Nobody Special

Yardbird Forge. My ex used to keep and sell ungodly numbers of chickens, and occasionally one would get out and do unspeakable things to my anvil. I keep a few now, partly to keep the current wife happy, partly for the eggs, and partly because watching bald eagles bounce off of box wire trying to eat my birds is funny. It doesn't hurt them, but it annoys the heck out of 'em. One actually bent the wire last week trying an assault from above.

Or you could use the ashes to make soap. And that's no lye.

Gadget, have you tried blown air over charcoal? Since the first time I tried it 10 years or so ago, I haven't looked back. I had expected it to take similar times to my propane torch. Instead I melted the steel crucible (which I don't recommend for a number of reasons, this being one of them) and had about five or six lbs of molten aluminum running out of the drain hole less than three minutes after putting the crucible in. Worked a treat for copper and bronze once I slowed things down and used proper crucibles.

I was reading a Roman casting technique just today involving urine. I'll have to look it up and bring it back here. They also had a neat technique I like for separating lead ores from silver, by melting the whole, then deliberately introducing impurities and skimming off the lead oxides. Lots of fun.

Another solution is to counterweight a board on a fulcrum with something that can be removed in parts. When it balances, remove the counterweight a bit at a time, then add up the bits. An alternate to my alternate? Use a BIG board and the counterweight is a water container, or something else you know the weight of. If you measure as you add, you know how much weight you've added. Water is a bit light for big weights, at "a pint a lb", (well, 1.04 lbs), a 400 lb anvil would require 50ish gallons of water to even out. What an enviable problem to have. It's like havi

Funny looking thing, isn't it? Definitely looks like a "real" anvil, but maybe one that was heavily modified. Honestly, looks like somebody took a Trenton, chopped the bottom inch or so off, welded a couple of feet on either side at the bottom, and drilled the hardy out, stopping only to flap disc the heck out of the horn. I'd take it, but I'm a sucker for abused and mangled anvils.

Also the wild emotional swings, loss of impulse control, easy distraction, aphasia in areas that use to be easy...it's the gift that keeps on giving. My wife is a TBI survivor (kicked in the head by a horse), and goes into a blind rage about five times a week or so. Can be for good reasons or lousy ones, may last 5 minutes or 50 until the circuit breaker resets, thinks it's perfectly logical until it's over, then sometimes doesn't even know remember it. I can't count all the times she threatened divorce, and she actually got to the courthouse and filed papers twice before she came back to h

I thought about playing with bone meal as a flux or to play with old style case hardening...and then I remembered what it smelled like whenever I heated up bone or antler for burn ins, to drill pin holes, or to cut it down for handles. Smelled like burnt hair run through a full litter box in a crowded chicken coop in August.

Just once, I'd love to see a post that said, "Hey, just wondering guys, if anyone knew if it was possible to get with a reputable foundry and for $30,000 or so and cast a small run of double horn anvils using H-13 or some other air hardening steel. If I could participate in some small way outside of design, that would be fantastic!" Instead, it's always, "Hi guys, I saw a YouTube video, and I was just wondering how to go about melting the souls of my enemies, unicorn tears, and some rebar by buddy Joe gave me into a useable three bladed sword made of Valerian steel using a Balrog

What a pretty little Trenton, and in California too. You must have lived a good, clean, wholesome life. My second thought was that somebody didn't love it very much. Too much cold work on it, left all those little rings and wallowed out the hardy hole some. Looks like you cleaned up some mushrooming too, and they got welding spatter on the feet. Poor little guy. Fortunately Trentons will take some abuse if it's not applied wholesale. Keep it warm and feed it lots of hot metal daily until it feels better. Nice find.

Fair enough, what's one more Ancient One? And besides, careers in advanced electric trends towards the mystical, eldritch, and devolved anyways. What was the original question again?

You clean the parts to be joined, very very clean. Then you heat to about cherry red, take a fast pass with the scale brush, and add copper, brass, bronze, or whatever you're joining it with. You can use other non-ferrous metals, but copper or brass works fine is tough, and takes some heat. You will likely want to wire it together before the initial heat so that they're held in place together. Anywho, rambling a bit. Add your non-ferrous metal, a bit of flattened pipe, wire, or brazing rod, and put it back in the fire until it melts and joins the pieces. I've seen it done with brass p

I'm not about to complain. If Yog Sothoth and the Goat with a Thousand Young don't insist on GFCIs, then I'm in, regardless of how many dimensions the build is in.

I don't suppose it could be a political token, could it? 1912 was a hotly contested election year. Please, no discussions of politics of less than 100 years ago.

That's why you need the unicorn blood, naturally. Allows for pattern welding of wootz without resolving the carbides into nothingness. The fact that it's glittery and rainbow colored is simply an aesthetic bonus. You could use griffin spoor, but that leads to undesired traces of phosphorus, and a stinky blade. For something a design that complex, I second casting. Although if cast separately and attached, I would have serious concerns about it cracking or becoming damaged upon striking.