Steven511

Recently I was researching making my own anvil, which of course got me down the rabbit hole and eventually lead me to looking at the possibility of having a makeshift anvil-creating operation as a side job. Now, realistically this is not going to happen, but it's fun to speculate how I could make quality(or quality-ish) anvils on a budget. I came to the idea of having steel anvil parts, but instead of forging them together, I would pour cast iron into the joints . This seems possible logistically, as I would only need to melt around 20-30 pounds of cast iron for each weld, which doesn't require an incredibly expensive professional foundry, or an exorbitant amount of fuel (relatively speaking). Would this work? It seems to me that the cast iron would carry enough heat energy to attach itself to the steel securely. I don't know of any companies that do or have done this so I'm guessing that it's either harder to do than forge welding, or not a strong enough connection, but I'd hazard to say that it could be a viable way to make relatively strong anvils. speculation is quite welcome, and if anyone who has cast iron onto steel could chime in I would greatly appreciate it.

I recently got some coke to upgrade my previously charcoal forge to. I started a fire, added some coke, and turned on my bouncy-house-turned-forge blower. The coke I originally threw on my wood fire caught and started burning quite nicely. The problem was after that. As my wood fire died down, I added more coke on top of the old stuff, and waited for it to heat up and reach forging temp. The problem is that the new coke wasn't catching fire. The old coke was burning, but it was giving off no flame, and since no new coke caught fire, everything stopped burning eventually. I tried again lowering and then raising my airflow, but nothing changed. I've looked up how to start a coke fire and it seems like I am doing things right. I don't know if it's the coke, the air supply, or what, but I haven't been able to find any posts on here that mention stuff like this. Does anyone know what's happening?

I finally spent the money on a welder, and my first project was a forge. It’s a little wobbly, the welds are terrible, and it took me about 12 hours in all to finish, but I’m excited to have made it. It’s at wrist height, the platform is 18x12, and the pot 4’ deep by 6’ across. Are those dimensions right for a forge? I know it works for charcoal, but I’m not so sure about coke, which I’m gonna be using from now on. Proud of it or not, if I need a bigger firepot I’ll redo the welds and all. Ps: sorry for the poor photos, I finished this outside at about 8 at night, so the lighting is pretty bad

I would if I could but I’m only 14, and with no suppliers near me I don’t think my dad would be ok with driving 3 hours to get coal. That’s why I’m looking online.

This feels like such a beginner question that should have been asked and answered on here hundreds of times, but after around half an hour of searching I have yet to find any post on where to get coal. Apologies if this has been answered, but I just can;t seem to find anything that answers my question: What is the best place to get coal? I'm upgrading from a charcoal forge, so I need to get some real blacksmith's coal. It seems like Blacksmith's Depot has the cheapest, but the cost of shipping is twice that of the coal I'm buying, so I don;t think I can get it from there. Centaur forge and Amazon have pretty similiar prices, but amazon probably ships faster. Does anyone know the cheapest place to buy coal? There are no places to buy very close to me, so I believe it has to be online. Blacksmith Depot seems to be used the most, so I wonder if I'm missing something looking at their shipping prices? Thanks for any and all help.

True, but as far as I've seen it isn't super common for anvils to have mimic top plates. I didn't mean to say the lip definitively showed that it had a steel plate, just that it made it more likely. I agree though, it is only possible to know if you see it in person and test the thing.

I don't know how rare anvils are around you, but going by the average, I'd say you should pay no more than 300 for it max. the lip on the top makes me believe it has a steel plate, which is a good sign. The shape of that horn reminds me of a some unmarked anvils I've seen before, and they all had pretty good reviews. I'd say to drive to it with a ball bearing and see what the rebound is. If it's above 60%, try to haggle to around $275. If it's above 40%, try to haggle to around $225. If it is below 40%, then don't buy, It's probably cast iron crap.

That is pretty dang well priced for here in Las Vegas, I can't imagine that up in Reno it's much different. If you've got the money, you should go for it. I'd recommend starting haggling around 350 or 400$. Peter Wright is a really expensive anvil brand though, so if you are ok with a slightly less quality anvil, you could probably find a much cheaper one that weighs about the same. I personally wouldn't go for it, because I'm content with having an anvil like a Fischer or a Colombian which gets the job done well enough. However, if you really need that top 1% anvil quality, a Wright anvil in that condition is a steal.

