Avadon

Does anyone have pics or links to their overhang? I'm thinking about building one in my backyard. Sort of like a small pole shed without any walls. Just a place to place my forge under and work under in protection from rain/sun/elements. What is the name of this type of shed/shelter?

That's crazy. For $200.00 you could just find yourself a giant chunk of steel and mount it, or hardface it if your really particular. I wouldn't pay much more then 80$ for 60#'s of mass, unless it was some extremely high end jewelers anvil.

How are you making the shanks on these? Do you just heat and hammer the work into the hardy hole? Or are you trying to square this up by hammer and eyeball for a relative fit?

Interesting thread. I always wondered about this. I mean most of us work with fire, saws, hammers, and other tools that do not forgive any mistakes. I wondered what I would do if something more severe happened to me. I think at the core of a blacksmith is a very ingenious and inventive personality. I honestly think it wouldn't slow most of us down. If there is a will there is a way. In my 32 years i've come to realize physical injuries heal much faster then many emotional ones. On a daily basis I work in my shop with moderate Raynauds. I have to take a lot of breaks if my feet and hands start going south on me. I put up with extreme freezing/burning feelings in the winter from the lack of circulation and in summer I put up with more of the red and burning hands and feet because of the disorder. It is loads of fun, especially when it hinders me walking around a large store for more then a few mins. I have to sit down and wait for the Raynauds attack to settle. It's been a few years with it and all I can do is basically cope with it. I've tried all the medicine and i'm waiting for something more effective, with less side effects, to come down the pike.

Glad my info cleared some of the air on Class 3 stuff.

Only 1000 miles in 12 days? I did 4000 in 11 days for one vacation.

I have a feeling it was probably closer to 1500 but hard to say. Sure felt like 4000. Keep in mind just before this I drove 3200 miles cross country. So i've really been feelin it.

How hot, and dry was it? Its been in the high 100's here - 113.Although the past few days have been 106 and 44% humidity-monsoon season here. Being dry is why I moved to the desert-less mold,mildew, rust, etc. The heat, well I could do with it being a little cooler, but it is only for 3 months that we have to deal with daily 100's.

Those freaky Ren, etc. folks may be some of your best customers. I am also on the leatherworker.net forum and one guy made $30,000 last year making Star Wars items, and his sales are still going up.

What about the Klamath Falls area? High Desert, but there are properties around. You also have Klamath Lake.

You may want to contact various chambers of commerce to see how many visitors they get, average in dollars spent, etc. What is the median income for the area? Are the residents permenent, or snow/sun birds? Being in a touristy place may be better for sales with the increased visitors from out of town.

Some places may even help move you out to get you in their city. I knew a businessman back in CA who contacted several cities in S.Dakota, and Colorado, and they were throwing all kinds of deals at him to get him to relocate to their city. Tax incentives, moving expenses paid, property deals, etc. With the economy the way it is they may welcome ANY business that wants to come in.

Wow, I never heard of such thing, except for major businesses. That is phenemonal!

Sounds like you and I are kind of similar in our views on politics, religion, places to live,etc. I wanted to be close to a metro area, but I didn't want to live in one. I enjoy running into Las Vegas,but I don't see myself living there. I live 50 miles out in a small valley with around 7,200 POP. We have a grocery store, 2 hardware stores (the ACE has a better selection of firearms than the Vegas gun stores do ), couple of restaurants, and some small Mom & Pop's.

Not being religious I am somewhat out of place in a heavily Mormon community, but we all get along. There is a real sense of community here, and a lot of pride in our little valley. We are having some battles with the county as they try and impose Vegas style regs on us. We are not Vegas, and want to be left alone out here in our rural lifestyle. So, check into local politics in the areas that you are considering, and don't take what you see at face value. We are looking into incorporating to get out from under Clark County. This has all been brought on by a county commissioner who lives out here , and has the idea that this is HIS town. We don't have enough votes out here to boot him out, and he knows that N.LV will keep him in, so he keeps messing with us. Talk with the local business owners to get a feel for the local politics, what is going on, what may be coming down the road, etc. This isn't like you are just moving to live there, you are relocating a business. Even though you operate on the internet, if you can make local sales too, why not? JPH told me that part of having his smithing business he is required to use propane-no coal allowed. So check into local regs on home based business, again what you think should be may not. Even out where I am we are bound by county regs which seems stupid to me and others, but that's the way it is.

Good luck in the search.

