Mike R Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 Got my first anvil today. Price was right, got it free from mother in law. It says Peter Wright on the side and has a 3 on the bottom under the horn and a 0 on the side at the front. I put it on the scale and it is 62 pounds. I am fairly shure it went thru the forest fire that destroyed the home it was in. Not shure if it was outside or went thru a structure fire whene the garage burned. Would this have damaged the hardness of it? I am going to use it as it is what I have but the edges are preatty beat up. I have access to an arc welder and hardplateing rod, should I lay some on and grind it back to square? can't seem to get pics attached. Will try agean later Thanks Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MLMartin Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 I would definitely say NO to welding until you have used it a long time. Also make sure to read up on the ROB GUNTER method for welding up anvils. If you use the wrong hard facing rod there is a high chance all the welding will crack off and make the anvil worse. Many hard facing rods are stainless steel they will not match the steel the anvil is made of. They will make it worse. Post some pictures. Treat the old girl nice. It is pretty hard to find anvils that small these days and some times they are worth more money than one that is 150lb Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 Yes a fire may have drawn the temper of the face. Easy enough to tell; go over to anvilfire.com and search up the info on the ball bearing test and look at values for PWs. Especially as small PWs will generally be harder faced than larger ones. I would think long and hard before messing with the face. Charles McRaven describes re-hardeing an anvil face in "Country Blacksmithing" but it's a process that possible could cause delamination. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike R Posted December 9, 2011 Author Share Posted December 9, 2011 pics of new anvil Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 Patina looks like a fire to me. As for grinding the edges square: the blacksmithing books from the 19th century tell you that the first thing you want to do with a new anvil is to round the edges---keeps them from chipping and prevents them from marking and putting cold shuts in your work. If you *need* a sharp edge make a hardy tool---size it right and you can have 4 edges to use before redoing it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timothy Miller Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 If it is soft that anvil is small enough to reharden in a large fire in a normal forge. You will need a lot of water to do it perhaps a swift flowing creek. The face is in reasonably good condition I would say no welding is necessary. Besides welding and grinding is more work than heating it up and quenching. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted December 10, 2011 Share Posted December 10, 2011 Flowing water needs to be under pressure to penetrate the steam jacket of any decent sized anvil---Charles McRaven used a high pressure hose from his local volunteer fire department to reharden the anvil he talked about in Country Blacksmithing. Anvil manufacturers often used water towers with a large diameter pipe to get enough water under enough pressure to harden an anvil---even at that large anvils tended to be softer than smaller ones; probably a feature rather than a bug as large anvils tended to see a lot more sledging than small ones! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timothy Miller Posted December 10, 2011 Share Posted December 10, 2011 Mousehole forge used water with only a few feet of drop to harden their anvils as proven by archeological evidence. Hay-budden used street water. This anvil is only 65 lbs I don't think you need anything that large to do the job for an anvil of that size. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John McPherson Posted December 11, 2011 Share Posted December 11, 2011 Yes, but at Mousehole Forge that few feet of drop was cold diverted river water from the sluice that powered the waterwheel, and was quite a few gallons per second. Quantity has a quality of its own. IIRC, I think they also said the discharge got hot enough to kill the nearby fish when they did large anvils. It has been a few years since I read the book, but I don't own a copy to recheck. The Sea Robin bladesmith anvils were inverted and the face dipped into a 55 gallon drum of superquench with a chain hoist. They were only medium carbon steel, with 40 points of carbon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike R Posted December 13, 2011 Author Share Posted December 13, 2011 thanks guysI didn't have a bearing so I used a steely marble. I suppose that is the same thing. I got about 6 inch bounce with a 14 inch drop on the main body and about 4 inch bounce with 14 inch drop on the horn. I also hit it with a hammer. Part of it rang fairly loud and part was a little duller. Should they ring the same all over?Senior Moment Member, I had a hard time with the search function on Anvilfire.com. Never did find the test or the values but I searched IFI and came up with the test info. If you have a link to the values I would appreciate it.As for the edges I get that they want to be rounded but would it make sense to weld where the big chunks are missing? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John McPherson Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 You say big chunks missing, I only see coin sized chips from the edge. Easily contoured and blended with a grinder, easy to work around until you do. If the face cuts easily with a worn file, it could stand to be re-hardened. If it skates, then it should be just fine as-is. If I was going to weld on it to restore the edges, I would do it as part of the preheat cycle before you quenched the face. Big chunks to me means thumb sized up to deck of cards size. I bought a 200lb Hay-Budden with half the face gone for less than a dollar a pound, just to be able to build the face back with welding rod. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 Anvilfire.com => Navigate Anvilfire => 21st Century => Anvils Testing Rebound Says that a PW should be in the 80% range. If your steely is a ball bearing makes a difference as ball bearings are quite hard making the test one of testing the anvil face and not both the ball and the anvil face. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike R Posted December 13, 2011 Author Share Posted December 13, 2011 I will find a ball bearing and try again. Thanks for the info. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timothy Miller Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 Forget about the ball bearing heat up some metal and try it out. Your putting the cart before the horse. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike R Posted December 14, 2011 Author Share Posted December 14, 2011 Southshoresmith I am almost done with my forge and think I have some coal so I will do that as soon as I can. Will I damage the anvil if the hardnes is not right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timothy Miller Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 You might put a few hammer marks in it but if its soft its not worth much anyway. If it is soft form being exposed to the heat of a fire it the anvil is already damaged. Use it guilt free Peter Wrights are common enough anvils. Just try to not let the hammer strike the face directly. Eventually you will probably want a bigger anvil this is a good starting point for anybody. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MLMartin Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 Yes Peter Wrights are common but that size is not. If it is vary soft I would not use it. Probably could sell the thing to a smith that could fix it. Put the money to getting a working anvil. If it face if still relatively flat there is no reason to beat it all to snot when some one could re heat treat the thing and get it back into proper service. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timothy Miller Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 Its still going to be harder than hot iron. If he is careful and works correctly he should be OK until he can find something harder and bigger. Yes it is uncommon to find PW in this size but its still only a $200 to $300 in very good condition. I would describe this as fair to good with the heavy surface rust and chips. if its soft its worth even less. It would take a decent smith minim 3 hours to reharden and temper this anvil so you would have to subtract the value of that labor from the price then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 I'd talk with a local smithing group and see if they would like to attempt the re-hardening as a demo at a conference---like SOFA did the re-facing of an anvil by forge welding on a new face at Quad-State a couple of years ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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