It seems all good, you must have done your research. The only real problem is that your propane-oxygen mix might be a little off. First, if flames are getting out of the forge far enough that you need to worry about your burner, you are probably running too much fuel. Plus, if your flames are blue all throughout your forge, you probably don't have enough oxygen. It looks like you are using an atmospheric burner, which usually has a problem with that. Try letting more air into the burner, and turning down your propane. Do know that all my advice is based on my own experiences about two years ago so I'm pretty rusty, and if anyone contradicts me they are most likely right.

I was thinking about my anvil-buying choices and was researching welding up my own anvil. I found out that it probably wouldn't hold because the welds wouldn't be strong enough or ductile enough to withstand being beaten on by a hammer. Then I got to thinking about a way to get a stronger weld that I could do at home. This got me thinking about using lead or aluminum for a cast weld that goes all around the top plate, not just the outside edges, like welding would. My idea would be to get a thick 2 inch spring steel top plate, connecting it to a mild steel body via casting aluminum into dovetail joints set in the top plate and the body, and welding around the sides. I think that as long as I preheat the steel, the aluminum would stick enough that it is structurally sound, and because the top plate would be extra thick, it wouldn't matter that the aluminum underneath is so soft. Has anyone tried anything like this? I already have the top plate, and I'm guessing that it would cost me around 20-30$ to buy the scrap steel body and the aluminum, and that would make me something like a 100# anvil. Can anyone think of some problems that would occur, or know of any easier but still cheap options? Is doing this even possible?

I'm going to be hand-filing/sanding my first blade in a few days, and it got me thinking a lot about sandpaper grits. My question is: What grit is fine enough for you? How far do you sand a blade, how far do you sand a handle? What do you think is the minimum grit something needs to look decent? What do you think is the maximum grit something needs before it gets extraneous?

Will do Daswulf! I'm out of town this week, but when I get back I'll be sure to post some pictures.

While taking a walk I found this large nut and bolt on the sidewalk, in the middle of nowhere. I couldn’t find anything that was missing a bolt nearby, so I decided that it could be counted as litter, and picked it up. Does anyone know or have any guesses as to what this might’ve been used for?

I'm in Las Vegas too, and that would be the deal of a decade for me. I'm currently haggling for a 50 pounder for around same price. If you don't mind driving, do for it for sure!

Daswulf/Thomas - About cutting to shape, what I meant by sword blank was something similiar to a handle blank - something that has just a little more material than what I need, that I can then forge (or grind in relation to handles) into the shape I want. So me cutting out a sword blank would be cutting the original piece of steel down to something around the weight of a sword that I could then forge out the profile of since the original piece of steel is way too big to use for a single sword. The problem is that I can't even heat up a small section of the piece enough to cut, because it is so thick. Plus, I don't think it is worth the time (or the fuel/grinder disks) to cut out a sword blank from this. It would probably be cheaper to just buy something closer to size.

Glenn - Thanks for the warning, it definitely was not my intention to forge with that coating on. I'm gonna be lighting a big fire in my backyard, setting the thing in, and leaving the fumes to burn off outside while I watch from inside. I'll probably have a fan going at it to blow the fumes away as well, then wait to the next day to go and actually use it. Thomas - Thanks for the warning as well. As for the sword forging, I know that swords were forged in small charcoal forges, but this thing is at least 3-4 times heavier than any sword blank, so it is probably impossible for my forge to heat this thing up enough to hot-cut out a sword blank (which I could then actually heat), and definitely impossible to actually forge a whole part of it into a sword. I meant to get that across in my original post, so apologies for the confusion.

Sorry. My city doesn't really have any scrap metal (yards or otherwise) so getting something like this seemed pretty big since i'm used to working with railroad spikes. Finding something like an anchor would be a ludicrously rare find for me, so right now my version of giant is about anything over 20 pounds - the bar is actually the heaviest piece of metal I have worked with.

My diving board broke recently, and I decided to take out the springs before chucking it. I assume they are spring steel since they are springs (duh). My question is, what should I do with it? I’m pretty inexperienced and only have a small charcoal forge, so a sword is out of the question. However, I would like to take advantage of just how much steel is in this thing. Any ideas on pieces that I could make using this? It is 30in x 2.5in x .25in, with a slit bend on either side

Exactly like that Thomas! The shakudo is a bit out of my price range, but Shibuochi sounds really cool. Thanks!

