ThomasPowers

I figured your manners were 1/2 the way into a great white birch...

Anvils are not considered "old" until they get to be 200 years or more, that one probably is not older than 100 years. I have an 1828 William Foster that is only "late middle aged" and still gets used. That looks like a 1/2 anvil to me. Damaged anvils sell very cheap and so are usually a great buy for beginning smiths. I bought one missing just the heel for about 33 cents a pound in Columbus OH. Yours looks in quite good shape. I'd pay you a dollar a pound (just for the anvil part not the base) if the face has been hardened. (see the ball bearing test). [and yes this is an offer, I can arrange pickup in MI] I used to live in Columbus OH which had *2* companies making anvils back in the day and so a number of "lunchbox specials" were around. Heat treat would be done after welding the top to the base so if that one wasn't a failed weld---which happened I have the *base* from a Peter Wright, (hmmm might fit that top....) I don't think it's cast in or else the angle iron wouldn't be needed to hold it in place. If it was a finished anvil that then failed there may be a stamped in name on the side. Hay Budden, Trenton, Peter Wright would be nice!---my 1/2 peter wright still had the weight stamps, the name would have been on the top half---Postman made the call on maker for me.

Better make them of a medium carbon steel if going with 1/2" thick stuff---perhaps heavy leaf spring? and heat treat them *tough* not hard.

Beth you do realize that all his beautiful works on a computer will probably be totally last in a decade or two right? *none* of my early computer programs is on a medium that I could currently read in today with any system I own. Even if I had loaded my paper tapes onto punchcards and the punchcards onto a bernouli drive my early works would still be "lost". The steel items I forge can be passed from daughter to grandchild to great grandchild. I have my first steel blade. It looks the same today as when I made it 30 years ago. I look at it from time to time to remind myself what a long strange trip it's been!" All creativity is good however creativity lost is a sad thing indeed. the "I remember" is a sad refrain compared to "look at this!"

I wouldn't pay a dollar a pound for that anvil myself.

Wow it was 42.2 C outside when were were working inside a metal building last weekend---treasure that cold!

Ever tried to ship an anvil or powerhammer internationally? (which is not that hard if you know *how* and have contacts with the right shippers...)

Lovely twist. I generally like my grips as smooth as possible though even rust pits get a go over with crocus cloth and waxing to keep my hands from wearing out.

Frost you got me backwards, I said it was OK to clean it up as the original patina wasn't a part of it's value as it's a tool to be used and not an antique to be conserved. In general I don't paint mine though I did wax the cute little 3"r I picked up last quadstate which *is* an antique---and still being used at demos!

Yes you can use an air compressor. You can also use 20 euro bills for fuel. Is it cost effective? A compressor puts out low volume high pressure air, the forge takes low pressure high volume; compressors are expensive and wear out with use. Little blower fans can be sourced cheap and last a long time. Visit your local heating and Cooling place and tell them what you are doing and ask about any of the assist fans for a super efficient furnace that they may have pulled out and replaced and so have them in their junk pile.

Cast iron is an amusing liquid at steel forge welding temps. Look up Rob Gunter's method of anvil repair. "First: Do no Harm!" is an excellent suggestion. I've seen a number of anvils pretty much destroyed by mills, including a recent one that took 5-6 hours of a professional weldors time using a big professional sized welder to get back to a usable face after the original was milled square and clean and too thin to use. If you absolutely MUST use a mill on it don't forget that the base and face may not be parallel and so FIRST clamp the anvil face down and mill the *BASE* to make it parallel and then flip it over and "kiss" the face lightly. I've seen two anvils where they didn't do that and so milled *through* the steel face and into the wrought iron on top because the anvil had a slope to it.

Borax helps prevent the molten metal from absorbing gasses but I don't believe it de-gasses the melt. Nassau Recycling always added a tree to their copper melts to de-oxidize---but the results were rather spectacular in a "Better have the Fire Squad and EMTs on hand if you try this at home" way!

Where's the *fun* in that? That's like buying blood meal to mix into a quench tank to try to replicate certain historical references. Oh Wait, NEVERMIND! And besides which I like to hear my wife laugh when I tell her I need to eat fiddlehead fern salads for the next 3 days so I can fill a quench tank...she knows the reference.

