Fred Beagle

And I guess this should go into the "It followed me home thread" but one day at the junk yard way up about midway on this 20 foot tall mountain of scrap I spot this angle iron notcher and I went mountain climbing! This might get you kicked out of the scrap yard so do this at your own pearl! Here's a cool stand that I made for my postvice, I guess you could use a nickel rod to weld the plate to the cast iron but I used the brutis rod and it did a good job. and I did preheat and post heat and peen the weld all the way around and did the weld in sections. I know we're kind off the subject of swage blocks and I'll upload photos of it and the stand for it in a few weeks when it is finished. Till then here's a final photo and what it shows is I had made a foot lever for the tire hammer motor clutch,but my father talked me into scraping that ideal because the 2 horse power motor is pretty dang heavy so we just wedge the motor so that it stays contacted to the wheel and then we turn it on and off with this. And so far so good.

Yeah it will be a little while before it's done, Till then here's some update photos to show where I'm at and a few other things. Not pretty but as you can see I have a lot of surfacing grinding still to do,my little crucible can only heat up some much at a time and it took like 12 pots to fill it up. Some may think what a waste of aluminum but the way I see it have you seen what big swage blocks are selling for?!? Money I would of used on one can now go on something else.. Oh I'll still be wanting one but this will work till I can find one at the junk yard someday<~~~ yep I know I'm dreaming lol.. Here's a picture of the main working side I didn't show yet..He sort of looks like Saturday night live's Mr Bill "Oh No!" Here's a crazy ideal that failed to launch.. it kept binding lol.. hmm I think I see a couple of big Bowie knifes in that leaf spring. And here's a better picture of my little 100 pound Fisher anvil that my uncle who worked at a scrap yard gave to me,He told me that he was moving a scrap metal load with the big claw and this thing fell out of it. I do wish I had a before picture that would of showed the damage down to the anvil face it was like left outside in the weather and rust was really flaking it away. As DSW and other folks who know a lot more than me.. 7018 is not the way to go on high carbon steel being that it is too soft. Still I'm really happy so far with the repair I made and no dents so far in like 2 years since the repair but then again I don't beat the crap out of it with a sledge either.

That's pretty cool, It did cross my mind to make one and I recently picked up a nice thick plate almost 2" inches thick to do something like that. I guess another reason why I made my block the way I did was I wanted those radius to beat stuff around.. I have some wagon wheel type jigs for bending stock around but these will help tweak any flat areas I was thinking. I'll post pics as I progress on the project.

Another guy had mention this book in his thread "The Modern Blacksmith - Alexander Weygers" and I'd like to say a few things about this awesome book.Mr Weygers lived way back like in 1930s and 40s and I read he even had applied for a patent on a UFO type flying machine lol. I know he sounds somewhat crazy but he was no idiot in fact he was a stone and wood sculptor and was in fact highly educated. But what so radical about his book was that he was indeed a hardcore junk man! And this is book is like scrap metal bible on stuff you can use for anvils and heat treating rail road track anvils and reworking hammer heads and other tool steel into other new tools a young wanna be blacksmith might need.. He even goes on to show how to make cool things like a endmill cutter, Open end wrenches, wood chisels and tools for stone masonry and he details what scrap metal to be on the look out for as well but you have to remember that auto makers these days use a lot of alloy steels in things like leaf springs/coil springs that they didn't use back in Weyger's day. There are quite a few good blacksmith books out there but this one is my very favorite and I personally found it very inspiring. But like I mention in the other thread the homemade table chop saw looks somewhat dangerous to me. because it has no guards and the frame is made from wood. Makes me wonder if his UFO flying machine was made of wood with a motor scavenged from a washing machine as well?!? But anyways yeah this book will teach a beginner very many things about heat treatment and tempering steels and other techniques that just makes and awesome foundation for many would be smiths.. Just a heads up.

