DanielC

Ahh thanks for clearing that up. Since they are mimicking an Italian anvil any way it makes sense. I also just realised that once you strap the anvil down, regardless if it has feet or a solid base, it isn't going anywhere.

I would simply refine the base and remove the legs and add a proper plate-like stand. More surface area in contact with the stand seems more sturdy to me.

Very nice. I would not mind one of those in my shop at all. I especially like all the real estate on the face.

I have a problem myself. I was born with Poland syndrome, so I have been used to a much weaker side all my life. Within the past couple years I even injured my arm doing plumbing and it took a year or two to recover 80% of my strength without reinjuring. So naturally I have back issues. I have bouted with a pinched nerve in my shoulder blade on my weaker side having to be 'patched' going to the chiropractor. The muscle building in my good side has even caused my spine to bend and twist at the same time to be adjusted by the same chiropractor. It is also not possible to swing anything heavier than a 1lb hammer on the weak side for more than a few minutes. I simply use my good side and just grind through the burn when hammering, while lifting dumb bells in between heats. If I'm going to have one fully functional arm, may as well have a strong one.

There are plumbing supply warehouses in most towns/cities. They sell everything that is black iron because that is what is used to run gas lines (Which plumbers do) for many situations.

That's some crazy stuff there. Alright fair enough, thanks for the information. At any rate, it still looks neat on the coffee table, and I now have the corrected information. B)

I understand that many pieces of furniture and jewelry are created from glass that have been processed with slag to form types of slag glass. However... If you go here: http://dayoopers.com/glry50b.html These guys are stripping piles of slag build up from the 1800's and find chunks very similar to mine. They don't really look like big piles of trash from a glass creating company... EDIT: I am totally fine with being wrong in this. I just started researching it lastnight, so it's not like I have my credibility on the line. I just found several sources that say and show this stuff coming from foundries and lakes near foundries, and not from companies that turn it into the many products we see on the market today. Another source: http://spheremaker.com/blue-slag-glass-hunting-in-muskegon-michigan/

Well I just wanted to share something with everyone what I found rather interesting. I live in an old house that belongs to my neighbor. This house was his parent's house before he bought it, fixed it up, lived in it, and then built a house next door and moved into it. This house used to have a coal burning stove for heat, which I did not know until last night.... It started off with me forging last night, a now usual occurrence as of late. When I was done, I spread my coal out and waited for it to be safe to pull back into my garage. While I was waiting, I wanted to check on some d-con trays I put in my crawl space. In I went, and somehow I recognized a detail that I missed time and again all previous times going into my crawl space (Its more like a hunch forward and walk-space). My water heater sits in a squared off dug hole, and in that hole was clinker! Chunks of clinker all over. I picked some up, inspected it and knew for sure. After that, I looked up with my flashlight and there sat the source. What appeared to be a pillar previous times was actually the base of the chimney to an old coal burning stove of sorts. In that pillar was the clean-out door. I opened it, and chunks of clinker started rolling out. Interesting indeed. Living in NC, you do not often find anything coal related. My neighbors family is from Kentucky, and they often brought back coal (I found several softball and basketball sized chunks in my yard that they brought here 40 years ago). Inside the house has since been remodeled and all that is left is the brick bottom and on top of that is a big decorative (though working) wood stove. After being surprised enough by this find, I traveled further into my crawl space to inspect the several d-con trays. After seeing they took the bait, my flashlight came across something brilliant. Among the usual browns and grays of a typical crawl space (I plumb so I see lots of them) was something out of place. A brilliant blue caught my eye. Covered in dirt was this brilliant blue rock. Knowing that blue doesn't often just happen in nature, I knew it deff. something out of the ordinary and carried it out. This rock looked like it came off of an arctic glacier. I cleaned it off with soap and water, and here it is. Upon further research I found out it is slag glass, created from the slag of iron smelting at big smelting corps. This chunk is likely from the 60's or 70's in the Kentucky area. I will consult with my neighbor this week to find more information about it, but I thought it was pretty neat and wanted to share it with you guys. Thanks for reading.

Interesting topic. I too would like to see their results and your newly bought china anvil.

I may do that. Hopefully the wife wont mind. On a side note, I just got in a package of about 15lb. of useable Black Diamond, Simonds, and K&F hand files. 95% are all still sharp. $20 well spent.

So after chewing through some of my metallurgy book I realized I may have improperly hardened my tool. I have tested it without any problems (it wedges in every position except for one however) but I will have to either leave it or normalize it and harden again (to my untrained smithy mind that is what I am thinking).

Awesome! If I didn't get the crazy idea of quitting smoking 6 months ago I would try it.

Thank you both for the suggestions. I will surely see how it acts tomorrow. I am assuming the wedging would cause stress to one of the weaker areas of my anvil.

http://www.amazon.com/Metallurgy-Carl-Gunnard-Johnson/dp/082693482X/ref=la_B001KIAJCA_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1356894768&sr=1-1 I happened upon this book yesterday and have been reading it since. Sure its from the late 70's, but it has a lot of great information and a ton of phase diagrams and graphs. Any one else read it?

