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Hey Frosty, I have a leg vise that looks exactly like yours in the picture ('cept for the paint) do you know who the manufacturer was?

I relize this is an old thread but, the subject is still an important one so I'll lend my hand and see if I can help. Describing the drill sharpening prosses in writen words is not easy and I am not able to supply pictures at this time but, here goes. First you need to dress your grinding wheel so it is flat and square. The star wheel dressers work better than the dressing sticks. Next you will need to have a secure place to rest your right hand so, the tool rest of your grinder must be in good shape. As far as I know everybody supports the drill with the right hand and does the motion with the left. I have never seen any one do it differantly in the nearly 30 years I have been a machineist. Be sure to have a container of clean water at hand so as to constantly cool the drill as you grind. When you sharpen a drill you must put the same angel on bothe flutes and they must be the same length or the drill will cut over size or not at all. The area behind the "cutting edge" must fall away so that no part of it is higher than the lips (cutting edge) The motion of the left hand is what does the grinding correctly. It is not impossible to learn and once masterd will never be forgoten but, it is nearly impossible to describe without a demonsrtation. Take up a new, unused drill in the right hand between the thumb and for finger and hold it in front of you so the lips are parallel to you (pointing to the left and right) with about a 1/2-3/4 " sticking out from your fingers. Now bring it to the face of the grinding wheel (leave it TURNED OFF for now) and see how the shank has to be swung to the left and the drill has to be turned so that the cutting lips are parallel to the wheel face and parallel to the tool rest. If your toolrest is bent then you must hold the drill inline with the axis of the grinder spindle. This is the starting position. The drill pivots on the fingers of the right hand and is swung in two directions at once by the left hand so that the heel is made lower than the front edge. The left hand will guide the shank of the drill in a downward arc and a clockwise arc at the same time in order to achieve this. This is as seen from above and back a step from the ginder. So now with your drill in hand practice this movment untill you can match the profile of the factory fresh point before turning on the grinder. Remember that the point must be sharpend evenly on bothe sides and the same angel on bothe sides. Once you get into the grinding position stay that way untill you are done, don' t stop to admire your work or you will forget wich flute you started on or if you ground the same number of times on bothe. I always take 3 passes on each side so I know I have taken an equel amount from bothe sides and count to myself "123 flip 456" and so on, watching carefully to keep the same angel on bothe sides as I flip from one side to the next. If you wait untill your drill is really dull or damaged befor you re-sharpen you will have a much more difficult time of it and the drilling will go much slower. If you try to push even a slightly dull drill through stainless and it starts to "squeel" you must stop and re-sharpen or you will end up getting the work hot and it will "work harden" so that you will never get an ordinary drill through it. When the drill is sharpend CORRECTLY it will give off two identicall chips from bothe flutes and the hole should just catch the drill and keep it from falling through (size on size) A couple of common mistakes when begining the grind are to "dwell" or hesitate slightly at the lip and cause it to always be below the heel. If this happens then the heel will touch the work befor the cutting edge and prevent it from cutting. Also, be sure to take only as much off the heel as needed for clearance. Swinging too far around or makeing too much of a downward arc will cause you to run into the other cutting edge around the back side and ruin your drill. Practice makes perfect. When I was first taught how to sharpen drills my old shop master handed me a coffe can full of dull and broken drills and took me to the grinder and described and demonstraighted on a handfull of drills and then tested each one untill it would "catch" in the same hole it had just drilled. He then watched me do a few and made some corrections to me and, then I spent the next two days sharpening and re-pointing drills (there were two more full cans in the tool crib) Again, catch the drill befor it gets too dull. Then it may only need a quick touch up and back to work instead of a more difficault sharpening job that might be better to just replace the drill untill you have the time to devote to it. As Ptree says above, the stick wax works very well and is safe for use around little kids or pets. Lard oil works well too but, hardends up after it gets hot so clean it off when you're done.

I saved the empty welding wire spooles from work untill I had enough for every cord. I find them very easy to use and handy to carry around were needed.

I have the same problem of slack tank freezing and water supply hose freezing as well. I use one of the floating stock tank heaters that cycles on and off to keep the water at 40F. This tends to cause lose due to evaperation so I replenish with snow. I also like the idea of the plastic barrel half with the gravel in the bottom to keep the hot steel from touching. I have a sheet metal tank for a slack tub that I just had to patch a rust hole in. I have a number of the plastic barrels that I could try out.

Oak Hill Forge, I have done the same thing with my main anvil. I have a 134# Hey-Bud that is FIRMLY bolted down to a 8x8x10" block of A36 and it does make all the differance in the world. I can not say that it is exactly the same as a 317# anvil because I have never worked on one that heavy but, adding the 183# block certainly did make a big differance. One thing I did find was that no matter how tight I tried to make the two together, the anvil would still "hit back". I don't mean it would bounce either it was a sharp shock I could feel through the hammer handle. I had taken a sraight edge and disk grinder to the bottom of the anvil and the top of the block to make them flat and give even contact and I even ended up hand scrapeing them to ten pionts per inch but, it didn't help. I then decided I needed something in between the two surfaces and stripped up enough ten gage sold copper wire to cover the top of the bottom block. I had made a rectangular frame from 1X1 1018 bar stock that fit evenly around the waist but, more over the feet of the anvil, and held it down with 5/8-11 X 6" grade 5 bolts with the copper wire in between. To reach my working hight from there I made a base from oak 4x4s and 2x12s A VERY knowlageable person on another blacksmithing web site does caution on the use of "inertia blocks" like this. You may have a mass that weighs 317# but not a 317# anvil. The anvil is no stronger than it was and should be used as it was befor but, it will be much more efficent now to the user. (Not an exact quote but, that was the point he made) It is important to get a full contact, even fit between the block and the anvil or you may end up brakeing a foot off or worse when you go to tighten them down or even when in use. This is also a reson for the copper wire. If you just want a good heavy stand then perhaps just a piece of 1/2" plywood between them. Good luck!