Dang, Avadon - You outta be writing for a travel guide! Nice pics too.

When you've lived in one place all your life, it's always interesting to hear someone else's impression. Larry's right, a drive-by never gives you the insight that being local provides but I think you did a bang-up job of a check out based on what you're looking for.


No matter where you end up we're down right glad to have ya!

The NWBA has a conference in October at Stevenson Wa. Try to make it up if you can - I'll buy ya a beer!

Thank you all for putting in good input. First let me just say that the following is only my opinion and anyone looking to migrate to the pacific NW really needs to get in a car and drive it all and even get out and put your feet to pavement to see where they seem to stick the best. So I please don't get offended if I didn't find where you live appealing. Different strokes for different folks. Just my personal opinions and preferences. Now for those willing i'll relay my exhausting 12 days in the car, and what must have been easily as much as 1000 miles of traversing the Pacific NW.

I first left Bend, OR and headed down to La Pine. I've lived in Bend before and it is a beautiful easily navigatible small town of 80K and has had it's waxing and wayning of growth. At one time Bend and Redmond were the fastest growing cities in Oregon. I think the housing and economy issue has changed that. Bend is quite chilly in the winter as it is high desert and can be baking hot in the summer. The dryness of the high desert can sometimes be a bit much. A lot of houses have built in humidifiers, others use them in their bedroom. Think lotsa lotion and sunscreen because Bend, Redmond, and central oregon boasts 300+ days of sunshine a year. The clearness in the winter helps make it rather cold. Bend generally doesn't get a lot of snow but it can get some. Up towards the mountains, sunriver and lapine and sisters it gets far more.

Driving from Bend I saw Diamond Lake which is just impressively beautiful was actually very warm which surprised the heck out of me as so many lakes in Oregon are really cold (mountain run-off), to cold to swim, even in the summer. From Diamond Lake I drove through Medford and Grants pass. I honestly thought I'd like this area more then I did. Of course it was a heat wave so that detracted a little. But the overall dryness of the area, heatwave aside, is evident, and to me it seemed like a destination mimicing central oregon, only west of the cascades. Some might like that, but as i've lived in dry areas before it didn't appeal as much to me as I thought. I even drove out to Jacksonville which is a cute little city. Not a lot out there as far as stores, just little country shops, post office, etc. No chain stores. Somewhat touristy as well. I drove out to the HWY 238 out to Applegate. This is a long narrow highway that locals call the Bannana Belt. It has it's own little micro climate which is a little more wet then surrounding areas. Of course this is no secret and housing prices in this area aren't very cheap. But they get better as you get towards grants pass. You are, however, on a long stretch of highway which doesn't make it a bit of a drive back to a decent size city. After checking it out, it just didn't seem like my thing. The areas of medford and grants pass are fairly conservative and religious. Lots of Christian religious billboards around. Some more menacing and provocative than others. As a free-thinker, respecter of all religions, and someone who's not personally religious it was a little presumptuous and off-putting to me. Mileage may vary with that.

It was so hot down there in medford/grants pass that I headed out to the Oregon Dunes which are just beautiful. Try to go to the camping areas that aren't meant for dune buggies and motocross and you can see some beautiful nature, otherwise you'll probably only hear groaning engines. The lighthouses out there are brilliant and really bring you back to a different time. Many smiths here said Coos bay was on the list of places to see so I did drive through there. Coos bay is exceptionally beautiful and has water everywhere. With that beauty though comes a vast remoteness. You're quite far from Eugene and Grants pass. Stores out there are locally owned for the most part. Places are little older and more historic which may or may not appeal to people. Seemed a little economically depressed out there. Sure was beautiful and peaceful. Fairly dense forested out there so I didn't see much open land for small ranches but i'm sure there are some small acred properties around. The remoteness of it though made it unappealing to me personally. Driving hours just to get to a target or walmart when I need something seemed to just be unacceptable. Retiree's do settle out there. Some really like it, others find that being way out there isn't all it's cracked up to be. Again mileage will vary. I would definitely rent in a place like that before I bought.