You're fine. You bring life to the thread! I thought your hot cut was a smart way to make a good, usable tool in a short time with metal that I didn't even think of turning into a cutter. And i learned about the curved edge hardy cut by reading Pugman's posts about Brian Bazaels hot cutters and why he curves his hardy cuts. My next hardy tool will be forged from the same steel (I have about 200lb of it). It really hardens well (file skips right off of it). Will get to try it tomorrow. The holidays have really been taking up my time! Thank you for the kind words.

So...any visible or technical critique of my tool? I noticed I should have made a better seat for the hardy above the shank. 7 hours of sweat it was.

My neighbor is my landlord, but we're both gun enthusiasts and more often than not are shredding a barrel full of sand with the various assault weapons at our disposal. No one messes with either of us, and he's 80% deaf any way, so I'm pretty clear to pound away at my anvil at any time. EDIT: Plus I live out in the country. Loud noises are expected.

Alright. What fun I had last night finally deciding on what this tool would be. I decided to not make a hot cut this time since I already have one, and will make one next time. This time I decided to make a fuller since I did not have one besides the cross pein on my #3 hammer. It took some time to draw out the metal and even still it is not symmetrical on both sides, but alas it was my first hardy tool and the top portion is what is important! I have some old files and new files (A few 8-10" files, a 14" file, and a whopping 18" file, barely used from my father long ago), and used a worn out one to do some hot rasping on the top of the fuller. Never done any hot rasping, and I am now hooked! I could not believe the metal I was moving with it. Much fun. After I had it roughly the way I wanted it, I brought it up to a dull orange heat and water hardened the top 1/3. I then took to the top with a general whet stone soaked in synthetic motor oil (Seems to work as good as any honing oil I've used) and went to town. After that was all said and done, I soaked the piece in vinegar (And I just remembered I have a whole liter of Glacial Acetic Acid! Next time.) over night. This morning I neutralized it with baking soda and rinsed it off, and took a wire brush to it. Came out great! Can't wait to use it!

So I wanted to try my hand on the creation of a hardy tool, and with limited stock, I seem to have made some headway. Using RR clips that are somewhere around .50-.60 of a % carbon, I decided to flatten it out to give me a workable form. I haven't been smithing for long, and I already notice that this steel is MUCH harder to work than the mild steel I am used to moving. I took it in stride and it honestly felt more fulfilling overall. After several hours of shaping the shank of the hardy tool, I finally went from a rectangle to a square (This took a lot of upsetting on my #165 China anvil since the shank if just squared would be too small for my hardy hole). Once I was pretty close to the size needed, I started to drive it through the hardy hole (Orange heat of course) of my sacrificial $50 #150 Fisher anvil. After several attempts, the hardy tool's shank came out as a success (Without any worry to my anvil). The shank is 13/16"x13/16" exactly and fits snug. After this, I estimated roughly how much extra I needed for the new tool and started to make the hot cut on an existing hardy cut I had for my #106 Peter Wright. It took several heats because I am not used to cutting such thick steel, and my existing cut is a straight edge, rather than a curved edge like Brian Bazael creates (exactly why I am making one) in is hot cutters, and it takes forever to cut flat surfaces as opposed to round stock with it. That is all I have for today since I simply ran out of time this evening. I plan on finishing it up tomorrow and posting results on here.

I did a quick search and apparently the issues are digitized (1996-2001). Heres July 2001 in the section about a post vise with pictures (at bottom): http://www.anvilmag.com/smith/107f2.htm Go here for the rest of the issues: http://www.anvilmag.com/bi.htm EDIT: Nevermind. They only have part 1 up and viewable. I now see the problem. Wish I could help further.

Thanks guys for the great feedback. I am enjoying this hobby more and more and this site has been a tremendous help!

Alright, I have been forging for a few weeks, and have worked with Charcoal, Anthracite coal, and more recently, Bituminous coal. Thanks to a local blacksmith in my area, I was able to take home ~375lb. of Coal, and boy it sure is a lot better! I have been working on repairing various tongs in my shop that I have recently acquired (making new rivets and re-bending/forging ends), and have made various tools to work my coal. I have made various nails and a few scrolls as well. To a close a friends' excitement, I also made a 3' rope gaff (Not pictured) out of 1/2" re-bar. All of these things have been fun, and I have learned quite a bit. I have also learned that once friends and relatives find out you work a forge, there is all sorts of things they want you to make! In practice for these various things I have tried my hand and arrow heads and even practicing twisting and shaping RR spikes. From the left arrow point to that RR spike is the order in which they have been forged. I could fill quite a few pieces in between each, but alas, they are either too big to be pictured together, or have been given away already!

I now own 3 anvils and soon a 4th. I am in love with Peter Wrights, hands down.

I just happened to have some Mobil 1 synthetic lying around that I've put in mine, haha. A little pricey but it's all I had!

The ASO has about a 40% rebound. Not the greatest. It has perfectly sharp edges and step though, and I'd rather get down hammer control on an ASO than my Peter Wright or Fisher. Any way I have sorted through the haul and had a question about a few things. Thank you nuge for answering my question about the squiggly clips being medium carbon steel. In the scrap there was also some "J" looking clips (I have 16 of them) along with the squiggly clips, and some humongous bolts (about 1-1.25" thick), and a few thick plates. I'm assuming these all came from the same place as the squiggly clips. Any idea about these? EDIT: Also, any idea of what kind of forge this is?