Foundryman

Great looking anvils there, all three of them look very usable, despite their age! Nice finds, you certainly know how to seek out the unique ones, whether it be age, size or shape/style!

We make our smaller hand bells, anything up to about 10" with patterns and cast in green sand, anything larger than that is made with what we call a "strickle" or "moulding gauge", which is basically a profile of one side of a bell, mounted vertically and rotated on a central axis to form the mould. I guess this is what you mean by a "sweep". These larger bells are moulded in loam, a sand/clay mixture which resembles mud, a much wetter than green sand casting would use. I'm glad you like it so much Owen, I've picked up a few more pieces since then. That's one of the perks of my job, access to the scrap metal bins! I'd still like to see what you've made with it, how'd the seax turn out? Sorry for the off-topic post, Simon.

At the foundry where I work our blacksmith regularly does forge welds that have to cope with high stress environments though I'm not sure whether or not this counts as industrial engineering. I work in a bell foundry (as a mould maker, not as the blacksmith sadly) and as well as casting bells of all shapes and sizes we supply all the related fixtures and fittings, including the clappers that strike the bells. Clappers were traditionally made from wrought iron though unless specially requested by the customer all modern bells are supplied with cast SG iron clappers instead. This is a googled picture of some wrought iron clappers so you can see what I'm talking about. These particular clappers have had a twist put into their shafts enabling them to strike the bell with a clean face as the balls do tend to deform after years of striking the hard bronze bells. When a bell is rung, the clapper strikes a bell once every 3 seconds or so, often for up to three hours at a time, this constant impact puts the wrought iron under a huge amount of stress and from time to time the shafts of the clappers will snap, that's where we come in. Broken clappers are brought to the foundry and where possible the broken ends are cleaned up, scarfed and forge welded back together, with the clapper then jumped up (upset) or drawn down to give the correct length clapper for the bell it belongs to. Sometimes because of the position or nature of the break it's not possible to weld up the broken halves and a new top end is forged from either pure iron or from the limited amount of "new" wrought iron that we have and forge welded to the remainder of the original shaft. Our blacksmith has been doing this for 30 years and not one of his forge welds have broken in that time, though he has worked on some clappers more than once where they've broken at a different point. Most of the clappers we work on were made in the last 150 years but every now and then we have some older ones come in, the oldest we've worked on were from around the 1300s, apparently that iron behaved beautifully under the hammer! I hope you will find this interesting, though I don't know if it's the example of forge welding in the modern world that you were looking for, but it shows that forge welding still has a role to play, even if it's just repairing and restoring items from the past.

Just a word of warning, I bought some tongs off the internet that were packed loosely in a box that was larger than necessary, when the box was delivered to me it was empty with a neatly punched hole in the side where the tongs went through! Pack them tightly with no room for movement and/or tape them to the box!

Uhm, we have two of the modern equivalents at the foundry where I work, not sure of their specific name, we just call them "mills", They're basically two heavy steel rollers in a steel drum that rotate breaking up and combining sand and clay for green sand casting. Apparently they help coat the sand grains with clay to help create a stronger mix.

Was interesting to see the brick making in that video too. There's a place about an hours drive north of London that still makes bricks that way, mainly special orders for building restoration jobs. It's good to see old crafts being preserved in these days of mass production, especially in industrialised countries.

Yup, sounds like it was galvanized cable to me, when you heat galvanized steel the zinc burns away, giving off yellow fumes which are really bad should you breath them in. Better put that bit of cable to one side and try again with a fresh, un-galvanized bit of cable.

Isn't that logo just a "K", that wasn't stamped in straight or particularly deeply at the top?

Tdaleh has it, they're called butchers block brushes, hope that helps you in your search.

That's really good for a first attempt, beats the hell out of the mangled piece of steel I ended up with when I first tried it, you should both be very proud, her of her work, and you of your daughter! That's a great PDF telling how to do a forged cross, wish I'd have come across it earlier! I learned how to do it from this video on youtube by Gary Huston, he has some great informative videos on his channel.

I'd say it's a forged wrought iron body for sure and if it's in Australia the chances are it was either made out there or in England I would think. The face looks suspicious to me though without a step, like it could possibly have been milled down, what is the rebound like? Some London pattern anvils were made without steps but they don't pop up that often in my limited experience.

Excellent thread Owen, it's great to see people's swords coming together, keep up the good work, you're a great teacher!

She's wearing gloves, boots, glasses and ear protection, short of a full face shield and maybe a leather apron I don't see what more she could do. Anyway, congrats on the anvil and on a good days work, now to get some iron hot and get pounding!

I believe that's a clinker breaker not an air valve, give it a wiggle and your clinker breaks up and falls into your (metal) bucket beneath the forge. The air flow comes through the horizontal pipe.

Another one popped up on UK Evilbay, this anvil also has bolt lugs in the base but doesn't appear to be the same as the one listed at the start of this thread, it looks similar to a fisher except for the writing all over it, could this be one of the BK anvils mentioned by njanvilman?

I would suggest working instead of working out. If you want to use a 5-6lb hammer for forging then use one. The best way to condition your body to a certain task is by performing that task, so leave the weights where they are, light the forge, pick up a hammer and get swinging! I have friends that spend 2-3 evenings a week at the gym, I always tell them that my forge is my gym when they suggest I should join them there. Besides, forging is so much more fun!

It might also be worth mentioning that if you do want to buy a second hand "real" anvil, they hold their value. Providing it's not abused, if your son looses interest you'll be able to sell it for what you paid for it, even for a profit if you got a good deal.

You did a good job saving that thing, it most likely belongs in a museum! Beautiful stake anvil, congratulations on your find (and rescue!).

I have seen a Fisher listed on ebay in the past, the seller mentioned that it had brought over by the Americans during WWII I think. That one looks odd though, it seems to lack a step/table, or maybe it's just not very pronounced.

Cool looking pokers guys, I've only been forging for about a year and only ever made one poker. I made this last Christmas as a gift for my girlfriend's parents, the only people I know that use a log burning fire. The log puller is riveted on with copper rivets, partly because i thought it'd be a nice feature, and partly because i didn't know how to forge weld successfully when i made it. The handle is made from brass and bog oak. Hope you guys like it, Simon.

Sadly in the UK we cant shoot anyone, full stop. Hand guns totally illegal for civilians and rifles/shotguns are strictly licensed. However i would recommend that you start restoring bear traps just inside the door of your workshop.

Interesting design, french? Those radii look useful!

Well if it does go missing, I wouldn't pick a fight with the guy that could carry it off that's for sure. That's one beast of an anvil Owen, congratulations on your find, Simon.

I'm no welder but as far as I'm aware you need to pre-heat the anvil (at least the area to be welded) to about 400 degrees before welding a big lump of iron like that or the weld quality will be compromised. I'm sure someone with far more experience than myself can confirm this. It's a nice looking anvil, shame about the crack though.

I love the Austrian pattern ones, which i believe are sometimes referred to "church window anvils" though I've never seen one in the flesh. They're very common in my other half's homeland so I'm hoping she can source one for me one of these days. I found this photo on google to show the style i mean.