From Coos Bay I drove into Eugene. Kind of a drive coming in from the coast. It starts getting less foggy and a little less rainy. As I drove in I came to areas like Crow, Veneta and the western part of Eugene. Ultimately this is the area I found I liked best out of everything I saw. I grew up near Pasadena, CA and Eugene has a similar size and feel. Very multi-national, progressive, liberal (and some conservative) place. You can see that it's very much a salad bowl of different beliefs, races, religions and walks of life. I really liked that as it seemed like the city has some real culture and there is always some fun event going on. There is some faery, renissance, pirates ball, etc etc. strange convention thing going on in august there. lol Lets just say that I don't think one would get bored there, nor would it be overly stuffy. The big selling point for me in Eugene was Fern Ridge Reservoir. That place is EPIC! This is a large local sun-tanning, boating, swimming, all around having a ton of fun place. Lots of college kids there and lots of bronze tans and abs. lol I felt pudgy, but then again most of these kids have 10 years to their advantage. haha. The water in Fern Ridge is quite warm for Oregon lakes and you can really spend the entire day there. If I was rich i'd buy as close to the lake as I could. But i'm guessing somewhere 10-15 mins circumference around this area will find something in my price range. There is steel suppliers in this area, there is access to nation-wide chains throughout eugene, movie theatres, fast food, etc. Very progressive place and with still room to grow and doesn't have the enormous hussle and bussle that portland/vancouver metro has. For this reason i'm about 90% sure i'll find myself there. Any local smiths feel free to get in contact with me. Maybe I can get to the conferences or help in any way I can. I sell on the internet so I'm not competing in the local theatre so I shouldn't offer any intimidation to anyone.

I will say this. Downtown Eugene can be a little on the bohemian, hippy, grungy side. I saw one guy wearing a hat that looked like it was made out of horse hair. lol Yah sorta strange folk down there. Not really my thing, but if it's yours, thats cool. There are however a great deal of health food, herbal supplement type stores, vegetarian/vegan restaurants and a plethora of cuisine styles. I really think you can find just about anything your hungry for in such a cultural hub, asian, indian, italian, mexican, thai, japanese, greek, etc. with relative ease. So if your into healthy living this may be the jewel of the NW.

My voyage didn't stop in Eugene. I went on from Eugene to see Corvalis. I didn't spend more then a day or two in Corvallis. I didn't really feel the town itself was big enough for me to want to live on the outskirts. But there are a lot of farms and acred properties around the area. I went to Bald Hill County Park. Kind of a neat little hike, some of it paved, the rest is a good hike up in there. I'd suggest going with friends as it's several miles up in there and because of heat and wildlife (black bears/cougars or snakes) would be best not to hike alone. It was bakingly hot while I was in there at about 3pm and a serious workout. Very rural out that way.

From there I went out and saw Newport and drove up the Oregon Coast. Mostly just to escape the heat. It is pretty out there but not much in the way of anything town/citylike. I came back in on Hwy18 and crashed for the night in Mcminville. From there I checked out several towns I thought could offer some hope. They were towns on the outskirts of hillsboro/forest grove which is a western burb of portland. I've lived in Hillsboro before and it is growing fast and no longer a place where deals are to be had. The area around 185'th and even going west into hillsboro is getting built up fast. Excellent in-town living if that's what your looking for but for a smith it would be impossible. Acres around hillsboro or forest grove would be quite expensive. Better off trying to rent an industrial shop space. Anyhow, the areas I drove through were Carlton, Yamhill, and Gaston. I was fairly surprised at just how rural these areas were. I mean in some places there was nothing more then 2 or 3 stores, as in a post office, micro-mart, and maybe a bar or coffee shop. You might be 30 mins plus to anything more. That may or may not be acceptable to you with some of these burbs on the outskirts of portland suburbs. The outskirts to me just seemed to far out there. But beautiful rolling hills for endless miles all out that way. The further you go into forest grove the more rural it gets while eastern hillsboro is far more trendy, western hillsboro a little more town-like.

From here I went on to check out Banks Oregon. Banks is really pretty and right on HWY 26 (sunset highway) which gives you the ability, when traffic is light, to rocket right into Portland in probably less than 40mins. Of course traffic is usually present at most expected rush hour times. Banks is definitely pretty but it's not a secret and finding some acres around there isn't going to be a steal but it might be worth trying to leverage a reasonable rental rate. There isn't a great deal in Banks, just a few local stores. Commute to forest grove or hillsboro are going to offer shopping and most living supplies. Steel yards of course in Portland. Hillsboro/Forest Grove have Airgas and good tool stores. I used to live in Hillsboro and I did enjoy it, great place to live if your not metal pounding and love to be close to it all.