You know I have a couple of questions maybe you can help to understand better.. Picture this you have two pipes coming together both are cut at 45 degrees so that they make a right angle corner. like in a pipe fence now let's say you want to put a pipe post under this joint. It sort of looks like a football cut in half on both sides of the pipe. Not sure what angle and I have to guess at it till I get close enough where I don't have a big gap sure wish I knew right off hand what angle I should cut the bottom post with. I mean it's still just a saddle but it's a somewhat deeper cut then 22 1/2 degree saddle is and like you mention it depends on the size of the pipe and if the two pipes are both the same. The 22 1/2 degree is just a good rule of thumb. You can always keep wacking at it I suppose. My second question is this if you look at the little swage block that Charles R. Stevens mentions in my very first picture on the ground If you look you will see that I made a little sand box to hold it in. Now that is just some 3" inch plate that was cut on 45 degree angle and it would of been fine if it was welded flat in a one dimension but when you start raising this into two dimensions what I found was the angle changes and you have big gaps develop! It's like it needed to be cut at 35 degrees instead. Do you have any insight or formula for calculating this I wonder? Any help would be greatly appreciated. As far as the anvil goes it is softer on the repair area but it's held up great for over 2 years now no dents as of yet but then I don't really wack the crap out of it either. I do often see totally wore-out anvils on Craigslist selling for what new ones would cost it's just plumb crazy! I do have some brutis rods but I usually use them for unknown metals and they leave a kind of rainbow color weld bead that would of looked really jacked up lol...

Exactly! I'm primarily a welder who's been blessed to have worked with some excellent teachers mostly old men and they have taught me a ton of stuff I never would have figured out on my own.This one old yankee named Bill Sherry who's probably passed away now but in our shop we didn't have a pipe notcher and he taught me to take half of 45 degrees which would be 22 1/2 degrees and set the chop saw up at that angle. And what you do is cut the end of the pipe you want saddled on both sides opposite to each other using this cut angle and it makes a pretty tight pipe saddle.. Now that's a handy trick to know! Other things I learned from these old men are like making lamb tongues from molding cap stuff like that But yeah I'm still starting from near the starting line as far as blacksmithing goes though and I've a ton of tools to make from special hammers and fullers to punches and tongs and I can't wait to get after it! :-)

Here's what me and my father been working on for a few weeks now. We had to really add some counter weights to the tire hammer because it was really dancing around and I'm so afraid of the counter weight flying off and getting embedded in my skull so I'm gonna have to build a safety expanded metal guard around all the moving parts but still pretty cool. Yep we're poor folks now! I'm talking country church mice! I guess I'm not as poor as the third world folks that do their forging on the ground but I don't have it no where as good as some you folks in your air conditioned shop but hey it's all good and I'm very grateful for what little I do have and thanks for checking out my work and hope you get some ideals

Oh you're talking about the little swage in the background? Yeah I bought that off a guy who was getting out of the hobby and he gave me a good deal on it something like 75 dollars and I've made a couple of things using it. But it doesn't have a punch out hole and my little fisher 100 pound Anvil if I start trying to use it very much for what I'm want to try and do I'm afraid I'll break off the heal of the anvil! It has a 3/4 hardy on it and I used 7018s to resurface the top of the anvil, wasn't easy but with preheat and post heat and only welding a little at a time it can be done.... The Anvil face was in pitiful shape when I first got it. I know some folks would frown on the fact I didn't use hard surfacing rods but I rebuilt 1/4 of the face of anvil and it didn't hurt it too much so yeah 7018s will work!

You know I have that book and I really enjoyed it and I've made quite a few projects out of it from the Hinges and hasp to the rail road anvil and I found it inspiring to be honest, He sure was smart, Only grip I would have is the table chop saw that he shows in his book seems kind of dangerous with no guards, I sure as heck wouldn't make it out of wood!

Here's my latest project I thought I'd share with you. Me being poor as a church mouse but I was in dire need of a swage block that had punch out holes and so I took some scrap and piece one together but instead of welding up every nook and cranny to make it one solid piece like a regular swage, I instead smelted a bunch of aluminum to help reinforce the top plate. It has a lot of steel internal support but I just wanted to face plates to have some reinforcing too. So tell me what do you think? I may later try and build a steel cone and fill it with aluminum someday, but just gotta see how this hairbrain ideal pans out The picture was one I took yesterday I've now filled it plumb full of aluminum and it will have a top plate welded on.