ThomasPowers

The O2 is supposed to burn it away not just blow the molten metal. In fact a person really good with oxy-acetylene can even turn off the acetylene after getting the cut started and use the heat of the metal burning to provide the preheat for the rest of the cut. Both bottles wide open is a danger sign; the Acetylene bottle should only be 1/4 turn open and the regulator set for under 15 psi. The O2 bottle may have 2000 psi in it so a regulator is mandatory for it too. The pressure on the regulator should be set for what your torch requires for cutting. I strongly recommend you to get training on O-A as it can be deadly dangerous if misused. (Did you know that acetylene can blow up even without the presence of oxygen?)

You may want to line it so that the floor is level with the cutouts on the sides of the firepot---firebrick laid flat was about the right height for mine. Simple job using a bit of fireclay was fine.

Matt, my shop anvil has a hardy hole at both ends, I'm scratching my head over how changing the side the horn is on will help! (single horned, 1.5" hardy holes and too heavy to move around!)

She did *real* *good*! (and Christmas is fast approaching! Better get to working finding something for *her*!)

Wow my #2 flypress stands 7' tall on the original factory base with a 42" diameter toroid; your #3 must be quite a bit larger! Or to put it differently there is no standardization in fly press numbering so my #2 Hoskins may be larger or smaller than your nameless #3. We've coined in brass restriking mexican coins without re-surfacing them with my screwpress with no problem. I would look into a board drop hammer for coin striking as single high impact blows are what you need and that's the description of a board drop hammer. I've seen them in use in Germany to take 2" stock down for hoe blades---1 blow per side and then refine the blade with a lufthammer (and in a water powered smithy too!)

A lot of it tends to do with what you are trying to do, perhaps you forgot to mention that?

Was this a cutting torch or just a welding torch? You should have cut the thing in two in less than 5 minutes with a cutting torch set up properly! (Did you have the O2 high enough?)

Welcome! May I suggest you edit your CP and place your location in it so perhaps *some* folks will read it and not make suggestions that are only good for their own countries! What are you doing and how can we help!

Chamfered legs so it's not a Columbian. Actually hundreds of small shops built post vises and few of them marked them. Nobody pays much attention to that, more important is what condition the screw is in. I have an iron city star marked post vise and several columbians that are not marked on the vise but have the brand on the mounting plate (and are not "married" to another brand of vise).

Do try to get to the conference; great folks and a great time and it will be like running an after burner on getting you forging faster! I wanted to go and I live in NM! Unfortunately I'm still wheels for my wife because of foot surgery and have to be in El Paso that weekend.

I'll check exactly where the numbers were punched ISTR it was near the cut out.

I was referring to silversmithing stakes. Nowhere did I mention working steel on them. I was making a suggestion on how to find cheap alloys that work well for such stakes and that for silversmithing you don't need to do complex hardening simple normalization will work. Where did your reply come from!

I noticed on my Blacker Anvil a number punched in the side of the face that was only a couple of digits off from another Blacker anvil I have seen. Do you have such an anvil and if so does it have such a number as well?

Looking at your 005 picture it looks like your charcoal needs to be cut smaller and the blower turned *down!* Charcoal needs very little blast to get it hot and disappears fast if you have too much air!

NJanvilman; I'm the fellow who sold you that blacker that had been through a fire. Moved out to NM now *with* my big Fisher. Funny thing I used to live in Monmouth County in the '70's...Holmdel NJ.

Have you thought of grabbing the blank by the tip instead of the tang and doing most of the bevel on your good side and only having a minimal amount to bevel on your off side? But Practice Practice Practice is the real answer! BTW if you edit your user CP to put in your general location you might find a local smith that can help you out.

The size of the forge determines how large a billet or pieces you can weld up as the size of the "hot spot" is based on that and some other factors---fuel, blower, etc. Being pretty confident about being able to do an advanced process *before* you have even mastered the beginning processes seems a bit like Hubris, no? Don't get discouraged if you find it a bit harder than you originally thought!

They didn't have homogeneous steels back then; it was wrought iron for the most part and blister or natural steels (natural steels come from high carbon blooms). The whole reason for the folding and welding done on steels back then was to make them more homogeneous!) The anvil generally would not have steel as a part of it, too expensive to waste! However as mentioned wrought iron worked at a white heat is soft enough to work quite well on a cold wrought iron face. In Western Europe "homogeneous steels" came from the crucible steel process pioneered by Huntsman in the 1700's. In central Asia wootz and other crucible steels were know from quite earlier times but were produced in small quantities at a time and generally reserved for blade making.

Normalized steel generally works ok for silversmithing, no fancy heat treat needed. Axles and coil springs make good stock sources

"Bent in the middle" How? there should only be about a 1/16" sticking out on both sides to hammer on! (It should not have to be hammered into the hole, a snug sliding fit is what you are trying for; the swaging of the ends is what holds it in place.)

Remember that if after tempering you decide it's too hard/brittle you can always retemper to a higher temp without having to reharden. When working with unknown steels for knives I generally work my way to the tempering temp I like in 25-50 deg increments testing after each one.

No he's thinking about anvils used during Migration and Early medieval periods---think viking age anvils not the recent stuff used in America during the last couple of hundred years and so in American museums. Although at El Camino Real International Heritage Center in New Mexico they have an example of a traveling smith's anvil that is a small stump anvil that was used out here in colonial times. I have both an early small stump anvil and the later larger stake anvils as shown in Renaissance paintings (Like "Venus at the Forge of Vulcan" of course there are a number with that name...)

Especially if you have ever seen the Cajun Blackened anvil pictures from a prior attempt by other people elsewhere. That could have been my old 1828 William Foster; but I want to keep it after it gets re-faced! (It's on my list which is why I suggest that it get done at Quad-State---and then had to miss it!)

If you are just starting out I would not advise making your billet that wide, get good at 3/4" wide and 4-6" long before trying wider and larger billets.

Or you could by small amounts through Knifemaking Suppliers. Kovel Knives just outside of Columbus OH used to be one such. May I suggest you attend the SOFA meetings and ask if anyone would like to go in on an order with you as the price per pound goes down if you will but an entire stick usually. They can also clue you in to that scrapyard in Dayton that has tool steels sorted out and marked.