After Banks I headed up to Vernonia. As I made the drive passing buxton and manning up the long windy drive to Vernonia I started to realize flat out this was just getting to remote for my personal tastes. Remote without much of a purpose either as it seemed to be going up an artery that wasn't very fast to get back and forth from. When I got to Vernonia it was early in the morning and misty up there. Really quaint little town up there and I was surprised that there is actually a little strip up there of stores. Lotsa logging trucks heading in and out of this area. If you were looking to get away and live up in the woods undisturbed by anyone then I might very well reccomend this area. It is quite remote and surrounded by endless forest. I didn't spend to long there. For giggles I decided to continue on and jump over the range on the 47 and out the long drive on the 30 to Astoria. I had a few reccomends in here for Astoria so I figured it was worth a shot. It was very cold and clammy out there when I got there. Astoria has a small little town. Seemed to be quite a few foreclosures out there. Again it's another small city that's really from most anywhere. Your a good 1:30 back to Portland. I didn't see a lot of chain stores out there so your prolly just stuck with whatever is locally owned. Lots of ship yards so I gather you could get gas/supplies/salvage/steel without to much work but you probably are limited in suppliers. A lot of the town seemd landlocked, that is you got the ocean and hills right next to it so people are in small houses up on the hills. I'm sure there are acres to be had somewhere, but I didn't see them driving through. It didn't really meet my looking criteria (close to a medium city, access to regular chain stores, suppliers, etc). If you like coastal living though this may be the best best in Oregon as I think your going to find the most people/city/shopping of anywhere along the coast. Definitely seemed more lively then Coos bay, but not by much.

For some reason I thought it would be fun to drive across the bridge (101). It is an incredible bridge that spans out to washington there. Everyone should drive that once. It's like entering a giant steel snake. The amount of metal in that bridge is impressive. It's terrifically long. From there though I underestimated how long it would take on the 401/4 all the way back to Longview WA. That was a fairly serious drive. Again if your out on the oregon or washington coast in those areas expect to be as remote as it looks on google. I mention longview because I was rather impressed with that area. It does seem clean and a cool feel. Definitely check out Lake Sacajawea right next to St. John medical center. That is one really impressive park, fun to walk around, and has all sorts of people jogging around it and fishing in it. Trying to find a bathroom there though was ridiculous, hopefully they change that. That park has some great landscaping and long paved paths as well as trails. I'd certainly imagine small acred properties are available on the outskirts of the area.

Leaving longview I went on to Amboy. A lot of things Chyancarrek (Neil) said about it made my ears perk up. It is definitely a neat place. Something I think smiths in Washington might want to take a hard look at. It's probably only about 40 mins to Vancouver from Amboy. Amboy down to battleground was only about 21 mins. In battleground there is most everything you'd ever need. Good size city down there. Amboy has some fairly forested areas as well as some rolling hills in there. As Neil said there is a mix of property types at differing elevations for reasonable price. In Amboy itself there is not much, just a post, grocery, and a few other little things. There are two massive lakes just north of Amboy that might interest fishers, water ski-ers, etc. Swimming there I could only find at one end. Most of the area is cliffs so I didn't find it terribly accessible. Probably easier to find the sweet spots for swimming and hiking in if your local. Water was a little cold but definitely swimable without wetsuit. The deal breaker for me with Amboy was just that the ways in and out were on the 503 and the cedar creek rd. Both seemed a little to much of a drive on smaller roads for me. I wanted to be closer to some more main roads where you can fly back into the city at a more reasonable highway speed. Again this is just my preference. All of these places someone has to see for themselves. I'll say this though, Amboy is definitely impressive in that Mt. St Helens is like literally right there. Almost scarily right there. I came around a corner and BAM there it was. Enormous! Hope it doesn't erupt lol.

So if you think this description sounds long then you should have been in the car with me for 12 days to see just how really long it was haha.. After Amboy I was just a broken man. I started heading back at this point but I was so impressed with Eugene I came back and swam in Fern Ridge Resivoir again, soaked up the sun and mostly vegged out at a hotel room enjoying excellent food, excercise, sun, and swimming. Not a bad way to end it. From there I drove back to Bend to relax.

