David Sanders

get it

wife wanted to go yard selling today and so we went looking around. at one house i found this 1950 Power King drill press Hardly used and still working. for 15.00. Good Day. it works dreat. just a little oil on the table and it is good to go.

Ok did anyone see the last Rambo. He.made.the prop for the boat and he.made the knife. Also Conans dad in the most recent Conan the barbarian. And yes I did watch dragon tale and how to trail your Dragon with the kids and loved it. And of course you can't forget the Hilander movies.

took a trip to see the see the family in northern Va today and told my grandparents about my recent purchase of my anvil when my grandmother started telling me about her father who was a blacksmith. she also told me she remembers as to where his old forge and tools still are and will see if they are still there for me to get and restore to working order. also had 2 of my uncles there in which one gave me a set of forged tongs he had in his box and another uncle let me know of a pile of coal 5 foot high in his back yard he been trying to get rid of said i could have when ever i bring my truck up to get it. there was an anvil but was passed down by another branch of the family that owns an auto repair shop somewhere. i try to keep stuff like this in the familyand will use it proudly if possible. i will keep my fingers crossed. hopefully the forge is still there. i dont care of the condition i will get it to work some way. i will also try to find some pics of my great grandfather with his tools to put up in the shop. she said she has some she just cant remember as to where. at 85 she is still a remarcable lady. i told her i would bring her fathers tools back to life for her. i could tell that ment alot to her.

You don't have to buy everything at once. My accumulation has grown over the last 12 years. Always on the lookout for older tools for the shop. Some finds from eBay some Craigslist. A few of my more expensive items were handed down from my late grandfather. When you find something never be afraid to ask if they would take less but no so much less as to insult the seller unless he is downright out of his mind, I have found a few of them. If you see something on the side of the road in someone's yard maybe, stop and ask but stay respectfully and keep speech ling and slang to a minimum. Ive had a case when I found something that the day before a young buck asked an old fellow about a place to hunt on he started with a bunch of yo yo yos and the old man sent him on his way but I come along the next day he told me and I spoke better English so he let me use his land. Feel its a good example for asking for anything.

Had to sandblast mine. The guy I bought it from got it from an auction because it looked good in his yard as an ornament he told me. It had so many layers of epoxy paint the wire wheel wasn't working. By sandblasting it I was able to identify and date it.

That's a good looking anvil. I was trying to see how you made your hammer holder around your base but it will have to wait till I get home. Only so much you can see on a phone. Looks great though.

Looks very nice. Now you just need to tell us.about you adventure getting it moved into the shop.

Grinding? Sanding? Not me! The best way to handle the rust is with a wire wheel and never mind about the pits on the face, just start to work the face with hot iron and a hammer, nothing heals the pits faster than hot forging. Unless they are big enough and deep enough to drop a marble into don't mind the pits they will work out over time. Looks like a pretty good anvil and I've seen a lot worse turn out some really beautiful work, it's more the skill of the smith than the condition of the anvil. If you are a lack luster smith no matter how good your tools are you will still turn out lack luster work.

waiting on tax money to buy the HF rod. close 7.50 something a lbs bought in 10 lbs cans made by Stoody. will be well worth it.

Ok i went ahead and done some sandblasting on the thing and got it cleaned up to see all i could see wrong with it and found the lable stamps and a few cracks around 2 of the feet. cracks are there but after some good looks from a buddy in NDT cracks are superficial and should be still sound. they look like the feet were forged on seperately during the forgeing process and ended up cracking later maybe due to not forge welding the feet on enough on that side when it was made. Still has a nice ring to it. the lable stamps i can hardly make out but after staring a while and doing a little history serching i made out M&H ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE. from another site i found how to date them and this anvil if i am reading it right was made 1820 to 1835 which would explain all the wear and tear from the years of abuse. Im still going to repair it and still going to use the crap out of it cause things are ment to be used. Love finding out the story behind the equipment i use, makes it all that much more fun and exciting to make things.


