devon blacksmith

The anvils we have here are mostly mounted on angle iron frames and this stops all the ring ,the anvils on the tree stumps ring a little, I personaly find the wood mounted anvils have a better rebound and therfor are lighter work when forging,

Hi can you tell me why you are trying to do this is it to stop ringing or some thing else?

I have made this shape a lot of times for replacement fire places. In my forge we would hand roll something like this with shaped rolls or forge under the fly press a small piece at a time,

Hi Dave I am just up the road from you well just north of Exeter and have three power hammers that I let local smiths use if you would like to come over and have a look you would be welcome most of the stone masons that I work with use a company up the road http://http://www.averyknight.co.uk/construction-engineering/stonemasons-tools-materials.html might give you an idea of what's about.

"Problem is the few minutes of voluminous amounts of smoke! Anyone got any smoke free starting suggestions for coke?"


most of the smoke could be from the paper and can be burnt off. if you reduce the air soon after the fire catches and only have a small amount of coke on top flames will appere on top of your lit fire, sometimes we have to place a piece of lit paper up the flue the start the smoke flowing up.

Hi I think thay are a tool of two leavers if you look at spining on utube thay use something like this on larger jobs.

I would use a bolster for suporting whilst punching and a header to head bolts and rivets the header is a lot smaller than the bolster as you need to angle the blows to form the head ,if you used the wide flat plate of a bolster desined to suport the punched piece you could not form a good shape of head.

I think it depends on what you make and the type of gear you have some things are quicker to forge than forge/fab, IE if it is hot from forging then it is quicker to punch a hole than to let cool down and drill or if you are at the forge making parts that nead to be welded then it is likely that fire welding would be quicker than welding (mig or stick etc) then grinding.you have to work quickly to make any money in any case, if you choose your customers correctly with targeted marketing you can choose the type of work you do and therefore the type of machines to use or not. here in the UK there is a growing market for quality work that lasts and dose what it sez on the tin.

The kind of hold down I use to hold work on the anvil is a flat forklift chain with a stirrup so you can put your foot through it in order to put pressure on ,i have found this is the most secure type. the goose neck devices I have found are not as good for some work but quick and simple to make and use.

another way is with fast and loose pulleys to turn the drive on and off

Whats a good way to determine the best height for the top of the anvil on a power hammer? I have a chunk of steel 44" long and I want to use as much as possible.

You could use all of your steel and set the bottom end into the floor.

yes you can forge weld stainless I forge stainless and mild steel to make damask patern blades etc in a coal forge with a flux for welding cast iron the stainless is old butchers hacksaw blades (magnetic)

I remember B.A.B.A doing an artical on this and it seemed to have now answer, but this was a few yeas ago perhaps there has been some progress,if any one is intrested I will look it out.

I bend the shafts to 90 then upset the end then straighten them probably not the best way but very quick and easy.

wire brush your work every time it comes out of the forge before you hit it Brush while the steel when good and hot,also are you useing coal or gas.

How tall is your flue? is it beond the ridge of you building is it afected by cooling how far is the hood from the fire how steep is the slope of the hood all of these and a lot more can stop the flue working properly,

EN6=1030
EN8=1040
EN9=1055
EN19=4140
EN24=4340
EN34=4620
any more?
Spring steel anything from 1095,5160, 9260,

Hi all has anyone built a cnc plasma cutter?

You could hot cut if you are going to forge it anyway.

yes it Is possible to gas weld real wrought iron but it depends on the quality of the iron as to how tricky is it, some of the low grades have a lot of slag in them that can melt at a lower temp than the iron and start to run out so you need to match the wrought iron filler rod to the iron of the piece you are welding.if you use mild steel filler rod the iron melts first.

To have the edges to form a shoulder or a 90 bend you can just make a hardy tool that is in line with the edges of the anvil I make these blocks up for the apprentices to use until there hammer control stops them dinging the face.

Yes it is this type of press I am looking into but probably a large one depending on whot thay can do.

Has anyone any experience of friction screw press ?

Hi befor I had my first power hammer I used the fly press to do a number of things that I now do with the hammers (blacker hammers) punching,rivet makeing,ball makeing,etc

We make small square holes through round bar for door latches we just drill and drift to the right size cheap and quick.if the out side neads to be acurate as well I would turn them down to size after.