If anyone wants more info on any specific area simply PM me and I can give more detail as well as pics of most of the areas. I can give my unbiased, or biased opinion whichever you like. I certainly have a good idea of the terrain and areas of Oregon and southern Washington now. The only place I didn't look at was going up north onto the washington peninsula up towards Port Townshend and Port Angeles. After seeing Astoria I just felt like those areas are more remote, excluded from chain-type stores, and going to be harder to socialize, find supplies, get to and from bigger cities, etc. I've been up that way before and it is, hands down, the most beautiful place (imo) in the entire NW, but with all that fantasy faery forest beauty you get very sparse towns and remoteness. That may or may not work for a smith, or for anyone for that matter. So for now I relegate the WA peninsula as a great vacation destination but not the best place for me to live and work. I think finding a paycheck out there would be difficult and even working from your home may or may not be difficult depending on what you do.

I'll try to attach some pics for novelty sake, but if you want to see em all just give me a private message and i'll zip them for you.

Avadon

When it comes to purchasing class 3 weapons, it is a lot different than standard firearms.

1st category is fully transferable. These can be purchased by anyone in a state that allows them. There is a full FBI background check, and a $200 tax stamp that is charged by the BATFE. All of theses guns will be pre-May 1986 manufacture, as that is when the ban on manufacture, and importation of MG's for civilian sales went into effect.These are the most expensive; $3,000 for a MAC10, $15,000 for an AK47, $30,000 for a Thompson, and waaaay up for the more exotic items like a GE Minigun of which there are only 12 fully transferable. If you have to ask you can't afford it. Lets just say in some parts of the country you could buy a very nice house for the same money

2nd category is pre 86 DEALER sample. For these you need a letter from a police, or other gov't agency requesting a demo of that weapon. You need to be a class 3 dealer to get these. You do the demo, and you can keep the firearm if you give up your license at a later date. These can only be transfered through dealers.These are not quite as high $$$ as the fully transferables due to the limited market.

3rd category is Dealer samples. These can be new manufactured, and when you give up your license you have to destroy, or sell the gun to another dealer. Lowest cost per firearm due to very low secondary market. We bought new from the Zastava factory in Yugoslavia AK47's for $150 each.

Short barreled shotguns/rifles, destructive devices,suppressors, etc have the same $200 tax stamp. AOW's (any other weapon) such as the Serbu Super Shorty 12ga, pen guns, cane guns, etc have a $5 transfer fee.

I hear machine guns being shot in my little valley from time to time. Less now that ammo prices have jumped - 7.62x39 is no longer $60 a 1,000 A GE minigun will digest 308 at a rate of 3,000-4,000 a minute depending on the motor speed that is set. M2HB.50 cal 550 a min. M3.50 cal 1100 a minute. You get the idea, some of these are very expensive to keep fed.

Washington had some screwy gun laws, so check to see if anything you have may be considered illegal. IIRC just having the full auto parts (auto sear, etc) from a parts set is illegal.

Well I hope that wasn't too long winded for ya.

That is certainly something to consider Rob. Maybe I can find something with a small down payment. I really don't plan on moving anytime soon.

@ BIGGUNDOCTOR .. now talking about guns.. that's just hitting below the belt. lol Yes I am torn between my love of guns and my desire to live in the pacific nw. Can you really own sub-machine guns? Don't they have to be pre-1970's or something? You can't just order up an MP5 in Nevada can you? I thought you had to have a 16" or longer barrel?

It cost about $6,000 to get that 16,000lb of stuff from mass back to the west coast. Yikes! It filled a pup-type trailer which is like 2/3's the size of a full semi-trailer. I did use a bobcat to forklift it up in there. Really was helpful. For only about $350.00 it saved the day. You gotta be really careful with the bobcat though and lifting heavy stuff. It's mandatory to keep people away from the load.

Eugene and Medford I haven't totally ruled out. Can anyone tell me of places around either where there are ~5 acre homes? It's hard to get to there and figure out where the good outer areas of these smaller cities are.

Thanks for the excellent replies all. Seems like many of my hunches were confirmed. In about 10 days or so i'm going to make a drive from Bend, Oregon up over the cascades to medford. From there check out eugene, salem, Western outskirts of portland, and the WA peninsula. I have about two weeks to do this in so I should be able to see a few places.