Note that A-36 spec is close to that of an HC RR spike in carbon content! As the mild/medium boundary is at 30 points, 26-27-28 is right close---and it's not a hard line cut off either just a generally accepted transition from one type to another. Just like quenching in oil doesn't increase the carbon content of the material being quenched, quenching in super quench does not either. It's a *faster* abstraction of heat making it possible to capture more of the few carbon atoms as the structure changes from Face Centered Cubic to Body Centered Cubic and so warp the crystal lattice to prevent easy deformation---ie makes it harder. This is a help for low run tooling where you don't want to fuss with using a higher carbon steel; but going up in carbon content makes a big difference in the long run! (early iron swords were not that much harder than hammered bronze ones; but when they figured out quench hardening the hardness numbers then soared over the hammered bronze ones!)

Jim are you in South Africa? South America? South Hampton? South Lemitar NM Co-Prosperity Sphere?---(if so let me know and I'll give you what you need from my scrap pile) Asking a general "where can I buy XYZ" on an *INTERNATIONAL* forum without providing a location is a bit off. I sometimes reply "Over there!" An easy way to deal with this is to add your general location to your profile so that people know what sorts of things you might have access to. eg mine is Central NM The hose clamp coupler nut with a piece of scrap sheet fastened to it is an easy "no weld" version. I have a L shaped strap welded to my pipe with a hole in it for a similar ash door---and riveted a dragon head handle on it for ease of use and amusement of kids---they see it more often than their parents who see the top side of the forge instead.

I built both of my propane forges at workshops given by the local ABANA affiliate where I used to live. They were done pretty much at cost for the participants. (We were set up in an assembly line to build them, then at the end of the weekend we drew numbers to see who got which one---keeps people from concentrating on *theirs* and slacking on others as anyone of them might be theirs!)

"Do you think we need to talk about the benefits of singing?" No; but whistling can be a safety hazard if you are sharing a shop with someone who doesn't!

Note that the cost of having a professional welder re-work this anvil probably exceeds the cost of buying one in better condition. If you can get the welding for free or the anvil has some other significance then re-working it might be worth it.

To my eye it's dang near *perfect* as an example of what they were like back then!

I love it when I get someone well versed in their "craft" come to me for a special tool and I can use their experience to get it just right for them by having their input as it's made. (and lead them over to the dark side....There was a wood turner doing very nice vases that came to me for some special inside turning tools---he used carbide inserts from metal lathe tools for the cutting and so just needed the shaft to hold them. I stuck a piece in the forge and when it was hot put it in the vise and told him to "grab the cold end and bend it just like he wanted it."---"Oops too far"---"so back it off a bit!"---"Perfect!" Next weekend he bought an anvil off me and started setting up a forge of his own...

sorry but 3/16" tent pegs? Round these parts we generally go for 1/2" sq stock about 2' long! Gets windy out here... I did a cub scout den demo once where they all took wire from election signs and twisted it into marshmallow roasters---I ran one kid at a time though it and had everything set up for them. Took an afternoon and then they cooked with them for dinner.

Let me toss a few more philosophical items out here: I've been running into a large number of people who are college aged and NEVER have done anything concrete! They may be absolute whizzes at various computer games but they can't point to something and say *I* made that! Not only do they lack common tool skills they don't think in the way that folks who have grown up tinkering with their environment have. Their eyes get very large when I tell them that we will take a ballpeen hammer head and MODIFY it to suit *our* purpose. Many of them seem to think that basic items were handed down from on high and it would be sacrilege to modify them to do their job better. I try to explain that instead of the *best* design, manufactured items are often the minimal design they can get away with to sell to customers. I am descended from over 1 million years of tool using primates and xxxx PROUD of it!

doing a zig-zag from a single piece of strap also works for a grate. I use a piece of expanded metal in my coal forge and replace as needed as it's free/scrap rate stuff.

Just off the top of my head I can think of, oh, about 5000 tools you can build to be used with flat dies. It's how the "big boys" tend to play; so look for videos of Clifton Ralph or Steve Parker for example.

Jeff this is a tool for using not an antique. Clean as needed/wanted. Worrying about patina when you will be hitting it with a sledge is a bit off.