TechnicusJoe

Contact me via Facebook: Joey van der Steeg. Display picture is me at the beach. Or send me an email TechnicusJoe@gmail.com. I prefer Facebook if you have it. I am sure I can help you locate one and have it shipped to you.

I'll be brief. (turns out I failed at trying to be brief) The anvil here, is a real single horn Peddinghaus, made before Peddinghaus was taken over by RIDGID The site link etc. read the VERY LAST post by SinePari. I talked with this person via Facebook. This anvil lacks all characteristics of a Peddinghaus. WHO in their right mind would use cones!? Peddinghaus anvils were forge welded at the waist, unless smaller than 50kg - 110lbs. (more) Modern Peddinghaus anvils are milled flat and then welded at the waist. I have promoted Peddinghaus and Refflinghaus anvils for their quality. I have stopped doing this for the latest RIDGID Peddinghaus anvils. They no longer are the same quality. The recent models are FAR below the standard of what they used to be. Having been at the factory in Gevelsberg, Germany, where they are still made today. I had the honor of seeing their production. Sadly, the factory Chiefs have informed me the market is too small for them to keep up the high standard for their now small range of anvils. They used to make 12 models!!!! It's down to just 3 today!! So they have to keep cutting corners. I have felt, seen and heard about: -Irregular hardness -Ugly waist weld -Not aligned hardy holes -Forging defects on the horns or body (the second one shouldn't matter much, just aesthetically less pleasing) -Irregular chamfering -uneven forged face transition into the horns. I have actually made a small documentation of this and sent this to the Chiefs. They know about it. But for the little demand there is, they can't make the anvils any better. Their main focus at Peddinghaus is their range of vises. I can rant on for much longer in much more detail but this post is getting very long already. I don't suggest people anymore to buy a RIDGID Peddinghaus anvil anymore that is newly made. Quality is just a lot lower than what it used to be. Keep an eye out for the older ones from RIDGID from the 1990s, they were well made. And of course not to forget all predecessors: PFP, Original PFP and Peddinghaus. Such a shame............

Gote, you mention "coal". But it is rather confusing, because I have no idea what type? The type of fuel affects the fire. The discussion isn't just "coal". There is: Brown coal Flame coal Gas flame coal Gas coal Fat coal (bituminous coal) Forge coal (bituminous coal) Nonbaking coal Anthracite What type of coal do you use, that will help clear things up. I made it clear I use, specifically, bituminous coal. And I mention I am familiar with other fuel types. With you saying you use coal. I find it hard to imagine it's anything but an anthracite type of coal. Coal types below the anthracite type produce a big amount of smoke when fired the way you describe. I have my experiences with anthracite. Some can't get anything else but this. But I really don't like anthracite. I had 70kgs - 154lbs I ordered extra next to my bituminous coal to really try it out for research purposes. Boy..... do I wish I had not bought any of it. It doesn't smoke, but it sure does produce clinker! I have heard this from others who use it as well. But what bugs me the most is that anthracite doesn't give me the same hot and intense heat coked bituminous coal and coke can. You can use it to heat stock and get it to forge welding temperatures if you put some effort in it. But it's very different in its behavior compared to coked bituminous coal and even coke. The fire ball tends to stay in the lower portion of the fire, near the tuyere. When heating billets to forge hammers, 2 inch - 50mm diameter stock (or larger), anthracite tends to heat the bottom. You can try and push up the fire ball with more air, but it turns into an oxidizing fire very quickly. Antracite coal has a small surface area for the oxygen to react with. It's not porous like coke or coked bituminous coal, so you quickly have too much oxygen. Coke and bituminous coal can be fired in more versatile ways. I can keep the fire small for smaller stock and works. But I can enlarge it to accomodate 2 inch + stock. And the nice thing it does, it spreads. This I very much use in my advantage. I can create a "furnace" if you will, around my stock that all glows evenly. This provides a nice even heat that can be maintained with a neutral atmosphere. I may only have to turn once to twice for a really nice even heat in a timely manner. All fuel types have their similarities but also still their differences. Your argument of how much air one blows into the fire is a very important factor. But there are a lot more factors.