I'm sure alaska is absolutely beautiful and land is cheap up there. I am however highly allergic to negative temperatures. Even though most here would mortgage their homes to see frosty's setup and watch him work, Alaska is just to far and cold. So far i've only lived in Hillsboro Oregon for a few years and in central oregon. Central oregon Bend and Crooked River Ranch/Terrebonne is about the coldest area I am entertaining. I prefer west of the cascades for health reasons (circulation issues). What chyancarrek said was very interesting to me. Can you tell me more about that area SW of St. Helens? I have a very similar setup. I sell tools online and ship worldwide through usps so trying to find work local would only be for supplemental income. I love guns (yah I know that's strange for a liberal lol) so being close to a shooting range would only be a benefit. Of course Washington has more restrictive gun laws. I don't really need to be in or near a community of local blacksmiths even though it would be nice. I wouldn't be competing with them locally.

So far I have actually seen some places in a low price range that were either stick built or manufactured homes. They were really nice roughly modern homes on Crooked River Ranch (north of Redmond/Central Oregon)

They were...
2,3, and 4 bedroom houses
1-5 acre properties
2 Car garages
(some with an exterior barn/shop)

They ranged in prices from about $70-$150,000. Even though i'm not really looking to buy right now I can infer that rentals would be $700-$1000 range which is more in my budget rather then try to find $1000.00 plus which is going to kill me once I start stacking utilities and business expenses on that.

Now if anyone knows of places like this west of the cascades from grants pass, OR all the way up to port towsend WA i'd love to hear about that!! Also if anyone has experience with Port Angeles and Port Townsend i'd love to hear it. It looks dry on the weather map (averages) but i've heard there is fog/mist? And as frosty said I wonder about mold.

Also what makes Astoria pretty good?

I don't need access to coal, but being somewhat near (30-45 mins) to a steel supplier would be good. Also I can't be to far from some sort of gas supplier. I need propane for my forges and for welding/heating. (Argon, Oxy, Acet, Propane)

The Ideal would be... (and i'm dreaming here )
5 Acres
2 or 3 or 4 bedroom (stick built or manufactured)
1.5-2 bath
2 Car Garage
within 30-45 mins of a city (even if it's a small 30-100,000 population city)
less than 45 mins to a steel and gas supplier.

And rent that is $700-$1100 range

My last shop in cape cod, MA was only a little bit bigger than a single car garage and I did an amazing amount of work there. From forging, to welding, to grinding and heating. These pictures are after I painted and was leaving. New tennants never knew there was a small industrial factory in their basement. 10 days of painting and cleaning removed all traces.

Thanks for the help. Keep any good ideas coming :)

Hello all,

Sorry I haven't been on much lately. For the last month or two i've been in the process of a major move. I'm moving my entire shop to the pacific northwest. A long haul from Massachusetts, about 3200 miles to be exact. I've lived in Oregon before, Portland and Bend but I wasn't doing blacksmithing before. So I'm curious what are excellent places for blacksmiths to setup shop in either Oregon or Washington. I'm basically looking west of the cascades, from Medford going up north along I-5 off into the washington Peninsula. I'm not looking for anything in Tacoma or Seattle or north of seattle, nor eastern oregon or washington. Trying to stay more in the temporate zones.

My requirements are to do my smithing/metal fabrication at a rental house like I did previously for five years. Less expensive rental house on prefably a few acres in a country-esque location. I'm debating on if I need to be near a bigger city and/or how far away I can be an still have readily easy access to materials.

Places i'm considering are Medford, Eugene, Corvalis, Salem, Portland outskirts (west side.. like Banks/Cornelius), and the Washington Peninsula (Port Angeles, Port Townsend area).

If anyone knows any good information about these areas blacksmithing or has any good general advice about relocating an entire shop i'd love to hear it. Right now all my stuff is in an ABF storage container. 16,000lb of stuff.. mostly shop tools and machinery. I'm looking to move fairly permamently 5-10 years+ as setting up and breaking down a shop is a huge, huge, chore.

Thanks in advance for any good help.

I've made a couple of anvil stands. These are the things I believe are most important

#1. Overall Weight.. The heavier the stand weight the greater your total mass is going to be which means less work.

#2. Bond.. The stronger, tighter, or more joined the stand is to the anvil the more the hammer will see it as one solid mass. You'll have less vibration and less noise. A good silicone caulk or sikaflex is worth it.

