Anthony San Miguel

I need something with a small footprint so a decent, small forging press. A small fly press would be my 2nd.

Good score, Kenny O!!

I got the email from Victoria last week that you were the next episode's interviewee so I was looking forward to the podcast. You are always one of the most helpful smiths on this site and I thank you for doing it. I enjoyed hearing you. BTW, I also would love to spend time watching Thomas Powers at the forge. If only we lived in the same state!!...

Mounted on a tall, portable stump and ready for detail work.

Forging a GOOD taper. It's not hard to forge a taper. But forging a good taper that doesn't require a lot of grinding isn't as easy as it looks. Example: Say you wanted to forge a hammer eye drift so you need it to be as smooth as possible because all the little pits/humps cause friction that makes driving it through even harder. I know the grinder can clean most of this up, but being able to forge the taper as smooth as possible to reduce grinder time is more desirable.

My newest anvil. A stake anvil that came from Amsterdam.

It DIDN'T get away after all! I found the lady that won the auction at her flea market shop and after talking to her for a bit she sold the stake anvil to me for $35. It has something stamped into it but I can't make it out. All I know about it is that it came in a lot from Amsterdam and it's mine now. It looks like it might have originally had a reddish color.

I don't know about the J shaped object but that Pandrol e-clip toward the upper left side is 9260. They are great for all kinds of things.

Probably won't need to plug it if I just use it as a fullering tool. Just a little peen dressing and it should be good to go.

The face on mine is in pretty good shape but you can tell the peen was used a lot more than the face. After dressing the peen I'm going to try it as a straight peen first and see if I like it. If not, I'm going to use it as a handled fullering tool.

Thanks for the replies, guys. I looked up linesman's hammer and sure enough, there were some that looked like this one. I can read Bell System faintly stamped into this one. I bought it at the flea market during my lunch hour for $3.00.

Thanks Frosty. I think you're right about it being a stone dressing hammer. But what purpose does that hole serve? I've only seen 2 others similar to this one. I say similar because the shape of the heads were a little different.

Can anyone tell me what kind of hammer this is and why it has a hole? It looks like something for rock but I don't know. I want to use it as either a straight peen or grind the peen to make a handled fuller but would the hole reduce its effecientcy?

Some railroad steel is great for knives or tooling. RR spikes aren't good for either. But I still enjoy forging letter openers and knife shaped objects out of spikes.

No, it kind of looked like an arbor press but the arbor had top and bottom attachments specifically for pressing or removing bearings. Various diameter cupping dies and things like that. I wish I had taken a picture.

I saw a small, old, neat looking ball bearing press this weekend. It was in good shape and had a few dies with it. I didn't give it much thought at the time so unfortunately I didn't take pictures. Now I'm just wondering if a small ball bearing press has any use in a blacksmith shop. Does anybody here use one for anything other than pressing bearings?

Lucky you! So glad you rescued it! I wonder what kind of bonehead took that to the scrapyard.

One got away from me the day before yesterday and I'm still a little unhappy about it. There is a particular auction house in town that gets stuff from all over the world. Most of the stuff they auctioned off this week was from Amsterdam. I won my 246 lb JEB Austrian anvil from them a few months ago. Anyways, they had two tables PILED HIGH with what they described as "primitive tools" being sold as a single lot. I didn't even recognize half of the tools but of the ones I did recognize there were a few unique and oddly shaped hammer heads. Mixed in this bunch of "primitive tools" was a beautiful stake anvil, and that's what I really wanted. I decided that I would bid as high as $300 because even after I kept all the things out of the lot that I wanted I could sell the rest and easily make back the $300, maybe even make a profit. No luck. The lot sold for $800 to a lady who has a booth at a local flea market. Anyways, I'll probably go see her this weekend after the Balcones Forge meeting and see what she's asking for it. Who knows? She might not even know what it is.

This man is push filing. The tang is in his right hand as he pushes away from himself so the teeth will cut on the push stroke. Draw filing would look the same except that the tang would be in his left hand and he would be pulling (drawing) toward himself. I know that some people push or pull regardless of which way they are holding the tang but the teeth are meant to cut in one direction so you will be dulling your file. I know they are consumables but I treat my American made NOS files like precision cutting instruments. I even wear gloves when I file so I won't get sweat and rust all over the file.

Thanks for sharing this about the Saltfork Craftsmen. I just checked out their site. $200 plus shipping for a new 36" cone mandrel! Gonna have to get one! I already have a nice swage block that I've been using a lot recently but that's a pretty decent price so I may just have to order one of those too.

If you can come up with $1700, Rathole Forge sells a 250lb anvil that I would love to have. They are made of H13. Worth looking into. It's one of the ones on my list, along with most shared by Fatfudd for when I get my Christmas bonus this year.

Powdering your file with chalk helps prevent a significant amount of shavings from sticking between the teeth. I use 12'' Simonds bastard files a lot because I have about 40 unused NOS of them. But my favorite file for drawfiling are Simonds Multicut files because they remove so much steel fast and still leave a relatively smooth surface compared to coarser files. I'm talking about the older, US made Simonds Multicut files. The new Honduras made ones with the black oxide coating are okay but not nearly as aggressive as the old US made ones.

I frequently use drawfiling for knife bevels and things that I want to hog metal off pretty fast. Two important things to remember when drawfiling. It's really only drawfiling when you hold the tang side with your left hand and pull towards yourself horizontally, or at an angle that is close to horizontal. When you hold the tang with your right hand and push that is called push filing. Both work really well once you develop a rhythm. I have actually gotten into such a rhythm where the stock becomes warm, (not hot) because so much metal is being hogged off so fast. Don't draw/push back and forth or you'll dull the file's teeth. They are meant to cut in one direction. Also, use a file card frequently or you'll scratch up the stock.

With prices pretty close to each other that wouldn't even be a choice. 1045!!

I'm no farrier but I have around 100 farrier's rasps because I like them and they are so useful. Not just for hot rasping and making knives/hawks out of but also for filing/rasping wooden handles. I have come to trust Heller and Save Edge rasps the most.