Quarry Dog

Yeah, I was 13, hadn't had enough time to hear all the old "Take it from me..." stories. Still haven't, but I've heard a lot more since then. I'm not sure if the rig I was using would take a tube. As I recall is was actually made for like 1/2" or 3/4" or some large drill bit. It basically resembled an electric motor, about 10" to 12" across the housing, with 2 handles sticking out either side, and a chuck out the bottom.

Actually that is what they teach in schools. It also makes sense in a lot of applications and even forging, well with coal/coke at least, I haven't messed with anything that uses propane besides a weed burner, and it's too bright outside to see if that has a visible flame. A yellow/green/white flame usually indicates either impurities that don't really burn, or incomplete combustion, and is usually not as hot. This goes for natural gas (like for a stove), oxy/acetylene (look for the blue cone), charcoal, and even coal/coke fires. Yes, coal burns yellow at first, but once it's coked up it incandesces red/orange/yellow/white, and if you look across the surface of it against a very dark background you will see very short blue flames hovering over the surface. Even with wood, at it's cleanest and hottest it is blue, although at that point there's really no difference between that fire and one that's made of charcoal, as it is just embers. Just make a fire out of 1 lb. of wood and compare it to a fire made from a lb. of charcoal. Even the hottest/largest stars are blue. So all in all the kid was pretty much right.

Whatever you do, make sure you can oil it. I've seen more hinges seize up and break off of heavy shipping container doors because you couldn't get oil into them. I imagine this carries over to other heavy hinges.

Just remembered something, I don't remember where I heard this, but doesn't the face of railroad track have a tendency towards lateral cold shuts, and have a somewhat rare occurrence of breaking off on long sections without the support of the webbing? I could be totally wrong on this one.

Eh, no sweat Frosty. There are two very important things that are hard to transmit by written language, especially nowadays with all of the throw-away words and loss of the mind-to-hand barrier. Intent, and Emotion. That's why I try not to get too wrapped around the axle, and try to watch what I type, and genuinely take a look at myself when someone calls me out. I will admit, I've only been at this hot metal thwacker stuff for about a year and a half. I have been welding since I was about 8 though, although there were about 7 years where I didn't have access to welding equipment due to not being stationed near home, and it has taken a lot of work to get back into the swing of it. Now that I'm out I'm going for a few certs before I get a job doing it, and I've already gotten my 3/8" 3G (vertical up) MIG cert, and I'm working on stick now. I'll admit I do over-engineer stuff, and I may be overly cautious in my treatment of unidentified metals, but I got both of those tendencies from mistakes I made early on in life, namely broken tools resulting from either under welding something, or quenching things after a weld, namely a 4" earth auger welded to a 1/2" bit in one of those big two handled drills. I broke 3 bits, and the 4th time I hit a rock and my 13 year old frame was thrown around it twice by the time I let go of the trigger. Every now and then I forget lessons like that and get a refresher course when I least want it, although not as bad as all that. That auger is still working pretty good though, more than 15 years later, as well as other tools I made back then. I also probably ramble more than Frosty claims he does, and I don't have a tree to blame. Back to business. I looked up 52100 on the ASM app (whoever posted that app, thank you again, I've already used it twice while making tools), and boy, after the weird stuff for the heat treat ("Refrigerate to -95°F after quench?!?!?"), I can see why they destructed so bad when they decided they were done. Their forging heat range is very narrow too, barely more than a 400° swing, with 1695 as the minimum. I'm not sure I have that kind of patience/heat control just yet. Now, the question I would pose, since it applies to what AU Stunts posted. What are large roller bearings usually made from? Same 52100 as ball bearings, or just case hardened softer stuff? I realize the application is slightly different, but I imagine deformation would still be a bad thing, as ellipses don't roll right, and neither do shards.

Thanks for clearing up that question of mine Frosty. I've seen my dad bring home some 1" or 2" ball bearings from his job where he sets up quarry equipment (crushers, screens, conveyers, batch plants, etc.) that were broken up into sometimes 2, 8, 10, or even more pieces, with some really small pieces missing, so i figured they were pretty hard stuff. Of course this was long before I ever started smithing, which is why I started with a question instead of just jumping straight in kicking down the walls, since I've never actually worked bearings. Since starting blacksmithing a year and a half ago, I had figured that they were heated, quenched, and then baked to the desired temper, or even 1 step heat treated (quick dips and let the heat from the inside temper the skin...same idea as quench the tip and let the colors run) so that the inside was soft and the outside was hard. I had never actually had a chance to test that idea out by heating and beating one myself though, which is why I started in with a question instead of a statement.

