This is my first anvil. I have no information about it and was wondering wondering if anyone could identity it or tell me if it's any good. 

I am looking to clean it up to look a lot nicer any help with that would be appreciated too.

Thank you in advance.

Difficult to offer much info from one photo with little detail. It looks to be a relatively modern offering and possibly ex school stock or such like. If you find any details to post pictures of (stampings evidence of weldments or casting flash) someone may be able to offer morre information. I could be wrong but that stand may be a little high, difficult to tell from a photo and not knowing your stature! How does it fair for rebound?

At a guess, you've probably gotten yourself a decent tool, any story behind it's purchase?

Check the ring and rebound; that looks like Brooks Blue to my eye; but the other folks in the UK could give a better opinion.  However if it has a good rebound it's a good anvil NO MATTER WHO MADE IT!   I could take 2 identical great anvils and by annealing one of them make it a terrible anvil even though it was identical to a great one to start.

It doesn't look like a brooks to me, the heel is too slender and there's no sign of the casting seam, though with the blue paint brooks was my initial guess. I think its just an anvil that was painted blue at one point in its past.

Vaughn's use the same or a similar colour and provide a number of anvil options, so I don't expect the colour itself to be much of a reliable indicator of manufacturer. I'd add that I suspect the stand may be user made.

I believe vaughns bought out brooks, or the two companies merged though I could be wrong and if anyone is better informed than I am please feel free to correct me.

I should have said in my previous post I don't believe it's a cast steel brooks anvil, I think they made wrought iron ones before moving onto the cast steel ones that were painted blue.

On 4 July 2016 at 10:50 AM, Michaelarmer said:

This is my first anvil. I have no information about it and was wondering wondering if anyone could identity it or tell me if it's any good. 

I am looking to clean it up to look a lot nicer any help with that would be appreciated too.

Thank you in advance.

Hi Michael, I'm just over the water from you on the Wirral. You'd be welcome to stop buy some time. 

 

If you put a few more pictures up we might be able to get a better idea. It's a farrier pattern  as it's missing the cutting table. Beyond that it's hard to tell. If you clean it up a bit with a wire cup on an angle grinder you might reveal some markings on one side. Looks like a fair size. 

 

All the best 

Andy

Thanks for the help guys! Sorry for the slow reply but I've almost finished cleaning it up now and I have found some markings on one side which read "2 2 20" mean anything to anyone? I'll post some pictures as soon as I get home. 

Thanks again 

300 lbs. Its in cwt weight. 112×2+28×2+20=300

and is a weight marking system that was pretty well localized to the UK and back before metrification; although I do have some UK friends who still weigh themselves in stone...