anvillain

Wishwon: I could have been more descriptive. It kind of depends on what you do find. But think of it like this, there have been a lot little anvils made out of short scraps of railroad iron. but used in the horizontal position as such it is pretty bouncy. But if you had a longer piece, say 3 foot, it might weigh 40 lbs ( ? ) in the vertical postion you would be hitting on the end and it would be very good then. Lots of rebound is good, that means when you hit the hot metal with your hammer the "anvil" hits back and you can really move some metal. I was amazed by the rebound once when I first started forging, I missed hitting where I wanted and the hammer made a solid hit on the anvil without there being any soft hot iron between the two. The hammer came back up so fast I narrowly got out of the way as I was kind of leaning over the work. I assume you were referring to JimG about the knives, I have a few pics of candleholders in the gallery, but no knives. I don't know what a body hammer is but I would just start with a blacksmith's hammer. In my humble opinion the cross peen is probably the most useful and versatile. Good Luck

Dear Wishwon: It appears you have been afflicted with that desire to heat & beat iron things. Welcome to the club. I've got good news and bad news. You know something about the stuff lying around machine shops, so you may find any number of things that could serve as an anvil. An end of a large shaft standing vertically will give you better rebound than a real anvil many times its weight. In fact one of the most famous knife makers I know uses a 4"or 5" square bar for some real serious hammering. I have a huge hammer head a neighbor gave me that would serve as a good anvil, so keep an open mind and your eyes open too. A pair of channel lock pliers will pick up all kinds of hot things till you gain the skill to make your own. Those huge arrays of hammers you may have seen hanging on walls are beautiful and desirable, but mostly thay are not necessary. I would recommend a cross peen of about 1 1/2 lbs to start and you will use it for 90 % of light to medium work. Don't even think about large jobs for now, that will take care of itself in time. The forge is not quite as quickly done but the previous post would give you one way to do that. If you want a quick one that don't smoke and requires no blower get a gas weed burner and a couple of small lp tanks and build an oven out of fire bricks on a substantial metal table. Do this outside and only as a temporary set up, no use dying for lack of Oxygen. ANY forge gas, coal or otherwise could kill you in close quarters without proper ventilation. Thats about all the good news. The bad news is your wife will probably always think the car should go in the garage.

Hello Elkdoc I believe I would start with your opening on the small side since you are sort of designing as you go. I wouldn't know what size to tell you even if I knew all the specs of your setup, but when I built my forge hood it had too large an opening (also mine was an updraft). I narrowed the opening with firebricks until I got what I wanted. In your case since a barrel is relatively easy to cut you might want to start small because that would increase the velocity at the opening. Good Luck.

I'm not really qualified to talk about business since I am barely past the hobby stage. I have sold a few items and would like to sell lots if I could make a little money along with it. Luckily I don't depend on this for a living. I think HWoolridge hit it on the head about finding the "right crowd" I too have watched a lot of people pick up articles that are of good value and possibly unique and artistic even. A good number of them are other craftsmen or potential blacksmiths that are trying find ideas for themselves to produce. Another large percentage are just people that would buy, but they know the demands of every day life over-ride this item that they admire, but can do without. The occasional match of someone with discretionary income and the beautiful forged work that is just what they are looking for is rare. My goal is to find a few items that I can have fun making, that will have wide appeal, will sell under $20 and that is rare also. If I can find some items like this to pay the overhead it will still allow me to produce more elaborate work that will be there when the rich connisseur of fine forging comes along. But don't despair,I think it will just make us more resourceful and innovative. So keep that sketch pad and pencil handy and who knows what you might come up with. Even a blind hog will find an acorn once in a while.

I had a lot of experience in welding,cutting and modern methods. I also wanted to learn as much traditional forging as I could. I wanted to design articles that were hopefully artistic and if possible original. I wanted to emulate the old ways but I also realized if it were not for the modern conveniences my smithing education would not be possible, so I reserve the right to embrace the new. The sum of all this: "Arc & Anvil 2000 Ornamental Forge". I have shortened this to "Arc & Anvil Ornamental Forge". Yet it still seems too long. I may shorten it again. I have an anvil in my logo with 2k on the side of it to represent 2000 which was the year I sort of started to get it all organized. I purpose to not let anything out the door that I am not happy with. Anvillain

Possum, I don't know what it is, but it sure is a nice one. Could it be a sheet metal roller? But I can't think of what would require a shape like that. Possibly it was just one step in a production routine and there are other tools used in conjunction with it.

Dan, I've read your post and all the replies and I just want to address one part of your procedure. All the considerations for overnight safety depend a lot on the construction of the building and surrounding materials. The part that bothers me about your procedure is the adding of water just before leaving the fire. I usually add water when I'm building the fire,but only after I have a good hot nucleus down in the tuyere. When you dampen the coal it causes gasification and depending on some variables this gas can ignite and cause one Heckuva concussion if you're lucky. If other flammables were nearby the possiblilities are endless! As you can tell I learned this first hand. In my case all it did was blow the ash dump door open and split the pipe from the blower. That was one of my first fires and I know now that I should have been pouring the air to it after SPRINKLING the water. I don't believe there is much danger to the cast iron firepot unless you would overdo on the water and that wouldn't be productive anyway. I sprinkle around the edges to help concentrate the fire in the center especially when I'm building up to a welding heat but it also helps to clear up the early smoky stages of a newly built fire. I wouldn't be without the water in the period just after getting a good flame on top of the coal and before the fire gets as hot as you need it. The other time I use the sprinkler can is after dumping ashes, cleaning out clinker and reconstituting the fire after 2 or 3 hours of forging. My experience with the coal I use may not necessarily be the exact recipe you need. I have found, too that the better coal the less water is needed. I strongly recommend you do NOT leave the fire any time soon after adding water.