(I have dropped a lengthy text responding to our (expanding) discussion) Even when you said disagreed and wrong, I think we still agreed from the start. let me explain. Everything is so dependent on context. By my statement: " The larger and higher you pile up, the more fuel gets consumed." I aim at a situation that a higher and more piled up fire, the actual the fire ball that is larger in size; the actually glowing and firey part. Soley, I aim at what you refer to as "fire ball". I can happily concur with this word. Getting an enlarged fire (ball) very easily happens with bituminous coal, charcoal. Coke and anthracite will do too, but slightly slower/differently. All of them have different fire maintenances. I address I use bituminous coal and in what kind of fire pot it is fired in. So what do we have and what do I aim at: an over sized fire ball: we agree this is wasteful. I quote you: " I agree that it is wasteful to make the fire ball bigger than is needed." Thus it's larger, and often higher piled up - You got more fuel consumption. This is with the perspective that the fire ball can and will grow Your perspective is at a different point than mine. From what I can read from your posts we are still agreeing, only looking from different perspectives. What doesn't help is our differences in fuels used and corresponding observations. I have used coke, bituminous coal, charcoal, anthracite, lignite, wood. But I don't get the impression you have used bituminous coal that swells up into coke as it burns (often). My video mainly deals with this fuel, bituminous coal. You include the layer of fuel that isn't yet used inside the fire ball, I exclude this. It's not the part of the fire that supplies the heat. It's not fire or the glowing embers. And the fuel you use, and right now I have to assume it from what you say - correct me if wrong, is coke. Coke works different in it's fire maintenance than bituminous coal. There are enough similarities though. Because from the start we agree that making a fire (ball) bigger than the work at hand, is wasteful. The way smiths pull fresh coke over your fire (ball) - I did the exact same thing when I was in England; using a side blast forge and coke - I had better not done the same with bituminous coal. I can, as in I am able to do it. But it is not desireable. You can ask all smiths who use bituminous coal that you had better not done that. With coke you can just pull it over the fire. With bituminous coal is it better to make 2 fresh coal piles left and right of the fire ball, so it can coke the fresh coal and help keep the heat in as much as it can, whilst burning off the smoke. Or you can make an alround soft of volcano-like structure. Though this last one brings some undesireble effects I will leave out of this discussion. Coke you can choke down, if you do it right, exactly like you describe. Then you can indeed mount it higher, but still only have the fire ball small down inside. But a look around in forges in the main part of Europe and in the US and Canada, you will find many use bituminous coal. If you do the same thing, the fire will spread. you can water it down and extinquish it. But this cools down the fire and makes it inefficient with large piles. The coal will ignite, burn to coke first, but then continues to glow at dull red; burning (if not extinguished.) If you allow the fire (ball) to become larger and have glowing fuel ontop of the fire core, it is very wasteful. It's more apparent with bituminous coal than with coke. By limiting the amount of fuel you have on your fire, you limit the fire (ball) size and already converve a lot of fuel - all proportional to the stock heated. Further fuel conversation can be done with exact amount of air fed into the fire.

