HWooldridge

No, a regular O/A torch cannot be used. Gasoline torches were more common years ago - my dad had one; it was the old pump up style. You could braze easily but not weld and it put out a lot of heat but it was a little like holding a bomb in your hand all the time. Gasoline is not cheap anymore either so I'd wager propane is a better alternative (and torches and tips are made for that purpose). I think "The Second Machinist's Bedside Reader" by Guy Lautard has some information on making one - but I wouldn't recommend it simply because so many other fuels work better and are safer.

Irnsgn - are you Aaron's FIL? What a small world!

Fishers are great anvils but do not ring - one of the reasons old smiths sometimes steered away from them. I had a 250 for a while and thoroughly enjoyed using it.

My rule is $10 per inch of jaw width, so a 5" vise is worth $50. I'll go up to 20% more on this guideline only if the vise is complete and missing nothing, with a good box and screw.

I've owned 9 or 10 anvils over the years but have only kept my first one, a 250 lb Peter Wright...and a 100 lb Hay Budden I bought for a portable rig. I traded an old Winchester that was worth about $125 at the time for the PW, which was around 1984. The Hay Budden was purchased about 1993 and I paid $140 for it. However, the PW needed a great deal of work to make it usable and the Hay Budden needed nothing so there was some disparity in initial condition.

I used to be certified on low pressure (<15 lbs of steam). We welded vertical up with 3/32 6011 for root and 1/8 7018 for the cover pass. I'd say get the book and study for the test.

H13 is a tool steel intended for hotwork. Works great for punches and chisels but probably not required for an anvil. When I say "required", I mean that cheaper alloy steels will work just as well. The old two piece anvils had a very hard face (60-70 Rc) but it's clear a lot of them did not hold up over many years because the edges crumbled. Time will tell on the newly made anvils but I doubt they will break down under normal use because they are drawn back to a lower but still usable hardness. The worst thing would be one with a face ductile enough to mark every time you used it, like some of the Chinese junk floating around these days.

Frosty, I made one handle for a brand with it so far, which didn't have any complex forging so I can't really say much except that it bends very easily at a low temp. It doesn't want to bend at room temp but moves easily at a dark red.

I work for a large production machine shop during the daylight hours and do this blacksmithing stuff the rest of the time (a good night's sleep is about 4 hours but who's counting?) At any rate, they were scrapping several types of obsolete material and I wound up buying fifty or so bars of 1/4 and 3/8 round C1002 stock - all 12 foot long and cold rolled. This was an overrun on a specialty material they ran several years ago for a part in some sort of telephone switching equipment. Let me tell you, it is like night and day forging this stuff against regular CRS or A36. Kind of like putty under the hammer and moves like lightning so this must be close to what the old Swedish charcoal iron was like to forge. I would like to try some larger pieces so I may try to forge weld a bundle and see how it closes up. I did forge weld a piece of 1/4 to itself and the scarf seam disappeared pretty easily. Sure would be nice if we could get it without paying tool steel prices... Has anyone else played around with extremely low carbon steel?

Olive oil will work in lieu of neatsfoot - but you should be able to get it at a leather products or saddlery store.

It is entirely possible that it is twisting with the longer stock. I can take about 12" of usable heat in my propane forge and usually get that much to successfully follow the scroll. However, square stock usually doesn't have this problem so is it possible your form is twisted to some degree? Another trick is to keep the scroll flat as you go - every time you take a heat and scroll, go to the anvil or (better) your layout table to true it. You might also want to use a torch and simply follow the form with localized heat.

Pewter works too and doesn't require the higher heat to melt aluminum.

I think I understand your dilemma - you are making rings from 1.00" to 4.00" with a .059" wall and some thickness of collar or crown. If I were you, I would try to find tubing in the maximum wall thickness you need and machine the rest. It would be better on a automatic lathe with fixed headstock and bar feeder than trying to do it on an engine lathe (like a Monarch "Predator" or similar sized machine). Here in the US, we also figure the cost recovery on the scrap in the part cost, so that might help if you haven't already thought of it. The method used by the other supplier is also very fast. It sounds like they could almost dispense with the drill and stamp the entire part then do the final hot forge to size. The extruder can't provide a net shape if the part has a collar so they are probably going to sub-contract it to someone else - hence the high price.