It's hard to blame people for assuming that we're not actually hitting hot metal. The world nowadays is so full of smoke, mirrors, and office cubicles that people think the only thing that's left is Hollywood. If the world goes full apocalyptic, there will be a lot of people that won't have the first idea how to survive without Starbucks and McDonalds. Whenever someone asks me what I do for fun, and I say I'm a blacksmith, about 4 out of 5 times I get that monkey solving a math problem look. When I explain, they usually look at me and say "Metal can do that?" but sometimes I get a "Oh, I think my great grand-dad did something like that," and to those people i give at least a little credit. I remember one guy in particular that had grown up in NYC, that didn't know where milk came from, or that onions are part of a root system. I assume he did not pay much attention in school. All said, I think the lesson here is that you can fix stupid. They have to be willing to learn though, even if it takes awhile, and it may be painful. P.S. I Hope you don't mind my stealing that saying BackyardBlacksmith, it's just too right on the nose, too classic, and too perfect of a description.

The first hot steel I ever smited with a hammer was a loop from a 3/4 inch thick coil spring. When straightened out, it came out to about 16" long. One end I forged a rounded taper almost to a point, the other I forged to a flat taper about 1/4" thick. I cut it in half, ground a center punch and chisel out the pieces, and heat treated the punch to straw and the chisel to first blue. Except for the straightening and heat treating, I didn't even use tongs. The mild steel of the tongs I made next was easy to work. The frustration there came from drawing out my reins to a consistent taper. I still use both the punch and chisel on a daily basis. I actually find the center punch works better than my chipping hammer for cleaning slag off of welds, and my chisel is great for making marks on the edge of a plate.

Wait, they're roller bearings? Aren't bearings usually pretty hard stuff? I've seen plenty of bearings sheared through on heavy equipment.

The primary reason that a vertical anvil was suggested is that because it has more mass directly under the hammer, a 3' section of 120 lb. rail (rail is weighed in 3' sections, so 3' of 120, is 120 lbs.) can actually work more efficiently than comparatively sized anvil. The mass most directly in line your hammer blow has the most effect. Once you get out past 45° from the hammer blow, the mass begins having more and more diminished returns. I'm guessing the anvil you made is about 10" to 1' long, which means that you would have at most 3 or 4 lbs. directly under your hammer, instead of even the 40 lbs. in that foot long section. Even standing that 1 foot section on end would return a lot more love than laying it flat. It does still have it's uses horizontally though. If you grind it nice and flat, it would still be very good for doing the final straightening on a piece of work. If you want the best of both worlds, you could shape a horn onto your 1' anvil (if you haven't already), cut the webbing off, and weld it (full penetration) to the top of a vertical rail. You would then have all kinds of love being returned on the face that is directly over the vertical portion, and wouldn't have to go through changes to use the horn for bending. Just make sure to pre/post heat the rail sections before welding, or they might crack on you. The rest of the rail would be good for a few hammers, bottom tools (hardies, bottom fullers, bottom swages, edge blocks, bickirons, mandrels, etc.), and top tools (flatters, sets, top fullers, top swages, etc.) Bickirons are very handy for flaring small pipe, like for cups on candle holders. Hardie mandrels are superior for truing up small rings, as when the ring is true it will sit level. You can't really true up a ring on a london pattern horn because they aren't a true cone, they're more like a cone that's flexing it's muscle, and so it is hard to find a truly circular cross section. Don't shoot people down when they suggest something that you already ruled out. A better response would be to look at why they suggested it again. Around here, especially when you say that you're new, it's likely that they see what you're saying, remember the troubles they caused themselves in similar situations and are trying to keep those troubles from befalling you. I haven't tried a horizontal rail anvil, but I hear they are miserable to work on. The only complaint I hear from post anvils, whether made of rail, or round stock, is that they don't usually have much of a face, or a horn.