Thank you for the compliment! I'm glad to hear you like them. And the more text suggestion has been noted, cheers! The first statement " You cannot consume more fuel than what can be burnt by the air supplied " I cannot disagree with statement, it's fact that it works this way. So, we're on the same page regarding this. But I have to add there is a lot more to it than just that. Yes, this is fact, though a lot more things happen in a forge. The statement you make applies when there is no other possible source for oxygen to react with the fire. But the forge is in open air. Oxygen is all around the fire, so there is always a source apart from the forced air we use to heat up stock. Even if you pile up, coke and the other solid fuels are porous and/or have gaps everywhere where air can move through. It will reach it. This is not as apparent with coke, but clear with bituminous coal that is coked or being coked during forging, charcoal, wood that is charred to charcoal as you forge. Low quality coal turns into ash rather quickly in this case. Coke will die out rather quickly without much ash when air is stopped. Bituminous coal, coal, charcoal and wood will continue to be consumed at their corresponding rates. You can water the fuel in various ways at various stages, but I want to leave this out of the equation for now. Coke you can rake over the fire, it's all the same fuel. With bituminous coal, which I address in the video, it is not desireable to rake over fresh fuel. This will litter the fire, make it dirty - this is especially important for forge welding. Fresh coal is favorable to have around the fire so the heat can coke it, so you can have clean coke by time it reaches the center of your fire. The center of a coal fire tends to be left "open" - by this I don't mean a opening down to the tuyere, but the top layer of coke glows. This will burn off the gas released by the coking coal. If you want to you can smother the fire and create HUGE plumes of whiteish to green and yellowish smoke. Though this is not favorable. Certainly when you do demonstrations with bituminous coal!!! Something else that also affects the fuel consumption in a fire is thermal dynamics. A coal forge lit 10 minutes ago will heat stock more slowly/differently than a forge that has been fired for 6 hours. Heat/energy wants to find equilibrium: heating some 3/8" rod, say 1 foot long, heating it at the end. After some time, you will feel the heat at the other end. On a cold day the top portion of the anvil may become very warm during forging, but the feet are still cold. After a certain amount of time you can feel the heat in the feet. Piling fuel ontop of the fire does this too. It will always search for equilibrium. So heat wants to go into the cooler piled fuel. Now there is also more to it than how I just phrased that. Coke is a porous material, so it can insulate the fire. Which is what we smiths try our best to do. Though the heat still moves outward, even with very little air. If you leave it as is, the fire will become a big glowing pile, rather than having all heat contained at the core. You're heating the fuel too, the forge etc., rather than soley the stock. So, back to my statement. Making a larger fire (mostly emphasized on making it bigger than necessary) will result in more fuel consumption. I will agree again, it won't go any faster than you feed it air. But it's not a perfectly closed system. More things affect the fire. I'll also happily go the other way around. Say that piling and closing the fire keeps all heat it in and doesn't bring up fuel consumption. I wonder then why I don't see smiths making a large fire by default. It will save time and effort scooping fuel. When I studied blacksmithing at the Herefordshire College of Technology - today Hereford and Ludlow College, the beginning smiths were informed to not make a (an unnecessarily) big pile of coke on their (water cooled side blast forge) fire. Rather, make a suitable sized "mole hill" that is fit for the stock to be forged. But no excessive piling. Here comes my statement again - If you make the fire larger and higher you will consume more fuel. The college very much tries to keep the coke consumed in the forges down.

Ermm.. how can I say this the best. Are you 100% sure you got the context I advanced in the video, or tried to? You know...., making a big fire only to heat for example 3/8" stock, working this all day only, no professional speed applied or production. Thus more fuel is more fuel consumption. Plenty of beginners do this ----> goaled audience. This is an attempt of mine to save them money. In many areas coal isn't cheap. I haven't seen any smiths making their fire bigger than it needs to be. There is a balance to this, you make a fire suited for the stock size. Making it bigger than this wastes fuel. Or please, make a fire the size big enough to forge a sword in. I'd suggest the type and size used by Japanese swordsmiths and then only forge nails. Without putting multiple bars in, just 1 of, say 3/8" cross section. But that's awfully wasteful isn't it? All that energy released and not used to heat more stock. Well then you come to my statement more fuel = more fuel consumption. Either load up your fire or bring the size of your fire down. I hope this clarifies it.