Bruce, The difference is the blood, sweat and tears you spent behind that anvil - you are entitled to your sentiment. The problem I have is with the people who are antique hogs and don't know when to stop. Thanks very much for your comments. I didn't do it for my whole life but I've spent almost 25 years behind an anvil - where did the time go?...H

Rings can be done on a conventional hammer with single mandrel set in V-blocks. The V-blocks are mounted to the lower die; the mandrel must be long enough to rest on both blocks with the piece between. The piece is then rotated while struck but can get no bigger in diameter than the clearance between the mandrel and the bottom block. Clifton Ralph demonstrates this concept on his power hammer tapes but you would have to create a fairly specialized setup to use it.

Sheldon Lathe and Southbend both published their own versions of a little book called "The Care and Operation of a Lathe" or some similar title - it has most everything you'll need to get started.

The lathe alone won't do much without accessories and a lot will depend on what you want to make. For example, I have a ongoing job making modifications to spark plugs for a local inventor (don't laugh, I've made close to 300 plugs at $30 a piece over the past few years). This job simply would not work without a variety of 5C collets so I had to make a draw bar, buy the collets and holder, etc. Although I already had the lathe and a variety of chucks, it took several hundred dollars to tool up for this project. I have Gingery's book and do not believe a beginner should undertake making a lathe - it can be done but why go to the trouble when so many are on the market these days? Diligent shopping may well turn up one in the price range you are targeting. In addition, if you know little or nothing about machining, I'd make the same recommendation as for someone who becomes interested in blacksmithing - find someone who has the equipment and can use it, then have them show you a few things. A picture is worth a 1000 words but hands-on beats all...

Several years ago, we had a guy here in Central Texas who was buying power hammers just to set in his yard. He did no blacksmithing but you could bet he would top any bid at the farm auctions to get one. A friend of mine was trying to find a 25-50 LG so was going to every auction he could attend and kept running into this guy. After the third time being outbid, he finally went up to the other man to see if he would consider selling one. The fellow smiled and invited him out to the house. My friend drove out about 40-50 miles but all the other guy wanted to do was show him the collection - NOT to sell one...I certainly don't mind folks collecting tools as it often saves them from the scrap yard but one can definitely get carried away.

Makes a good upsetting plate. Put it on the ground and upset large bars.

Sure - one or both of the torch valves could be leaking. You might consider requiring whoever is using your torch to shut off the tanks every time they use it.

Thomas, I agree with your comments - the Japanese (and certain other cultures) are/were often bound tightly by tradition and that became both blessing and curse. The blessing side of it is the laser-like focus they can bring to an analysis, which is one of the reasons they are good at making things today like automobiles in modern factories. The curse is becoming so ingrained by tradition that a fresh look out-of-the-box is often not possible. Look at some of the martial arts forms that have stayed engraved in stone for several hundred years (one of the things Bruce Lee criticized during his time). That was my reason for mentioning Musashi - he was an original thinker who figured out that a piece of wood would defeat most blades if wielded properly. He also "invented" the two-sword style, which would also have been unheard of at the time because none of the conventional schools apparently thought the same way. IMHO, the Europeans seem to have moved along at a faster pace because of the frequent wars fought between different races and peoples. The Japanese primarily fought each other - so technology didn't advance like in the West.

Read Miyamoto Mushashi's "Book of Five Rings" and you will get a sense of the importance of the blade and what it represented as a Way of living to the Japanese warrior. He was primarily interested in winning the duel - no matter the method, a perspective with which I am personally in agreement. It may be that a skilled European fencer could beat a mediocre Japanese fencer - or vice versa; and it may be that a good Norse sword might break an inferior Asian blade - but the speculation doesn't possess any validity as the various styles arose in different environments on different continents. Conversely, it doesn't make much sense to extol Japanese swords over European or Persian ones as no one style answers for all situations. It's sort of like arguing that the 1903 American 30-06 rifle and cartridge is "better" than the 1898 German 8mm Mauser - in either case, one must hit the target. Simply put, Japanese blade and their methods of use are typically of high caliber - as are blades and styles from Damascus or Toledo or Paris. The Japanese swordsmith cleanses himself and wears white as a symbol of purity. Each sword was considered to have a soul of its own and the smith was just one part of the process - the polishing and hilt mounting craftsmen being the others. There were probably some Europeans and Persians who felt the same way...

Looks like a flywheel driven punch press.

I made this one for the shop that I restored for the New Braunfels Conservation Society but I don't have one at my home shop since it's located behind the house and no one ever visits (apart from other blacksmiths).

Lord, he went quickly. May God receive his eternal soul into heaven.