It's too bad I missed the show when you came out here. I helped bend up a lot of the deadeyes (thing chained to the railing that holds the ropes for the rigging) for that ship. I just attached one to a chainplate yesterday. It's kind of silly though, the engineer for the project specced out full penetration welds using MIG for it all. I think forge welding would actually be faster, and more than adequate for the job, and even period correct. We're also making 3/8" (I think) silicon bronze blind bolts, with modern threads, and hammered finish heads.

Okay, seriously dumb, serious questions incoming. Most of the work I've done has either been round stock, square stock, or flat stock, always with a fairly close fitting set of tongs around. If tongs wouldn't fit, I was working with stuff long enough for me to hold onto, which is really how I prefer to work. As such, I've never really used any of the mass amounts of flat jaw tongs I've seen. What would they really be useful for unless you're holding onto a small piece of plate? I also have yet to make a knife. I have a feeling that I would still to have the work parallel with the bit and have a channel for one of the bits, or that weird style where it wraps around the bar. However, in the event that I had to work perpendicular to the bit, there's not really an effective crossbit setup for plate/billet/flatbar, is there? All the ideas I have for that seem like they would crack in the first day of use. Would not a flat-jaw set of tongs, sized to the stock, be appropriate for the application of working a knife billet at perpendicular/odd angles? RKM even said "They worked great." I wouldn't say that about a set of tongs if the metal was wiggling, rattling, or slipping excessively. Could it have been just a matter of hitting it just wrong and having bad timing? TLDR Version: 1)What makes Flat-jaw tongs unsuitable for blades? 2)If not a blade/plate/flat billet, what use does a properly sized set of flat jaw tongs have?

This is a video of a 616 in action. The handle is the drive of it all and has a combination bevel gear/straight gear/cam on the same shaft that I will call 1. The straight on 1 powers a pinion on the end of the shaft that spins the flywheel for inertia. The bevel on 1 spins the chuck. The cam on 1 bumps a lever, which pecks at that top "sawtooth" gear, which turns a screw that applies pressure, feeding the chuck and bit down through your work. All post vices I've seen work on the same principle, but I've only seen about 5 myself. If there is another gear that's supposed to be there, I don't even know what it would do. TLDR version: The following are the functions you should see: 1)Bevel spinning the chuck to cut. 2)Flywheel for inertia while cutting. 3)Sawtooth feeding the chuck and bit into the steel.

I haven't had any experience with the Vista or the Old Towne shop, but I have been hanging around the Bandy shop for about a year and a half now. They are unaffiliated with any blacksmithing groups, but are part of the Escondido Historical Society. I know that the Vista one is affiliated with the CBA and does classes, although their schedule posted on the internet seems kind of awkward. I don't even know if the Old Towne shop has classes, or if they have any affiliations. If you go to the Bandy shop between 9AM and 4PM on any Saturday besides Christmas weekend, talk to John about when his next class will be starting up. He's the big guy (6'+) with a pony tail that is doing demos for the class or answering my million questions. I'm sure he is glad that I have fewer of those, although they're getting more complicated now. The class is in 3 hour (9-Noon and 1-4) sessions, pay as you go, so if you learn quick and work hard, it can be very reasonable. Depending on what part of San Diego you live in it can be quite a drive. We have a guy that comes from Pine Valley most weekends, and another that stops by from up near Ventura on occasion, so you won't be alone there. It's kind of inconvenient having us all spread out, but just imagine being the one guy without an anvil, or any interest, in a neighborhood full of nothing but blacksmiths.

Hmm. That does look pretty clean, I'd take a cup brush to it and be done with it. The edges don't even look like they've been radiused. It looks like some farmer bought an anvil, used it lightly, and kept it in a shed.

@ George Geist: I hear what your saying about opening a coal yard, and about shipping by train. The problem with that is that we're too spread out down here, to the point that a train car full of coal would provide enough coal for 10 years for the serious ones...wait, maybe that's not such a problem :P. I took a look at that Penncoal website, $15.00 a bag of coal, and checked Fedex Ground for shipping rates for tier 1 (I'm hoping that mean low priority, and not just short distances), and its 86 dollars for 500+ Lbs. If that rate holds by the ton it might not be a bad deal. The group I hammer with usually orders from Cumberland Elkhorn, out of kentucky, and their coal actually ain't too bad. I'll have to bring up Penncoal and see how the prices compare.