Gegroet vanuit Alphen aan den Rijn, Nederland :). I will continue in English. Jan, your Peddinghaus is made sometime in the 1950s. The "Original P.F.P." anvils are the last ones to have been forge welded at the waist. The after the 1950s Succesor marked "PEDDINGHAUS" and the contemporary "RIDGID Peddinghaus" are electrically welded at the waist. I own several of the "PFP" and "Original PFP" anvils and one RIDGID Peddinghaus anvil. It's a joy to work on these drop forged steel anvils. Groeten, Joe

That has to have reasoning behind it. A context there must be. There are many people (especially with many people posting on Facebook and YouTube) who post what they do, beginners as well. And there is far more than just IFI Assuming it's aimed for the beginning smiths amongst us who don't often forge much larger stock than the 3/8" range, perhaps 1" stock once or twice. If you have a medium sized fire pot, say 3-4 inches deep, 9 x 9 or 12 inches, and load this up with fuel to only forge small stuff, that is fuel wasting. In any size fire pot there is a certain amount of volume of fuel consumed per hour. The larger and higher you pile up, the more fuel gets consumed. It all releases its heat, but if you don't have stock in there to absorb it, it's wasted. A certain % of heat is always lost. But you don't have to waste more than needed. Or do you always shovel a ton of fuel on your fire and let it go up in smoke, hahaha. I assume not. Even with a crank blower or shutting off air inbetween heats, you have a fuel volume that can heat many more pieces of stock than what one puts in. Say with the medium fire pot, you have capacity to easily heat 3" square stock. Now only put in 1 bar of 3/8" round. You still have all that fuel getting consumed. You can minimize it by carefully regulating air. Making the fire smaller, but large enough for the stock at hand is more fuel efficient. Or go the other way around, load up your forge with more bits of stock. A saying comes from this "Too many irons in the fire". For the same reason, one would perferably load up a gas forge with as much stock as you can. Because that burning gas is giving off heat. Whether you put it one piece or load it up, it will release the same amount of heat. Of course some regulation of heat and gas consumption is possible. But that is not the point I am trying to make. Still assuming it's aimed for the beginner smiths amongst us. Who of them can work more than one piece in the fire without burning or messing it up? Especially taking into account many don't have a teacher to watch over their shoulder. Or can instruct them and correct any info. they accidently took on differently than what whas said. I'd bet that whatever video you say, was totally not aimed at more seasoned smiths such as yourself. So that bit of info. doesn't at all apply to you. Context is important. If I could look at the video, I would look for the stock sizes used. If it's all small stock, a shallow fire makes sense. Many smiths (clearly not all of them) in Europe mention stoking a fire appropriate for the stock size you are using - And to not load up your fire pot with as much fuel as you can. It makes no sense to make a big fire suitable for forging an anvil if you're only going to forge nails.

Ladies and Gentlemen, In this video I present you the production of how the best steel for blades in the world is created. There is no other material that can match the superior qualites of this steel. If anyone is interested in buying; the price is 500USD per spike + shipping to your doorstop.