My interest in blacksmithing lay dormant for 30 yrs while I was taken up with making a living in modern metal working. Back in l973 I bought "Practical Blacksmithing" by Ted Tucker from Rodale Press. I always had a feeling for the old ways and my Grandpa was about a 100 yrs behind times(I loved it and respected it, but couldn't live that way)so I was exposed to a lot of primitive life, but not blacksmithing. I too, like many others thought blacksmithing was for shoeing horses only. Anyway I read the book and it didn't appeal to me at the time because I was learning how to arc weld, torch cut, etc. I ended up making a career in pipe welding which I loved to do. And it payed well and allowed me to retire early. About ten yrs ago another pipe welder I was working with mentioned his interest in blacksmithing, I reread the book and it started to dawn on me about the artistic aspect of forging. A short time later I read an article in "This Old House" mag about a well known blacksmith in New Jersey and saw the work he had done. Another friend of mine took me to visit a blacksmith he knew and from then on I was hooked. At first I had trouble locating an anvil, then suddenly I realized I had more anvils and tools than I would ever need. I joined the Illinois Valley Blacksmith Association and saw some very expert demos and now I'm at the point of trying to imitate some of the experts. Once in a while I come up with an idea that I think maybe no one has ever done it exactly like this. I don't make a living at blacksmithing but I'm thoroughly eaten up with the creative aspect of it, as well as just the joy of making something useful or beautiful with heat, hammer and a hunk of iron.

Here is a link that should get you to a site if you wanted to download the graph paper program. When I first got mine I got it from ZDnet.com but they don't seem to have it now. I am assuming there is still a free trial version available. Try this: www.sharewarejunkies.com or just do a search for "graph paper printer"

I wanted to share an idea I've been using for several years. I enjoy the planning stage of a project and often spend hours making sketches, discarding them, improving, changing etc. I also feel that I prevent a lot of scrap iron from piling up in the shop. One of the tools I use is a small and infinitely useful computer program called graph paper printer. It is shareware and is definitely worth the $15 it costs. You can print endless varieties of graph paper, one of my favorites is the isometric paper. The one that is really useful for me is a page of concentric circles and divisions. At present I am using it with six divisions to lay out designs for a trivet. You can set up your own requirements and change line weight, one could even use it to find odd angles, for instance, and cut out and transfer paper patterns. When I settle on my trivet design, I'll post it on the gallery. We could even have a brainstorming on trivet design using a common (or uncommon) grid to work on. I've been wanting to make trivets for some time and haven't perfected one for production yet. To make one using an arc welder would be a snap, but I first want to use a simpler design using traditional techniques but I also want it to be a unique design of my own.

As much as it pains me to say it,you guys had some very interesting fires, but I'm afraid you are merely amateurs First I have to give my dear old Dad credit for HIS fire ( no doubt it had a lot to do with my talent, which surfaced later.) Back in '53 we lived near an abandoned RR bed that not too long before had coal fired steam trains travelling on it. Well, fire was a tool which was very useful for cleaning fencerows, weeds and such. This was in the fall, dry stuff He knew could burn fast, but He had no experience with coal dust. Pretty soon it seemed to me the whole world was on fire, but actually it was only about a half mile of dust and cinders accumulated, it burned deep into the roadbed and when it rained it seemed like it just made it burn better. Now I know that it did, similiar to sprinkling water in the forge to clean up the fire. After about a month it went out. Now mine: When I was much younger and working in a welding shop someone had brought an empty barrel in to have the end cut out. My boss DID tell me not to use the torch on it and I could understand why. Sometime later that same barrel had been neglected but was supporting a boat trailer that I was welding on. I had just stopped welding and was walking to the restroom when I was enveloped in one Heckuva a boom and cloud of black dust. I looked back to see that boat trailer levitated eight feet off the floor on the cloud of dust. Apparently a spark had found its way to the fumes of some dreadful concoction inside the barrel. No doubt it was My Guardian Angel that spared me by inspiring me to take a break. PS: just last week I was burning some brush piles, it was very dry, it became very windy, fire trucks were summoned,water was sprayed,leaves were furiously raked, and it was under control after two hours, there were a dozen volunteer firemen that were NOT amused and my wife went to the truck which was some distance away so that no one would think she knew me. About two acres of the neighbors woods were purged of loose flammable material and one deer stand was slightly rearranged. I'm not proud of it and my wife DID tell me so. Humbly submitted by Anvillain (but fire IS a great tool!!)

Ed Congratulations on the building of your shop. There is an advantage to having an interior flue. It will be warmer and draw much better in the winter, of course it will also warm your shop in the summer too. Anvillain