7A749

I have the exact same grinder, only I modified it for my own uses. Put a decent motor on it and it'll remove material quite well for its size. I've had this for over 12 years and it's been about trouble free. I have maybe $400 in it total including the brand new motor I bought for it.

All that, AND be sold at possibly a PROFIT if you wanted to sell it! Either way, it will solidly hold every bit of its value for the most part. Seems the anvil sales business is the way to go Dang! That's some BIG BUX NO WHAMMYS right there!!

Thanks a lot man. It would be great to find a competent plating outfit again the one here in town was old school and prices were very reasonable. Really was sad when it burned down. They had been around a long, long time. Going out to start on a base for an aluminum frame I made about 12 years ago and never finished. It was for a demo at a wedding show, but the booth that was going to use a couple of my frames found out they couldn't have any secondary advertisement, or they could be asked to leave. When we can hook up I wanted to ask you about applying simple Damascus type techniques to some stuff I have in mind, purely for the effect. I'll be sending you a care package soon too

Please post up pics of the machine. It looks fabulous!!!

I have heard of them before. I'll have to check it out, if anything to just see his stuff. Many thanks for the info. I'm on the North side of Lansing. If your ever gonna be in the area, let me know. You're welcome to stop by. Yea, you ain't kidding there. I never thought I would hear five bux a pound, but it's not a surprise.

I apologize in advance for not taking any in process pics. I was doing this after hours and just got into getting it done. For the record, this is the FIRST time I've ever forged anything from stainless. The grade is unknown. I bought a sheet of this stuff from the scrapyard specifically for a couple projects I've planned to do. Paid $1.75/lb which is the going rate around here for resale stainless at the scrap yard. Thickness is approx 11 ga. (1/8") Anyways, I did the initial profile with my plasma cutter and cleaned it up on the belt grinder. I don't know how many heats I've got in it, but maybe a few hours total time for everything. The main goal here was to experiment with how it worked under the hammer, how long it remained in a malleable state and what kind of polish it would take after I was done forging it. It's far from perfect, but it fulfilled my original criteria as to what to expect when forging it on a larger scale. The veins were initially cut with a chisel tool I made to do this, then I used a thin cutoff wheel on a 90 deg die grinder to enhance the lines. The distressing is done with a needle scaler. I used a 50 grit ceramic sanding disc to create some smooth surfaces on top of the distressing, then finished it on a sisal wheel with black compound for cut and loose muslin buff with green compound for the color. I heated and repolished it a number of times to see how it colored up. Used water and oil for a quenching medium. I have to play with the heating a little more and use some really small brazing tips for the edges to bring out the "rainbow". I was able to get a little on one of the heats, but it's difficult to control and will turn gray from overheating it in a flash. The material took on a straw gold color after moderate heating and quenching in oil. I thought is contrasted well with the as forged black color of the distressing and reverse of the piece. I normally use a die grinder and thicker cutoff wheel to remove all the scale off the reverse side of the work I do, but left this the way it came out of the forge. A few of the earlier stages.. A few things I've picked up from this so far....... The material is HARD. (No Duh! lol) The window for hot working it is less than mild steel or so it seems to be after this experiment. It produced almost no scale to speak of in comparison to mild steel. It takes a polish very well after preparation, which I was expecting and a key reason I wanted to see how this turned out. Coloring is not as easy to achieve in comparison to mild steel tho. I generally use a small hand held propane torch for doing coloring, being its a lot easier to control the heat output than with oxy fuel. I intend to use panels of forged and polished stainless contrasted with dark colored mild steel panels for some light fixtures I have in mind. Stainless holds bright glossy finish without the need for coatings or regular maintenance in normal conditions. I really like the bright finish for some projects and used nickel plating to produce this in the past. It gives you a high shine, bright finish without the need of coatings to protect it. Since the local plating operation here burned to the ground six years ago, there is almost no one within a 70 mile plus radius that does decent (or affordable) nickel and chrome plating. There are outfits down in Detroit from some looking I've done, but that's pretty well a two hour drive in traffic one way. I found a place up near Saginaw, but I wasn't real comfortable with their unwillingness to provide some type of minimum baseline charges before dropping a bunch of stuff off up there to find out they want a fortune for the work after its done. It looked like a pretty sketchy operation driving by. I've had some done by a place in Kalamazoo thru a friend who does some high end home furnishings, but he said they were a pain to deal with and very expensive. **If anyone is in the mid Michigan area and knows of a good plating outfit near the Lansing area, please post it or PM me. I've looked around a little, but have come up empty so far. Many thanks if you know anyone!!** I plan to do a lot more of this in the near future. Any comments on your experiences would be fantastic and appreciated. I apologize as well for the length of the text, but if someone has suggestions knowing exactly what I'm working with creates a context to base them upon. Thanks for viewing.