Can't this all be concluded very shortly? Either you think it's worth the money or you don't. Either you feel it makes a difference, or it doesn't (to you). It's a very personal thing. Both sides have good points. Though what I find interesting. If one doesn't want to spend, or say it isn't worth to spend 200USD on a new hammer, or another artifact of an equivalent price range. If this same person wants to sell his or her (forge) work, does this person sell at Walmart prices? Or does the price go up too? Because why should you spend 5USD, 15USD or perhaps 25+ USD on a bottle opener for example, while you can buy them very cheaply in stores. It's only to open bottles. Like a hammer is "only" to hit with, tongs only grab, a door knocker only knocks and a candle holder only holds candles. Or let's step up a bit. Say you're ordered to make a forged gate with some fencing, filled with scrolls and finials. Will this not be sold at pre-made and pre-fabricated prices as well? It's only some bar stock with the function to barricade. It may look "nice". But that's got nothing to do with function. If the answer is yes to both those two questions, I personally find that very strange. The forged bottle opener and or gate get a fair (this may differ per person, but higher than Walmart ranges) price, thus the produced qualities by the craftsman or -men have to be recognized. But at the same time, the works of other craftsmen are denied. "I ain't payin' 200 bucks fo' a hittin' stick!" Certainly, not everyone has the same budget. A starting hobbyist certainly can do as much with a 200USD hammer as a 5 dollar hammer. But so do this person's costumers for everything else he or she makes and sell. And yet, this person sells more expensive works that can be bought much cheaper else where with the exact same function. Mass produced, no personal touches, like the average Joe and Jaine have down the street. It's my opinion that I have to recognize and acknowledge other craftsmen's qualities and their blood, sweat and tears invested in whatever they produced. Of course, some things should be flushed down the toilet, but that's not the point I'm trying to make. These people should be paid accordingly, because I find it's worth the price and makes all the difference. (just an opinion) If I deny my fellow craftsmen's qualities, I deny my own as well. My 2 cents.

Sadly, yes it can. If it gets hot enough, the anvil can become softer. Sometimes temper colors occur, even though it hasn't reached this temperature. I don't know exactly why this happens. If you want to know if your anvil is too hot, put some water on the face, not much at all. If it boils, it's quite hot. Perhaps you want to ease off, or make less contact with the anvil - this is more efficient, to not have the anvil rob heat. If it just steams a bit and doesn't boil, you're in the safe zone.

LOL So any time you make a mistake you give a discount to customers? It doesn't work that way

Sigh..... RIDGID bought Peddinghaus the anvil and vise forging company, in Germany. RIDGID is American. Main center for RIDGID in Europe, is Belgium. The anvils have always been, and are still forged in Germany. Even though RIDGID is American and their main center in Europe is in Belgium.

Borax, sand, glass, dirt, egg shells, anything that melts and forms a liquid on your material, wether wrought iron, mild steel or tool steels will work as your flux. Time and time again I have experimented with forge welding and trying to find WHY it works and when not and WHY again. Have you ever tried to grab a bread crumb in a kitchen sink filled with water or a hair in a filled bath tub? You will find that the moment you try to grab them with your fingers, they shoot out just before your fingers touch. It's hard to grab. The same thing happens in forge welding. Of all videos I have seen, all smiths I have seen live, all videos I have posted myself and my personal research videos, they are the welds that have "squirting out" effect that always work. Thus upon the first impact, flux, or whatever, shoots out of the weld seam. If this doesn't happen, 99% of the time it didn't weld. The flux, whether sand, borax, bla bla bla, pushes all dirt out from the weld seam, making the surfaces clean enough to bond when they touch. What is a weld without flux? Instead if using, borax, sand etc. you use something else. You use scale. Yes fire scale! The melting point of mild steel is somewhere around 1450 C - 2642 F give or take. The melting point of fire scale is 1369 C - 2496F. It is this that allows me to do a "fluxless" weld. The scale melts and cleans my surface for welding. Hence I like a little oxidizing fire for my welds on wrought iron and mild steels, it forms the liquid scale faster. Once the liquid scale is present, it can't oxidize any further, it is a barrier for the oxygen. The iron or steel won't further oxidize unless the scale drips off and exposes the steel, which then again forms a liquid layer again. Why doesn't this tend work for tool steels (higher carbon content, higher than 0.45%C) If you look up the iron carbon phase diagram, you can see that as the carbon % increases, the melting point decreases. So when you bring these tool steels up 1369 + C --- 2496 + F, you are too close to its melting point. The steel structure tends to be ruined. GRRRRR Glad I saved my post. a BIG part is still missing and IFI won't let me post! GRRRR https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZyhORADu5g

What the............ I can't post what I wrote!? But this does come up, is it too long? I have it saved, but I can't post it on here. What is this nonesense, while this bit of text CAN come up here.

