Even though it's smaller when you quench something like a knife it's recommended moving the blade back'n forth or in a figure 8 pattern.  In the video where the anvil is attached to the truck would driving the truck forwards and backwards have the same effect?

maybe, go backwards at 40 mph into the lake, then forwards at 40 mph, about a second in each direction for 10 minutes or until it has cooled, whichever is the longer

maybe, go backwards at 40 mph into the lake, then forwards at 40 mph, about a second in each direction for 10 minutes or until it has cooled, whichever is the longer

haha, thank you for the explanation and great visual

now if you built the fire on the far side of the lake and had a "carrier" for the anvil and enough cable to cross the lake and ....Hmm finding a high pressure pump doesn't seem such a hard thing...Out here the farmers have pretty big irrigation pumps...but the VFD would probably do it for the giggles...(especially as my pastor and his wife are both in the VFD...)

I will be using forced air with the wood + coke fire to get the thing up to temp. This is not the first piece of steel i will be heating.
 
Also, I going off of  HWooldridge's experience with the hardening. I will have several wheelbarrows and garbage bins filled with water (and friends) ready to help me pour the water onto the anvil.
As much as I would love to ask the fire department I'm sure they would not oblige.

The quench is obviously important but it's also vital to keep the residual heat in the body from running back into the face. That's one of the reasons to need the extra water volume. If you start to run low on water and have to choose is an area to keep cool, it's probably better to let the heel and hardy draw more than the main forging areas closer to the horn (best to not run out in the first place, eh?)

The quench is obviously important but it's also vital to keep the residual heat in the body from running back into the face. That's one of the reasons to need the extra water volume. If you start to run low on water and have to choose is an area to keep cool, it's probably better to let the heel and hardy draw more than the main forging areas closer to the horn (best to not run out in the first place, eh?)

 

Good point. I will have a a container of water to put the anvil in once the top gets cool. I will put two bricks in the container, and flip the anvil face side down into the water raised on the bricks. The entire anvil will not be submerged the the face will be. 
The water will not get above 100 degrees Celsius, any water that evaporates I can just pour more back in. Also, while it is face side down I will be spraying it with a water hose to get the heat out.

Good point. I will have a a container of water to put the anvil in once the top gets cool. I will put two bricks in the container, and flip the anvil face side down into the water raised on the bricks. The entire anvil will not be submerged the the face will be. 
The water will not get above 100 degrees Celsius, any water that evaporates I can just pour more back in. Also, while it is face side down I will be spraying it with a water hose to get the heat out.

Sounds good - let us know how it goes. Best of luck!

Good point. I will have a a container of water to put the anvil in once the top gets cool. I will put two bricks in the container, and flip the anvil face side down into the water raised on the bricks. The entire anvil will not be submerged the the face will be. 
The water will not get above 100 degrees Celsius, any water that evaporates I can just pour more back in. Also, while it is face side down I will be spraying it with a water hose to get the heat out.

Setting the hot face on blocks during the quench will prohibit proper quenching. The face needs to be flooded with water under pressure so as to (as said above) keep the steam jacket to a minimum.

I suspect with an alloy steel if you heated only the face you want to harden you would be fine with a big body of water,  I would be more concerned with cracking of the face than under hardening.  These are oil hardening steels and I suspect even with any steam jacket problem water is still going to cool the part way faster than oil will.  I have never seen a waterfall or firehose used for quenching in any of the commercial heat treat facilities or foundries doing their own HT I have been to and they were quenching parts up to thousands. of pounds   They use agitation of the water instead.  As long as you have decent water pressure I suspect a large hose running into  your quench container you will have a plenty fast quench. 

Setting the hot face on blocks during the quench will prohibit proper quenching. The face needs to be flooded with water under pressure so as to (as said above) keep the steam jacket to a minimum.

I meant I will place it in a container of water face down once It was already hardened in order to prevent the face being tempered.

I forgot to mention that the anvil face is 3'' wide. The entire anvil is 28'' long horn to horn, 13 7/8'' tall and roughly 120Lb

I DID IT! I DID IT!

Just finished an hour ago.

 

I was worried during the quench because at time the pour was interrupted but at the end it worked and the face hardened up well.

 

I will have the video up soon.

 

Here are some teaser pictures for now.

 

I DID IT! I DID IT!

Just finished an hour ago.

 

I was worried during the quench because at time the pour was interrupted but at the end it worked and the face hardened up well.

 

I will have the video up soon.

 

Here are some teaser pictures for now.

 

 

 

 

Good job!  Now you know how to do it.

Good job!  Now you know how to do it.

 

Thank you HWooldridge. You where the one who gave me the idea for this method, and you helped me a lot along the way answering my questions and so forth.

This anvil have been over 5 months in the making (Late February)

I now have a usable tool, I only now need to pretty it up.

I got a wire wheel last week and had time to pretty it up today.
 
I took two photos, one after cleaning, another after painting. I still need to give it a few more coats.

The anvil looks great! Nice work!

Good job!!  Nice to see you got it done despite the naysayers.

Very nice job,  can't wait to see what else you make now!  Bet a power hammer will be in the works before you know it.

Yes I am quite happy I got this anvil finished. I am very lucky I got to use the shop at school and all of the equipment there.

I am already planning the Power Hammer!


Here is the video of the heat treating.
 
I will put out one more of the cleaning / painting / mounting.
 

 
 
Solid Edge Full Assembly Drawing

How did you like using Solid Edge?

How did you like using Solid Edge?

The only other program I used was SketchUp so i do not have much of a baseline to compare to.

 

I found Solid Edge very frustrating, but as you can see i eventually was proficient enough to draw the  anvil. (Not very proficient) 

How did your pour get interrupted at the end ????

How did your pour get interrupted at the end ????

 

In the video you can see we did not get a constant pour, it was a little interrupted.

 

Near the end, to prevent the temper from running up the face i wanted to lift the anvil face-side-down in the wheelbarrow full of water (It was raised off the plastic with steel spacers). It took longer then i wanted for that to happen.

 

Despite all of that it all turned out well, as you can see with the rebound at the end. -The horn though is softer then the main body because it was hard to get a even heat form the body to horn in my forge. 


 

Same thing happened to me on my first anvil (the one I still use).  We also ran short of water so I kept what flow we had over the main body since that's where most of the mass was.  The heel back of the hardy did not get quite as hard but no matter - it has held up for many years and will outlive me.  It actually might be a good thing to have less hardness near the hardy to provide some toughness in that area.

 

If I ever do another one, I think prefilling a couple of those industrial 250 gallon plastic totes with water would work to provide volume after the initial quench.  Just like any other carbon steel, the temperature needs to fall rapidly to form martensite but the main purpose after that is to prevent the residual heat from tempering it too much.

 

I think you did a great job and the anvil will be a joy to use for a long time.

Last Video Guys.

 

Cleaning it up, painting, mounting.