That was pretty awesome, makes it all look easy. I like the electronica with the extra thump, and the thump timed to your hammer blows, real slick touch on the film maker's part.

Southern CA means I either have to go with "cheap coal" from Utah, buy the good stuf locally for $27 per 50 lb. bag, or buy it by the ton and still pay $20 a bag, and have it shipped from the other side of the country. Cheap? Not really. Cheaper than charcoal in the long run? Don't know, but I know places that sell a 50lb bag of charcoal for less than the coal, but not enough less that I'd wanna roast my self out or deal with charcoal's fire fleas when I don't have to.

If it is wrought iron, there may be inconsistencies in carbon content, meaning undissolved carbon pockets in the grain. There's no telling if you're melting an isolated pocket of carbon into the base metal, effectively turning the weld nugget into pig iron, which is basically brittle cast iron. Also, their's no telling what percentage of silicon the weld nugget is. Of course if it's puddle iron, then you may end up with something like medium carbon alloy steel, as most of the impurities were "boiled" out, although it will still rust faster after welding. If this gate is wrought iron, depending on how refined it is you may not be able to fix it, since you cut off the Ys. If you had cut the bolts off with a torch, and punched the remnants through the holes, you may have been able to build up the ends of the Ys and not had to worry about what the resulting weld nugget was composed of. One last concern is that the grain of the metal, meaning the fibrous nature of the silicon impurities, are what gives wrought iron the corrosion resistance that it is known for. This silicon will be melted and uniformly mixed into whatever welds you do, which will have to be full penetration at the Ys. Because of this, your welds will rust away before the rest of the gate. As to bronze brazing. I don't know if that will hold butt joints that basically have to support the entire weight of the gate. So you have 3 options to try: 1)Weld it. Your welds will be brittle, and you may have long term corrosion issues. 2)Braze it. Expect joints to fail at the cut off for the Ys. Expect a little bit of surface corrosion on the bronze. 3)Test the metal and hope to goodness it's mild steel. If it is, make sure your welds are good and you will be just fine. As for the rivets, you could also cold rivet them in place. You may want to heat them up once in the middle of the riveting process, and sand them a little when done.

I know two things coal is better at than charcoal: 1)It keeps the heat it produces contained. Charcoal radiates a lot of the heat it produces. In other words charcoal makes you sweat a lot more. 2)Coal and Coke rarely spark. Even good Oak lump Charcoal throws off little sparks whenever you stir it, even in the slightest. Mesquite is even worse. I haven't found anything else at a decent price here in southern CA. Coal smokes alot, but the cure for that is a good hood and maybe an exhaust fan. I haven't burnt enough charcoal to be able to tell the difference in price to work ratio, so I can't say anything there.

Stoody, huh? Can't say I've run across that stuff. My local weld shop where I get rod usually just has Miller and Lincoln stuff. I'll try looking next time I stop by Airgas, but that's a ways away.

Thanks, but don't get your hopes up too much, I could be completely wrong and the tool might bounce around like a 5 year old at a boring movie. I'm just saying to try the cheaper option before wasting your time welding a hardie hole that won't work for so well for face based hardie tools (like swages, bolsters, headers, etc.), or wasting your money by taking that piece to a machine shop and having the hole broached to 1" square. I will say though, the wider the shoulder, and less sloppy the tenon, the better it should work. Also, be careful not to make the tenon so big that it gets stuck, or it'll probably break off at that upset shoulder and be wedged in there for good, especially if the tool is hardened. Another odd idea, you could try a notch in the face about 1" square by 2" across and about 5" or 6" back and then weld on a saddle (full penetrations with 1/2" to 1" plate with a 1" key to that half-round. The idea is that the saddle would keep it from moving side to side, and the key would keep it from sliding forward and back. This would also make it so that all of the weight of the half-round and the plate would be directly under your hammer blow for drawing. Your standard anvil (double or single horn) does not have this feature in its horn, although they do have the various ovoid cross-sections useful in making scrolls, where you really don't need mass. An added bonus, you can remove your "horn" and maybe even make an interchangeable one if you ever find a machined cone or taper As to that cut, with all those perfect sharp corners, it looks like it was made using either a burn table, or a plasma CAM system. An idea for that is maybe you could weld along that little maze-looking cut leading to the cutouts to make it a little more solid, cut that "wall" down, cut and dress out a 1" hole, and BAM, hardie hole w/ "heel". Those perfect right angle cuts make me worry though, they might want to start cracking if you use it like that. I would weld in a little radius on the inside corners of that hole, and grind a smooth rounded bevel all around the inside and edges of those holes before beating in that general area. Be mindful, I have a tendency to overengineer stuff, but I usually use 90% of the odd stuff I throw into the design.

