CrazyGoatLady

Cut apiece off of the parent... wheel. It's about 1/2" thick by about 1 1/2" wide. This is what I could actually get to break. Or rather Tommie did. He's helping me. What do y'all think?

Yes we can see your location now Paul. Welcome to the group!

Okay this is something that didn't follow me home, but I suppose I followed it home. This is one of the wheels I was telling y'all about in the conversation about WI. The others are not WI, but this one has me excited to hope it is, but I don't know yet. Going to do a spark test

Paul. Really nice looking work!

JHCC, are you serious? Thank you!

"Scrap Art"...I like the way your mind works

I would love to forge some of it. It has to be worked at high heat or it will delaminate. Is that correct?

The first thing I ever forged was a squished and burned piece of scrap metal. I think the first thing I made that was actually usable was a leaf keychain.

I bet she will!

Thank you George. In the dusty cobwebs of my mind, I knew that. Thanks for jogging my memory. Between your and John's advice, I'm certain I can tell now

I left the edges crisp on a new anvil I bought until I figured out what I needed from it. About the only thing I have done is put a probably 1/8" radius about 4 or 5" inches long on the far side of the face. I was advised to not go too far with it until I saw what I would need to do as I used it and adapt to my work. But I didn't have paint to deal with. I would have taken that off in a heart beat lol

It's pretty great to make what you need isn't it? Good job! We had bought some old chicken tractors when I first started smithing and they had screen doors on them. No door pulls so I made some. They were very plain but man I was proud to have made them

Thank you Das and Larry! I think it was Frazer and I that had a conversation with about them one time and he was talking about maybe making them themed with the elements. I tried one with like an ocean wave affect for water and I couldn't come up with something that looked right.

Thank you JHCC. I've got 3 wagon wheels that I acquired from the property and two I already had. One is a big thing. I'm 5'2" and it's about as tall as I am. I'm assuming it's a wheel anyway lol. Could be something else but I'm going to look closely at it now that I know what to look for

You'll have to be sure and tell us about your experience with this anvil. I have a Vulcan that I bought from the scrap yard for $11 and some change. The heel is broken off so it weighs something odd like 62 lb. If IIRC. It was a step up from a RR track anvil only because there was more surface to work on. I actually think the track anvil was harder lol. But the weight made it want to walk a lot and it wasn't mounted to a good stand. So I don't know if the flimsier stand and a light weight anvil was the cause of that or not, but you probably want to mount it way better than I did. I've seen really good reviews for it and it's awesome that it's more affordable to get started with. I hope you make beautiful things on it

Wow what a great find JHCC. I have some wagon wheels that were left on the property. I wonder if they may be wrought iron because knowing the man that owned the place, there's no telling how old they are. Do y'all know how I could test that other than cutting a piece off or would that be the only way? Thomas Powers had mentioned something about that years ago, but I can't for the life of me remember exactly what he said

Chad J. , nice door handles. I've not attempted to make that kind of twist before but it looks pretty awesome. Good work! Shainarue, thank you! The ugly one was made out of a piece of scrap that was shaped like a U and conveniently already had a hole in it. But very thin so the loop is probably pretty fragile. I should have cut the flame part shorter to give me more room to roll it over itself. I tried to, but it ended up being too short in overall length. I have several long bars of more appropriately sized stock so I'm gonna cut some of that up and see what I can do with that.

Frosty, thank you! I actually made a prototype of this design a few years back. Much more substantial material in the original one. I need to make at tab punch. I've been using a small ball pein for that but I didn't do so well with it in the opener I just made. I am hoping to get these down and maybe make enough to help pay for the propane

Leaf practice again today. Squared a short piece of random round rod for it. My hammering skills are definitely not where they were, but getting a little better. Also finished this bottle opener. I'm not happy with the bottom where the flames curve over, but it was a thin piece of material so it may break anyway, but it does work. Thought I'd show y'all the good, the bad and the ugly Almost forgot, Chad J., thank you for sharing how to make those hummingbirds!

Nobody Special, that's interesting that some were made that way. I don't remember the make of that anvil but it seems like it was a name that I wasn't familiar with. I just popped over to Craigslist to see if that anvil was still on there and there's a new ad up. Guy has 3 for sale. A Trenton 255#, a Mousehole 93# and a Peter Wright 132#. $1000 for the Trenton, $400 for the Mousehole and $500 for the Peter Wright. Wish I had some extra cash! He's not far from me either

Chad J.,I really like that. I need some of those for my backyard to go along with the real ones Shainarue, very nice looking punches. I have a couple of pairs of tongs that's I've made. Eventually I'll make some more. I'll have to post a picture of the big honking pair of flat jaw tongs that I have from the previous owner of the land we bought. He was a bit of a blacksmith himself and he left me that pair of tongs and I found another pair buried in the dirt. He also left me a huge pry bar thing he made and a big machinists vice. He found out I had an interest in the craft and we instantly hit it off.

I'll try packing dirt in them

Rojo, glad you're hammer is working out so well. 2 lbs. Is my limit. I bought a Mustad farriers hammer. I haven't decided if I like the long handle or not yet. BillyBones, thanks for advice about the transmission case. I woudnt have thought about that. AndI figured these cinder blocks are not going to last very long but didn't think about it crumbling into a big pile. My anvil is only 105 pounds and I'm not a real heavy hitter so maybe they'll eek out for a little while

Somehow I thought that maybe anvil prices had gone down but that was really naive. I looked up the one I bought a few years ago brand new and the same one today is over $200 what I paid. There's a guy on the local Craigslist that has one that looks pretty good on the face, edges etc. But if you look real close, you can see that it's been broken off at the waist and welded back on. I don't know if that's such a bad thing if it's done right?, but he wants $1200 for it. I'm glad I'm not looking for one.

Shainarue, thank you. I couldn't remember to save my life. BillyBones, I still have it. It's just sitting in the corner of the loafing shed right now. This was just a quick and dirty way to get some hammer time on. I don't have anywhere but outside to do it right now