After that I recommend getting as thick of metal as you can if your making a metal anvil stand. Use a good 1.5" - 3" thick piece of plate to set your anvil on. The more mass you have there right under the anvil the better. I put mine on a 2" piece of plate and one could even go thicker if one wanted. Also whatever tubing structure you use on your legs get as thick of a wall as you can. You won't regret it. I actually filled my legs and cross support with sand. I can pour it out if I ever needed to. It's not welded in. There are 3 fasteners acting like plugs at the tops of each legs where i poured it in. Like people have said constantly around here the more the anvil+stand is joined to earth the more effective it all will be. Even at 715lb's this gladiator+stand is better when it's anchored to the concrete. So if you can, bolt it down. I also highly recommend cross members on your legs. A failure of one of your welds could be catastrophic and could injure or kill someone. I highly recommend multi-pass welding. Steel anvil stands are one place where overkill is great. So make things beefy, especially with the heavier anvils 200-500lb+ range. See diagrams on the internet if your unfamiliar with laying down several lines of weld in joints. Only weld a metal anvil stand if your an experienced welder and your sure you can get excellent penetration. Pre-heating of thick materials 1/2" or greater is generally necessary and will help raise the material temp for better penetration. I can't recommend enough the use gusset plates around joined areas. Should part of a weld fail somewhere it can allow you to fix or repair the area before a catastrophic failure. It also adds incredible strength and reduces vibration. You see them on civil engineering structures all the time like bridges as well as aircraft framing.

Cheers -Av

Hi Avadon.

Not exactly a leg vise but it may work.

http://www.abana.org/downloads/education/VerticalVise.pdf

Hope it helps.

Rubén

Yah I think your talking about this thread. I'm thinking of something very similar to that now. I just wish the bottom leg of the post vice was much heavier like a 2" thick piece of steel or something. Looks like 1/2"

Check this out. I like my anvil on the high side for most work. Just about 1.25" below my wrist. So for striking work and heavier forging I just made this for myself. This gives me about an extra 2-1/8" of height, making the anvil quite a bit lower. It's a fairly easy fix. Now if your anvil is normally to low. Now that's not solved as easily. Usually you have to hoist your anvil and put something under it's feet, or if you have it buried in sand, add more sand.

This is 25.25" x 30.5"

Well does anyone know where I can find plans to build my own leg vice? This may be a good start. :)

Good ideas.. A 250# leg vice/post vice is not a bad idea. I forgot to mention that i'm looking for a standalone, portable option so it won't be bolted to a table, hence the necessity for a really heavy clamp/vice hardy tool holder. I guess the leg vice going up to that weight is going to be a pretty penny. Are there plans to make your own leg vice? If so I could probably buy just some of the top thread parts and fabricate all the rest of the no-brainer parts and bolt/weld it all to some sort of really heavy pedestal, maybe sand filled, with some wheels I can ratchet down or lean over so I can wheel it around like a handtruck.

Thanks Frosty, I can only take credit for copying the hood art, the idea came from Lorelei Sims' book the Backyard Blacksmith, it makes an otherwise utilitarian object look more interesting.

Cheers

Ian

Can you up some pictures of your lean-to / overhang your making?

I've often thought about making myself something like that at my next place. Sorta like a carport in dimensions with maybe a hole cut into the roof of it to exhaust my coal forge. Maybe even closed/walled up on a side or two.

I'm curious if anyone has ever made like a hardy vice. I've seen people put hardies in post vices but I gather that there's not very much mass in a post vice, especially when compared to a the mass that's normally in an anvil. So i'm curious if anyone ever welded up a very heavy hardy tool holder that doesn't just hold the hardy tool but clamps it in either one or two axis as to hold any hardy of any common size. If you've never seen anything like this, anyone have an ideas for a good way to go about this?

I've even thought about maybe making my own post vice that is just a stand alone vice made out of very solid steel and where the walls themselves clamp together instead of just a toothed area. Thoughts?

C'mon guys, you're losing track here. He just wants to match the "finish". Paint!

You can only make something look forged by forging it; that is significantly changing the shape of hot metal under pressure. Your bit of plate does not look forged because it isn't a shape that can be forged (at least not from one piece by a man with a hammer. A design like that needs to be as clean-cut as possible.
The looped bit of metal to the right also looks very much like cold-formed steel to me. Hitting a lump of cold steel with a hammer will produce only a hammered (dented) finish, it will never make it look forged.

search farrier tongs on you tube

Phil

here's one video, but its not the one I was looking for.
http://www.nokomisforge.com/videos_bs1b.asp
Phil

Drat, no one seems to have a video of this? I think i'm doing it with correct form but an instructional video of this would be worth it's weight in gold. Shoot, maybe I'll have to improve my technique to the point I can make my own video. ;)