@Bob: To each his own. My opinion is that it is easier to clean paint, and preserve something that is painted, than it is to treat corrosion. Corrosion can get out of control even in dry dusty southern California. I've also had to perform corrosion control on said metal, and that's a lot more trouble and expense than a coat or two of paint. My blower is pretty old as far as useable tools go, I want it to be useable as long as possible, with as little scavenging required as possible. I don't want my housing rusting out before my well-oiled gears are stripped, and even then, I may just make new/scavenge old gears if the housing is still good. Which makes another point, the more parts are still good on the piece of equipment, the fewer have to be replaced. These tools may be considered vintage/antique, but they are a tool, and just by using them you are stripping them of vintage/antique value, and making them only as valueable as a hard to find used tool, so treat them like a tool, that means protecting them like your new tools. I will concede though, that some things are pointless to paint. I won't paint anything that will come into direct contact with fire or hot steel, that the paint won't stick to, that actually sees regular wear, or anywhere that I need to grip. The rest, if it rusts and is going to be around awhile, is fair game.

Ok, I just googled hard facing rod and the first thing I came up with was a rather handy document by Lincoln that sounds like it confirms what I've been thinking for awhile now, you don't want a manganese rod, they're listed for abrasion or rock impact (quarry) applications. Document Link: http://www.lincolnelectric.com/assets/US/EN/literature/C7710.pdf Here are a few very pertinent excerpts from the Metal-on-Metal rod table on page 5 (beginning of section 2): 'Description: Weld deposits are martensitic. Harder deposits have higher wear resistance. Wearshield MI offers impact resistance.' ... Deposit Characteristics: a. Resists edge distortion and “mushrooming." b. Wearshield T & D and Lincore T & D have a deposit similar to a type H-12 tool steel. Both can be used to rebuild dies and metal cutting edges. ... d. If required, grind or anneal, machine and heat treat.' After reading this document, I'm very convinced that Lincoln Wearshield T&D is practically made for facing anvils. It is made to be used on dies and cutting edges, both adequate descriptions of an anvil face. It even says that it basically deposits H-12 tool steel. The "H" is for hot work right? I think I've seen anvils that are made of H-12 advertised before. It also states that the deposits are martensitic, in other word already pretty hard. As I stated above, you'd need to anneal before milling, and then harden and temper as required/desired, or you will chew up some milling tools.

Also, if that face has chips in it, I would not be surprised if it has seen a fair bit of use. This use may have included being used for striking operations. A lot of anvils that have been used as such have a tendency to lean toward the side that the striker was on. For this process there are 3 things I would do: 1) Before any welding on the face, I would set the anvil on the mill and then use a bull's eye level while tack welding on shims to make it sit level with the mill. 2) Before welding I would take a weed burner to the anvil and use a tempil stick to about 400°-600° to ensure a good pre-heat. 3) I would lastly put the anvil in some sort of enclosure full of vermiculite, such that there are at least 4 inches of vermiculite on all sides. Step 1 is for the reasons that Thomas stated previous to my post. Steps 2 and 3 are to prevent any Heat Affected Zone cracking resulting from welding on a tool steel anvil face. It sounds to me that the rock-on-steel rods are the high manganese, abrasion resistant rod. My understanding is that these do not get hard until there are hit HARD and REPEATEDLY, which means that they will dimple and warp when you hit them. Abrasives are almost useless on this stuff. I haven't heard of or used steel-on-steel hard facing rod, but by the sound of it, those may actually be what you want. If they have problems with cracking it may be because they're air hardening? If that's the case, I imagine that they will need a pre&post heat as described above will solve most of those problems. To be extra sure, you could take the weed burner and heat up the anvil again to temper that hardness out. Be aware that milling such surfaces without annealing may be a very expensive idea, as you would probably go through a few carbide end mills with this stuff, and that's with a good cutting oil.