Thanks. About this free propane...... Most places I know where I can get it "free" they put you in jail for taking it Seriously tho, yea oxy fuel is very expensive. I'm willing to give propane a try, but I'll have to invest some $$ to get the stuff. I have a very nice selection of heating tips and heads for acetylene I've picked up over the years. That big rosebud (of course if we were talking die repair it would be small in comparison to that stuff lol) will drain a 300 CF acetylene cylinder in a hurry. I could only wish for a manifold system lol. I have a shop made one that's even higher volume but I haven't been brave enough to ever hook it up. Being I got a lot of this stuff with lots of equipment I've purchased to fix and resell, I don't got a lot in it, which is a good thing. Really thinking about a coal fueled forge. Once I can make the room it's a serious consideration. I'm major cramped for space. I have to be able to move everything out of my shop when machine work comes in. I work out of my garage full time, it's a pain once in awhile when you gotta jockey stuff around like musical chairs every time paying work comes in. Its the nature of the beast, I'm afraid. At least for the time being...

Is this guy down in Leslie? Visited a dude there once who had a bunch of them more than ten years ago and I thought his prices at the time seemed high. You'll get your money back out of it down the road like arftist said. Just use it. It's a really nice anvil. I don't know much, but know enough to know that's one of the real "good ones" They just seem to be going up up and away in value. Good luck with making it happen man.

I totally can empathize with you. I got a very, very bad case of tendinitis in my right arm (I'm right handed) when I was working at GM back in 2005. It was so bad I could hardly lift my arm to run the hoist on the job I did. That coupled with a carpal tunnel release on the right hand the year before and it was almost agony to work. I gobbled handfuls of ibuprofen every night. Vicodin wouldn't even touch it. I also iced it during every break. Took a good four months to get where it wasn't excruciating to just use my right arm. I've found, proper hammer technique and not going nuts with grinders or hand held sanders goes a long ways towards keeping pain and numbness away. I still have problems with my left hand (CT related) but I don't have insurance so I'm pretty well stuck with it for the time being. Charles, do you run into numbness problems with gripping the tongs? I can't hold on to anything very tightly in either hand, I have to be very careful what I do. Sorry for your injury intrex, but hopefully your experience will save someone else the pain of tendinitis. It's NO joke. The pain would bring tears to my eyes when it was really bad. Best of luck healing. Wear the forearm pressure ball band (it helps take stress off the sore area) and take it easy killing it on the table tennis matches!

Nice haul. I never turn down scrap, uh I mean usable materials I can imagine you were drooling to beat the band. I sure would have been. It's interesting how the mind can suddenly flip into mega-overdrive problem solving when you see something like that big hammer and start thinking about how it could find a home in your shop.... Being in the buy and sell business, I can get away with quite a bit of "acquisitions".. Of course, it requires semi regular trips to Sephora to keep her from asking too many questions

Thanks for the info Richard. You have some nice equipment by the sounds of it. Ive always viewed American Rotary as quite reputable. Maybe they done something different with the VFDs they're running on rotary converters? Who knows. The one thing I really like about the standard setups is that once you put it in service, there's few things likely to go wrong with it. I repair a lot of older Miller inverter welders and they're great until the stop working. Usually when they puke, it's serious and expensive. Overall they have a good service record tho. I just like "install it and forget about it" reasoning for something that will be under electrical load constantly while it's running. I would have went that route when I first installed the electrical in my garage shop, but the rotary came many years after the fact. It would be a waste of money in my circumstances to install a service to run off the rotary now. I have a test lead for it with large jaw clips that can attach to either terminal lugs or to stripped ends of cord. I like how the Burr King setup is with a speed dial right on the front of the machine. It's running off a VFD I'm sure, so that's kinda the plan there. I don't need vari speed on all my grinders, just one would be nice and since it already has a powerful three phase motor there's absolutely no point in removing it to put a single phase motor on it for about the same price as a VFD. I have a number of Hoffman style boxes, putting it in one with a muffin fan would be a piece of cake. Once I get this welder/feeder combo I'm working on done and out the door, I'm gonna tear down the Ruman belt grinder I have and start working on it. Thanks again for the info Richard. Steve

And please be assured that I understand exactly what you and arftist are saying and hope to develop the skills as mentioned in the posts.. I think the point I made in mine were beginning to be taken out of context. I meant the comment in regards to both posts with complete respect

Point made. I think I illustratively already explained where I was coming from. The technicalities at this point are really irrelevant. Please don't hijack the thread with an exhaustive discussion involving such. Thanks guys.

Oh, Richard. Did you ever consider a transformer off the rotary, or didn't you have enough KVA to run it? I was planning on one (or running a suitable unit in reverse) just to put high voltage welders under power. It would be much easier than having to change jumpers versus throwing a switch and getting enough output to run the machine to an acceptable level. I load test stuff I work on around 200 amps on average. That's all my service to the garage will support. I have run some 400 amp machines off my rotary on a 50 amp breaker and did close to 300 amps, but that was about as far as I wanted to push it. It will run my Lincoln motor generator but there is a noticeable reduction in output. I have to check the rpm on it and see where I'm at. What are you running off your converter?