AARRGHHH!!!!!!!!! !@(#$)(*)(*_@()%#% Stupid disappearing posts!!!!!!!! Curse you! #$()*_ This really annoys me....... there's a lot of typing gone to explain why I use my forging hammers to strike my tools and the round face on the rounding hammer. Maybe another time... Sigh...........................................................

Well done on the tongs. Keep at it and you'll have a nice arsenal of tongs to easily handle and tackle your future projects.

Peddinghaus's alloy for the drop forged anvils is a secret. It wouldn't surprise me if the PFP, Original PFP, Peddinghaus and Ridgid Peddinghaus (These are all the same Peddinghaus but in different times) all have a slightly different alloy.

Partially squared hardy hole on the Peddinghaus anvils: solved I have gotten a few copies of the old Peddinghaus catalogs; anvils, vises, pipe clamps and more. In one of the catalogs, it is mentioned that the models 2 and 5 (20kg and 35kg) will only have the hardy holes hot drifted square after drilling, the customer wants this and pays extra. Models 7 to 12 (models to 50kg - 110lbs to 125kg - 275lbs) come with a square drifted hole. The exception to this were the earliest PFP (before Orginial PFP). All models were only drifted square if requested and paid. This is why some Peddinghaus anvils in the 180lbs range, or heavier, with only a PFP (NOT Original PFP) stamp have a round hardy hole and the top lightly pushed square. ​ So, if anyone gets a second hand Peddinghaus with a hardy hole that hasn't been drifted square, it's because the first owner bought it like this. Today, Ridgid Peddinghaus only produces model number 5, 9 and 12 (35kg - 75kg - 125kg). If the 35kg anvil still has to be requested with a square hole, you have to ask your Ridgid tool dealer.

Mostly directed at the enthusiastic beginners smiths amongst us. The well known railroad spike is a raw material to many and I'd like to provide a different kind of alternative than stake flippers, bottle openers or anything with a cutting edge. A railroad spike has a lot of material in it and many things can be made of it. If you're a beginner smith and need tongs, why not make tongs of these spikes? Of course there are better choices of steels for tongs, but it's not bad. They will work and do the job. Forging flat nib tongs. Forging bolt tongs.

I've received a response from Refflinghaus. They have researched and tested alloys to find one that is suitable for an anvil. 52HRc is considered to be soft. Of course it's harder than mild steel. But it's not regarded as hard. Refflinghaus produces an anvil with a 59HRc face. If I remember correctly, Mike's (Yesteryear forge) 1245lbs Reffinghaus anvil has a hardness of 64HRc. From Peddinghaus I have yet to receive a response.

Bolt tongs are already on the list I see. But here's my version of bolt tongs from (2) railroad spikes.

The picture isn't very clear, but I can sure tell it's flat. Thank you for adding the picture. Now this is a Rathole forge anvil, made of H13, an air hardening steel. My assumption would be that he leaves them as the castings were and then just had the face milled flat. You could nitride it, but I would very much doubt he'd do that. He says they're a minimum of 52HRc, shooting for 55HRc. Have you tested your anvil see how hard it is? Again my assumption is he has it milled after casting and then leaves it as it is. Yes, that's how you can get a flat face, with bicks, somewhat hard. 52HRc not being that hard. Peddinghaus, Refflinghaus, Kohlswa, UAT, DLC, just to name a few brands, are not made of air hardening steel. These are made of forged or cast steel that require heat treatment after they're cleaned up. It's just a natural thing the steel does when heat treated in that state. Even if you could mill it flat, think of what you're doing. The hard face is a few mm deep on these anvils, and doesn't extend down all the way to the feet. So after heat treatment. You can consider milling it flat again, but that gives 2 problems. With a 58HRc (Peddinghaus) or +- 59HRc (Refflinghaus) you will ruin your bits to mill that. And if you do succeed after at milling that that super annoying hard face, there will be a good portion of the hard face gone. Thus you're almost back at having a soft face again. You could send Peddinghaus (and Refflinghaus) an email asking why they don't use air hardening steels. Or the other anvil manufacturers. I'll send them one as well.