OK Sask Mark, I'll take that as gosple. Thanks agian. Any body on this thread that hasn't already, go over to the "Hay-Bud " roll call thread and let us know were you are.

Sask Mark, are you sure about that? Because that is the third different date I've heard now. I guess I really should get my own copy but, I was waiting to see if Postman would come out with an updated version. It is cool that the old guy just keeps getting older though. It really is amazing to see what good condition it is in for a tool that has seen alot of obvious use but, not abuse.

Isn't it funny, how attached grown men cane become, to something as simple as a web site? I was never worried, I knew it would come back.. Doesn't matter anyway... I.. can get... alongwithoutttttiiiiittttt!!!!!!!!!!!.......... ...don't do that again....

Hey to my Hey-Bud brethren. I suggested that we start this thread last week but then I was unable to accsess the this web site for several days so it didn't get done untill now. Thanks to who ever that was that kicked things off. I have #11243 @134lbs. and according to AIA, made in 1898. I'm in N.E. Wisconsin, U.S.A. This is my main anvil, with a 110lb Russian pattern for my number 2 and a 99lb PW for demos.

Yeah, I need to get a copy of Anvils in America and learn more about them. I know mine is all wroght iron body with just the tool steel top plate though.

howardz71, aside from the lack of safety prepairidness, you did every thing right. You probably should'nt fire such a big batch at a time though. A good friend of mine makes his charcaol the same way but, with just a couple of differances. He made his cooker from an old electric hot water heater tank. This he cut in half and then cut another 3" ring out of it so the top half would fit over the outside of the bottom half. Because his particular tank was more of a barrel shape this worked out and made a nice tight fit. He also added some straps to secure the two halves from blowing apart. The tank has two 3/4" pipe threaded holes in it from the water in and out so one he pluged up and one he turned a 12" length of pipe into. He first tried directing the pipe back down to the fire but, felt it caused more problems than it was worth so now it just sticks straight up into the air. the cooker sitts on a stand about 6" high and the whole thing goes into a 55gl. burn barrel that has the required holes around the bottom of it. He uses scrap oak pallets for the charcoal and any other scrap wood for the cooking fire. Using an old miter saw he cutts the oak into 2-3" chunks and fills the bottom half of the cooker and bolts it together. He then lites a good fire around it in the burn barrel and keeps it going untill the "vent" tube starts to steam and roar (like a jet engine) the gasses will usually torch and he just keeps a moderate fire going untill the "torch" goes out and then it's done. He has set up the second cooker in the mean time and then swaps them with a front end loader and lets the first one cool on its own and continues on with the second one in place. Don't open the cookers untill they are cool and you're all set. He makes some very good charcoal that gives off little or no smoke and very few fire fleas as well. Of course as every one else has stated: makeing your own charcoal is dangerous, if anyone reading this trys this methode at home remember that your safety is YOUR responsability!

Thanks, steveh. I've been a "lurker" here for some time but, Barnaby's post on his Hey-Bud(Hay-Bud?) compelled me to finely join up. Some of the names here I recognise from anvilfire .com so if any one is wondering, yeah it's me. I'm in NE Wisconsin so I have to thank you right away for the "brisk" weather we have been having here for the last 4-5 weeks. That's alright though, it keeps out the riff-raff. That is cool about our close numbers. Someone should start a Hey-Bud rollcall thread telling your number and were you are...

Hey Barnaby, congradulations on your "new" anvil! I picked up a 134# Hey-Bud last April (#11243) that I'm told was made in 1898 and except for a few nicks on the horn it's in great shape too. I should tell you that the body of our anvils is solid wrought iron (not cast) with a tool steel top plate that has been forge welded on. The rough, pitted appearance on the bottom is what wrought looks like when it get heavily pitted and is nothing to be conserned about. If you feel you must do something with it, you might try just useing some rust converting spray paint on it. My anvil has that fine brown patina on it and I think it looks great. When I got it I just took a wire hand brush to it to get the greasy dirt build up off of it (didn't want it to catch fire!) and built a heavy stand for it. You will find that repeated applications of hot steel that is worked in with a 2.5# hammer will have the face shinned up in no time as well. Anvils are only truly happy when they are put to good use and, don't like to be pamperd or fawned over. You say that the bottom is a little uneven and the anvil dosn't sit right? You might think about a "sand box" style stand. This is simply a box made of welded steel plate(1/4-3/8) and filled with enough sand to bring your anvil to your correct working highth but still leave enough side wall to keep it in place. You should probably put some straps over the feet to keep it from tipping out of the box while you're working on the horn. I know of someone that has a set up like this and he said he put a thin steel plate under his anvil to prevent it from being slowly driven down into the sand from pounding, although I think that in your case that would not allow the sand to conform to the bottom of your anvil wich is the whole reason for doing this in the first place. Like most others the Hey-Bud has a pretty loud ring that is not good for your ears. To prevent this I recomend you place a strong magnet under the tail were the hardy hole comes through. This will all but eliminate the ring for you. Welcome to the Hey-Bud Brotherhood!