust with "condition" when it's more like looking at a car that is dusty with bug splatters on it's windshield. What you want to look for is evidence of a crash or the state of the motor and transmission---not if it needs a car wash! As for price that seems high where I am at and very high indeed! where I used to live at. Whey you are at I haven't a clue and so can't help you with what anvils in your area go for. Remember that *cash* in your hand can sway a seller. $2 a pound is generally a decent deal for a good brand anvil in that quite good shape most places in the USA. clean with a wire brush on an angle grinder WEAR PPE!!!

The school auctions I attended back in Columbus OH were sometimes productive---whenever they sold something new, the dealers wouldn't bid on it until they could go back and research it and so the next auction they would bid things up. So the first time they sold a Johnson heat treat forge---I bought one for $40. The next auction they went for several times that. With smart phones that probably no longer occurs. I did buy a lot of sheet brass at a School "garage sale"; I'm always looking for materials cheap even if I have to store them for *years*! Last Saturday at the scrap yard I didn't find much except for 30 7' pieces of 5/8" rebar that I happened to need for a project---stakes to hold wattle panels up. I believe I can cut them down to size, make tentstakes from the drops and end up getting the wattle stakes for free.

Perhaps a set of hand forged handles to make it easier to carry?

Q&D "bluing" on using armor is often done by heating as piece and immersing in oil and sort of "burning it on" Discussed in *many* posts over at the armourarchive. For cold dishing the rule is "soft over hard or hard over soft"; so if you are using a wooden stump with a dish carved in it you use a hard (steel) hammer. Note that ballpeens are NOT generally used save for if you grind the hammer face to a shallow curve---if you think of it a ball actually has a point and will leave dings in your metal giving you the "bag of marbles" look to your dishes that requires massive amounts of plannishing. "The Complete Modern Blacksmith", Weygers, has instructions for modifying ballpeens into dishing hammers) If you use a toroid or welding tank bottom, (hard) to dish in you often use a heavy rawhide mallet to make smooth dishes. All this is discussed exhaustively over at the armour making forums; which actually predate this site by quite a long time and so have a large amount of information built up on the topics.

*Great Idea* on the but cap---consider it stolen! I forged a small skinning knife from the remains of a Buck Brothers chisel preserving the logo on it---going to really confuse somebody some day...

That "clamp on drill" is a Cole Drill, Very handy when you need to drill heavy holes far away from electricity! You can also set it up with your traveling demo kit as it takes a lot less room and weight than an old post drill. Thomas

my favorite pair of tongs are a short pair of snub nosed shoeing tongs that I paid US$1.50 for at a fleamarket. They are sized for 1/4" stock (what I generally use for knife tangs and starter projects for new students) and are light and easy to work with. Picking up some old tongs cheap and then modifying them to work with your methods and materials can be a good idea---be sure to smooth down the reins as rusty pitted reins will make your hands sore fast!

There is a big H frame hammer along the way to "The Big Pit" coal mine museum in Wales and I found a blacksmithing museum in Germany once as they had a 250? Kilo "luft hammer" at the end of the driveway. Better a display than scrapped; but better still to be in USE!

I really like the simple wooden handles; many people trying to make early style knives put a much fancier handle on simple using knives than would have been used. (this is of course compared to some of the extremely fancy work you could find on upper social status blades---gold and garnets, etc)

Look through the books like "The Backyard Blacksmith" or "Civil War Blacksmithing" for projects or look through the blueprint forum here or the i-forge forum over at anvilfire.com Doing ornamental and camping gear is a big help before doing knives as you can make items successfully while learning the basics of fire and hammer control and how your forge works---mild steel is much more forgiving of overheating, underheating, decarburization, scaling, etc than knifegrade steel---But every taper or bevel you form or bend or twist you make or straighten is practice directly applicable to the blades you will be making!

Don't recall if anyone has mentioned things like Books or Training---probably the most important things for getting from zero to being a working smith. I think you would do better in the long run hammering on a stone and taking Mr Turley's blacksmithing class than buying a new Nimba and trying to figure things out all on your own! Looks like I picked up a new student; Mechanical Engineer student who's attended our church a couple of times and got invited to forge; we're working on projects and I'm feeding him the books he should go over and showing him what the words mean at the anvil.

HT heat treat (note that there are several different processes of which hardeing is only *1*, a different HT process can make the metal as soft as it's going to get---good idea to be specific as to what HT process is being talked about!) Rc and HRc refers to hardness on the Rockwell c scale as determined by a Rockwell Hardness tester see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockwell_scale As to coal vs coke the answer is "it depends". What is most economical where you are, what you plan to use it for and possibly the most important factor---which *YOU* prefer!

You don't want any restrictions on gas into the headers. Do it the same way they did it for the single input double output but split it into two. Note that the vertical burners may have problems with the chimney effect when one isn't being used. Is there a brass orifice in the burner that could melt?

The only time I advise folks to get a Vulcan is when there are serious noise issues to be dealt with---and even then fastening an HB down so it doesn't ring would be the better way to go! Serious overpriced on the vulcan too it6's about the lowest of the "real" anvils in quality and price sould NOT be that of a top of the line anvil!

Use will even polish out light rust pitting on the face---scale is an abrasive!