Here's something I haven't seen many do: a ball bearing test on their own anvil. In this video I compare the rebound of a 44lbs Peddinghaus (Original PFP 1903 - 1930) and a 277lbs Peddinghaus (Original PFP same period). I need to get in touch with someone who'd allow me to scrutinize his or her new 275lbs Ridgid Peddinghaus and compare that with the older models I have. If I can, I will record that too and post the results. Also, somewhere back in the thread I got asked for pictures of the horn drop. This seems to be very common. I don't think I've ever seen a Peddinghaus with no horn drop. It's just a thing that comes from heat treatment. The 277lbs has something like 3mm + in horn drop or so. The 303lbs has something like just under 5mm. I'd have to measure again to be sure and take pictures. Has it bothered me? Not that I am aware of. My Refflinghauses have the same horn drop, again from heat treatment. If anyone thinks they can't work with horns that have a slight bend in them (I'd be more interested in you trying to add more drop into it with forging) I will advise you to never buy a Peddinghaus, nor a Refflinghaus. I haven't seen a double bick Kohlswa, DLC, UAT. It's funny though that most have a London pattern of any brand with the horn pointed up. But no one complains about this I know the purpose for the pointed up horn is to make the horn last longer, because they are usually made of soft wrought iron, Without any steel facing over it. Exceptions excist. But most are just soft wrought iron. Though the point still is "it's not straight or inline with the face" I'm not sure about the Czech cast anvils what they do with them. They're only 44HRc, so I could see them mill that flat still. If anyone has pictures of his or her double bick anvil that is perfectly flat with a straight rule over it, put it on here and share it.

Some of the responses I find quite humorous to read. Anyway. If anyone receives anything don't you check if it's up to specs? In the case you think it isn't, what do you do? You call the factory or dealer and get it sorted out. If you do this, job well done. If anything you just bought isn't what you expected of it, contact the seller, get your money back. Job well done. But if you alter things and there are no real factory issues to be found, it's your lost money and problem. Should've looked at that before doing anything, everyone's own responsibility. Anyone can always find anything to moan about, it's very easy. Present me or anyone something anyone made and the drawings and a whole bookwork can be written about things to moan about. If anyone has got anything to moan, why not document this well and send it to the seller/factory for improvement. If you have, thank you and job well done. That's a lot more useful for future buyers than moaning here. Because whether it's Refflinghaus, Peddinghaus, Kohlswa, Vaughns, Rathole forge, Rhino, Fisher, Vulcan, Peter Wright etc. There's always a group who hates them and always a group who swears by them. The haters are especially a value group, because they tend to look for all bad things in a product. This is very valuble information! This is the info. of where to improve! As well as provides all pros and cons of a product! Maybe the people who started to dislike me, starting in this thread, start to understand what I am doing here and why Take a look in the other reviews on IFI and what other anvil review is as divers as this one!? Even though all bad things that can be said about Peddinghaus, they're still bought and owned by very MANY happy owners. For example, there are enough things I could moan about with my Refflinghaus anvil. But I must never forget how they're made, still by humans, Peddinghaus too. And that I can't do it better for a cheaper price, same for Peddinghaus. If anyone can make a forged steel anvil better than Peddinghaus, why don't you? Especially if you can make them so much cheaper. I too musn't forget the GOOD things either! And I talk about this with Refflinghaus. If you don't believe me, I'd suggest you give them a call or email them and ask for my name. Does my way of going about, start to make sense? I don't intend to make anyone's blood boil, and if I did, I give my appologies. But it did result in true and unsalted reviews, which are priceless! Because look around, many reviews are heavily sweetened! Happy hammering! Cheers, Joe