I just bought this FN 250, 1904 from a farrier I know.
I am going to be using it primarily for bladesmithing
Ive been looking for a good anvil for some time now, as I already grind knives on a 2x72 and have experience making knives by stock removal, this is the next step for my shop.
My question is should I carefully sand the pitting from the face or leave it be?
The working face is otherwise very serviceable and straight.
This anvil has killer rebound.
.80 a lb for the whos out there

No, leave it alone and just go to hammering. They are great anvils.

i did a light clean up on mine , glad i did it , just do it slow and cool it down with water now and then , dont let it get hot....

I'd say leave it alone. It is a fine anvil and a steal at $.80 a pound. Congrats!

If you remove over 100 years of patina, you will NEVER be able to restore that same patina in your lifetime. If you remove any of the face of the anvil by grinding etc, you will never be able to replace it to the original condition, gone is gone. You can patch, or resurface but it is not the same as the original.

Pound hot iron on the anvil for a while. It does NO DAMAGE to the anvil. In fact it will actually clean the face showing you any imperfections or dings from previous owners.

You can always sand, wire brush, grind, modify, or weld on the surface later. After all it is YOUR anvil to do with as you wish.

I will let it be.
I figured the only place I would find a good anvil in Floriduh is from a farmer or a farrier.
I did however use the old wire brush and linseed trick; to keep the patina

If you want textured blades, leave it alone. If you want smooth forgings, freshen it up......Your choice.

You cleaned it best with the wire brush, otherwise leave it alone and just do some hot forging on it. You got a great deal on that anvil. I have a 300# Fisher and really enjoyed working on it.

If you want textured blades, leave it alone. If you want smooth forgings, freshen it up......Your choice.

thats why i smooth out mine , it was leaving bad marks on my work, i had to do something...

That is where a 2x72 helps. We will see how hot working cleans it up.

You cleaned it best with the wire brush, otherwise leave it alone and just do some hot forging on it. You got a great deal on that anvil. I have a 300# Fisher and really enjoyed working on it.

Great deal, your telling me; I literally begged, he knew what it was worth, but in a divorce situation...
He bought it off some corn-fed Iowa farmer, brought it here and now it will stay with me, hopefully one of my kids will one day get into metal work.
All I know is Im never gettiing rid of it
Even If I loose use of my arms I can still bang my head against it :blink:

In this situation I'd definitely suggest using it a bit and then deciding about giving the face a kiss with a sanding disk.

I have an HB that was stored in an unheated area in a swampy location that has fine condensation pitting all over the face. I'm polishing it out by smithing on it---the scale is an abrasive and already the "sweet spot" is nearly clean again.

Good to know. I figured it would clean up with use.
Most of the pitting is only a few thousandths anyway.

Funny, here in my region I've noticed at least three old anvils at various houses (my job keeps me moving!) that have perfectly flat faces. I couldn't believe they were so flat and perfect after all these years so I took a closer look.

You could clearly see that the faceplate was less than an eighth of an inch on all of them. Turns out, one of the common habits was to sand and file the face to keep it nice and flat regardless of how you abused the anvil. They all still had ring and rebound, but you could see minor separation and chipping starting to become an issue.

You could also send it in to an anvil manufacturer and have another steel face forge welded on---there are add for that shown in "Anvils in America"

This bad boy is a half in thick face all the way arround

My anvil (Sweedish) was mercilessly scarred by a center punch (previous owner). Must have been over a hundred holes. Do to a lot of forging it is now clean as a whistle. Treat it like your wife and don't rub (sand) her the wrong way, just beat on her.