Mousehole Forge anvils can be dated from their logos: (These are all cicra - about - dates and the words would be stacked):

1780 - 1795: MOUSEHOLE
1795 - 1820: C&A MOUSEHOLE
1820 - 1835: M&H ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE
1835 - 1854: HENRY ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE
1854 - 1875: M&H ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE FORGE
1878: BROOKS & COOPER MOUSEHOLE FORGE SHEFFIELD WARRANTED (with the outline of a mouse and HOLE for the first time)
1879: M&H ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE FORGE SHEFFIELD WARRANTED (mouse) HOLE PATENT
1880: M&H ARMITAGE MOUSE HOLE FORGE (mouse) HOLE WARRANTED
1895: M&H ARMITAGE (mouse) HOLE SHEFFIELD
1896: M&H ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE FORGE SHEFFIELD WARRANTED PATENT (mouse) HOLE
1911: M&H ARMITAGE MOUSEHOLE FORGE SHEFFIELD ENGLAND WARRNANTED (mouse) HOLE PATENT
1927-1933?: OWEN-THOMAS THE OLD FORGE SHEFFIELD ENGLAND

Notes:
- C&A = Cockshutt & Armitage
- M&H = Morgan and Henry
- Mousehole Forge is the only known manufacturer to use dots/periods between the weight numbers, such as 1 . 3 . 14. Sometimes all which remains of the logo is the dots.
- Weight markings are in the British stone system to where the first represents multiples of 112 (1/20th long ton), the second multiples of 28 and the third remaining pounds. Usually off from scale weight a bit.
- Mousehole Forge was one of the last British anvil makers to change from the old style to the modern (more blocky) feet. They did so cicra 1895.
- The origins of the name of Mousehole is not certain. The square handling holes in an old anvil are called mouseholes. In England a bend in a river with a deep spot is known as a mousehole and Mousehole Forge was located at such as spot. There is a coastal English town named Mousehole and it was well known as the site of a brief French invasion about the time the forge was started.
- Mousehole Forge contined to use water power (heave or tilt hammers) long after other manufactures switched to mechanical hammers. All Mousehole anvils are pretty well 'handmade'.

Source: The Mousehole Forge by Richard A. Postman (with John and Julia Hatfield) http://www.abana.org/resources/discus/messages/4/442.html?1254101882

Not a bad looking anvil, seen and worked on worse. Take wire wire wheel to it and get some of that paint off so we can see the real condition. Looks as though it has had a lot of use after part of the hard face broke off which should show a lot of folk here that consider an anvil in that condition totally useless. However one broken like that is still useful for general smithing work, just ain't as pretty as a new one. What comes off of an anvil is more about the smith than the anvil. Welcome IFI we look forward to hearing from you often.

Hey David, welcome to IFI. Where in VA Beach are you? I'm in NC and travel to VA Beach quite often. Dr's, commissary, work......
As Rich stated, the RR takes a dim view of people walking the tracks let alone taking spikes so try to keep that to a minimum.

There is a good blacksmithing group in the tidewater area. Tidewater Blacksmith's Guild.

This is their site:
http://www.iforgeiro...acksmith-guild/

They are well established and those that I have met are really good guys.

Thanks for that info Rich Hale. I will keep that in mind for now on. Wouldn't think spikes tossed to the side would be a problem but I can see where that could be an issue if someone did have a problem. There are a lot of scrapers around here and that I don't need to be confused with if someone saw me.

it has some black paint on it

Hello all new to the site and to Blacksmithing and today i bought my first anvil. Still not sure as to the manufacture but needs a little repair to the Hardface. Im a welder by trade in the navy and i know it can be fixed. i found this on ebay and the guy posted that it was 250 to 300 lbs. He originally had it for 300 but after a few emails i talked him to 250 with some gas money to meet me 3/4 the way to my place . he lived 100 miles away after he pulled up and opened the back of his van i could tell by looking at it it wasnt 250 or 300 it was closer to 200. but i had already paid for it and it still has a nice ring to it even though the face is a little damaged but all in all i was happy. he even had an old pot to give to the wife for free after i got home. figured she would use it as a planter. on the way home i knew of an old abandoned rail track to my amazment had an engine running down it something i havent seen in the 12 years i have lived here. some of the tracks i was able to shift with my foot thats how old this section was. while i was there i found 8 rail spikes to the side scatered so i collected them and took em home. there are some stamp marks on the side of the anvil i make them out to be 1.2.20 thats all i could find. it anyone has some info on this anvil i would like to know. i restore old equipment to use in my shop, kind of a hobbie to fix something old to use again. thanks for reading, Dave