Didn't know the part about the rotary not running off a VFD either. I knew it was usually one control to a motor. They won't run welders either. This thread has proven most informative. American Rotary is top gear all the way. Good stuff. I totally agree with you on the rotary converter. Mine has served me well and cost almost nothing. Where did you get the VFD for your sander? Just wondered

Well, I got up this morning and dropped my son off at school. Got home and this was in the driveway.... A Burr King Model 760 belt grinder. This brings my total number of belt grinders to four. Long story short, I did some horse trading and got this for a couple hundred bux. He dropped it off on his way down to Ohio. I'll pay him for it and do some work on a couple stud welders he has. Granted, it needs some work, just like the Ryman, but at around $2000+ retail, I think I did ok. Frosty said he hated me when I posted pix of the Ryman. I'm sure this will draw his ire even more... Honestly, I wish Mr Frost lived close, I would hook you up with a nice grinder. I've seen a number of them come and go around here over the years. I'm going to fix it up and keep it. Even if I put $500 in it, it would be like new, with a VFD drive and completely rebuilt. I'll fab up a new aluminum door for it and probably buy a new contact wheel for it too. I'll also fabricate a real base for it and the Ryman. The scrapyard has some nice larger thin wall box tubing. Gotta see if they still have some. It'll make a great pedestal for each machine. He gave me two Millermatic 35 welders too. You can see them in the background of the second pic. Heres the other three machines. First the Ryman. Then my two Kalamazoo machines. I built these both from existing machines I modified. The horizontal is a 2" X 72" that started out life as a kit you buy from Kalamazoo and add your own motor. I extended the contact wheel arm out about 12" further than the factory one and put a hard nylon caster on it for a contact wheel. Works pretty good for a low budget machine. The upright is a 4" X 60" Kalamazoo that started out life as a horizontal wet table grinder. Got it from MSU salvage for $100 about five years ago. It was really, really nasty. They were grinding some kind of stone with it. Had before pix, but they're long gone... Completely gutted it, turned it into a vertical unit. Cut the table assembly down and turned it into a stand. Made sheet metal sides for it and put a 2 HP motor in it from good 'ol harbor freight lol. Works real nice and has lots of power. Im running out of room fast! I used to have a monster 10" X 60" Sunstrand belt grinder with a 5 HP motor on it. Shoulda kept it but it was just too big for my needs and frankly, it scared the heck out of me. Had a belt blow up in my face on it once. Bad times Well, I'm sure Frosty really hates my guts now.... Thanks for viewing. If anyone has any tips for installing VFDs I'm all ears. Already got some real good info out of a power hammer thread.

Excellent. What a cute little bugger

Thank you so much for the info. I don't know jack about them besides what I've stated above and was hoping for something like this. I only have limited experience with the three phase ones that ran the pumps on the dairy farm. I have two belt grinders I recently acquired and would like to have vari speed on at least one. I'll look into what you suggested. Running anything other than a welder is a pain with the rotary. It works good for what it does (run three phase welding equipment for testing after repairs). We are planning a move to another state in the future and I plan on a 25 HP rotary for running three phase stuff with a transformer for 460, but it will be mainly for running and testing welders I repair. I may end up running it off a VFD but I kinda like the "buy it and mostly forget it" approach you get with a rotary. They're fairly simple and not a lot to go wrong down the road. The VFD pukes and you're buying a new one. Thanks again for the info and warning to stay away from the used stuff. Sincerely appreciate it!

Yeah, the proportions are all off. That's what made me think it had broken or was cut, whatever. I guess half an anvil is better than none at all

Yea. Super nice!!!

Those electric arc furnaces are a sight to behold. I'm super jealous you got to see one for reals. I've only seen them in videos and online. I bet you were about ready to go into an industrial cardiac arrest after seeing the stuff in that building I likely would have Oh man, that's great Not that they took the pot anyways.. I haven't even done mine yet. I filed an extension tho. That really stinks. They took everything, even the "kitchen sink" (well, pot..)

That's pretty cool. I hope you get the plow to go with it. I wouldn't mind finding a single bottom horse drawn job for my front yard. I got a big rendering pot at an auction some years ago and put it in our stone bed in front of the house.

If you turn your phone to the horizontal position. The pics should post straight. Im interested in seeing the bottom of the anvil too. I'm completely clueless about them for the most part but I'm wondering what the deal with the bottom is. Looks like the entire bottom half from the waist down is gone..

Those are really nice aus!

Oh, you have that issue too?? I try to make road trips by myself to avoid such pitfalls...