I'm going to be working on a knife with a metal bolster, and want to try casting a bit. I also want this bolster to be unique. I can get to around 2600 degrees farenheit in my foundry, does anyone know any cool looking alloys I could melt down around or under that temperature that are durable but still machinable? I was originally going to use some kind of aluminium-bronze, but I've heard it's either way too tough to put holes in, or way too fragile to be on a knife. I definitely want some copper in it for the gold look it gives silver metal, so copper has to be in at least a little. Any suggestions are welcome.

At $100 max you would be incredibly lucky to find any real anvil. From the population, Dayton seems like a relatively big place, so I doubt you have any old farmers with anvils from their grandfathers, which is the only way to get an anvil for under $200. Also, you haven't really started forging yet, so I would recommend not spending so much money on a London Pattern anvil (the kind you normally see) and just get something that you can work on. My first (and current) anvil is just a railroad tie plate (much easier to find than track, but also lighter) glued and railroad-spiked into a stump of 4x4s with a heavy chain around the bottom. Something similiar would definitely suit you until you can find more money and until you know the basics of blacksmithing and know that you are really interested (watching videos is much different from the real thing). That being said, if you can find a 50+ pound anvil that you can buy for $100; jump on it! Anvils go for at least around 3-4 dollars per pound, and usually far more. Just make sure that it is a decent anvil. No cast iron. Find something that is steel, ductile iron, or steel plated, ideally brand named. Separating the crappy from the good, especially at your price, is going to be hard, so you should look at the "Buyer's Guide to Anvils" thread on here. Overall, I think you should probably start with the cheapest anvil you can find, then eventually upgrade to something better when you have more money and are sure you like blacksmithing. However, I know that itch for a cool new tool, so if you absolutely must buy an anvil first, please be VERY careful with what you get. At your price, 8 times of 10 it's gonna be crap, so inspect everything. PS: I phrased this a lot nicer than some of the curmudgeons on here might, as you commited 2 first-timer sins: You immediately want the expensive tool before you've even forged anything, and you asked a question on here that has been answered hundreds of times before, and could have been answered if you researched it in past posts. If you did research, then you commited the other sin of asking a question you already heard about because you didn't like the answer. Everybody did it when they started out, but please next time do your research, and accept that the answers to questions a month ago will likely be the same answer now. Hope I helped.

Thomas - the Fisher is in great condition, only a little crumbly-denty looking on the edges (not in a bad way) and some light rust. I do really want a quiet anvil because one of my neighbors works nights and I don't like to wake them after only 4 hours of sleep. I'm planning on using it for light work - mostly decorative things like leaves and some small knives. Stevomiller - The NC anvil is said to be made of steel from both the buyers and the seller on amazon, maybe they changed materials? Anyways, I don't really need any other tools that I can't forge myself, and I need a light anvil because I'm gonnna be moving it in between houses (parents seperated) every couple weeks. My max weight would be around 120lbs, and even that is pushing it. I also don't really need that heavy an anvil for my work, so I think the range of 50-90lbs is my sweet spot. However, getting a cast steel anvil for only $145 is a pretty good steel (see what I did there ) so maybe I should be on the lookout for something cheaper on ebay?

I've decided to upgrade out of my railroad track aso now that I have the money, and from all my looking I seem to have 2 good options. My first option is a 60lb Fisher anvil which is being sold nearby for 350$, and my second option is an new 70lb NC Big Face Anvil for 370$ (including shipping) off Amazon. Having an anvil being sold nearby is pretty rare for Vegas, since the place only got really established past the time of blacksmiths, so I'm leaning towards the Fisher. What do you guys think? The Fisher is cast iron with a steel top, and the NC is steel (I think cast steel). Is the extra 30$ worth 10 extra pounds? Which kind of anvil is better quality? Is there a third option somewhere? Thanks! Edit: After typing this out, I realize I put it in the wrong thread. If there is a way to move it myself, I don't know it, so if any mod that sees this could move it to the anvil thread, I would appreciate it greatly.

Nice! A very bold pattern

I like how you think Thomas, but my friend knows they need some practice before making a knife. But they want to know just how good their forge finish, their hammer control, their tapers, etc should be before they can actually start making half-decent knives, and I don't have an answer for them. I was wondering if anyone had a rule of thumb for how fast or how well they need to be able to make so and so things before they can make real knives.