Jump to content
I Forge Iron

Anvil ID and repair(?) advise


Recommended Posts

I got my "freebie" anvil ($50 in gas and a few favors later), it's 100 lb on my bathroom scale. Not a big one but way better than the piece of rail I've been using. I'm posting some pics hoping someone might recognise the pitted logo, and I need some advise on the condition.

The horn is missing a chunk, I'm wondering if I should try to;
a) work around it
B) grind it to a better shape
c) weld before grinding

There looks to be welding around the main face, I'm wondering if it was built up. The chunk off the horn looks like a buildup came off. (edit: Or maybe a layer of wrought iron?)

The third pic is under the horn, I can't make out the letters well enough. The fourth pic is under the heel, is 1908 the date or a model #?

Thanks for any help and advise!!

5396.attach

5397.attach

5398.attach

5399.attach

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Appears to be a Fisher, the emblem on the side looks like an eagle.
For the horn repair you can use either E6010 (according to Robb Gunter's repair procedure) or E7018, then grind to shape. I don't think I would do anything to the face, doen't look bad enough to worry about. As far as the #'s and letters at the feet I don't know what all they mean. I'm sure someone with a copy of "Anvils in America" can tell you more on that. Good looking anvil and the price sounds good too!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's a Fisher all right, the best of the tool steel face cast iron base anvils out there!
It was made in 1908 and originally weighed around 100#---the 10 on the leg. The emblem on the side would be the Fisher Eagle.

The face looks great! but the horn has been abused. Fisher horns have a tool steel top plate to them and you can see where that has been broken off. What's left is cast iron and *not* something easy to weld up. I would leave it and make a bick for the hardy hole to work on for things that need the end of the horn.

Oh yes, the Fishers are a quiet anvil that do not have the bell like ring of many of the wrought iron/steel face anvils---a good thing for use in the shop! The top should be quite hard enough for good forging---if not the anvil was in a structure fire.

My major shop anvil is a large Fisher and I love it---I just did a week of camping/forging with my small travel anvil and the ring was painful when we did not have it muted with a bullpin dropped down the hardy hole. Ringing is good to bring in a crowd at Demo's; bad in the shop where you work.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks, guys! I wasn't planning on doing anything to the face, I just meant it looks like welding bead in certain places around the edge. Small as it is, it's a world of flatness compared to the used rail I was using...

Thomas P - I noticed it does not ring, yet has good rebound. If it is 100 years old, I guess I'd be better off leaving it as is.

Thanks again to both of you!

edit: I can make out the "FISHER" letters under the horn, cool!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The reason why it looks like a weld line around the top of the anvil is because that's exactly what it is though not in an electric weld bead sense. The bottom of a fisher anvil is cast in place ontop of the heated tool steel plate to get a complete weld of the face to the body. Depending on how the anvil was dressed this can be more or less obvious on various fisher anvils but has no impact on the useability of it (and the other cast body tool plate anvils such as vulcans)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"The face looks great! but the horn has been abused. Fisher horns have a tool steel top plate to them and you can see where that has been broken off. What's left is cast iron and *not* something easy to weld up. I would leave it and make a bick for the hardy hole to work on for things that need the end of the horn."

My bad...wasn't aware of them being cast iron with a tool steel horn top plate. Glad to know that. Thanks Thomas for the info.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Fisher and Vulcan are the two most common American brands of steel faced cast iron bodied anvils.

I love Fishers and hate Vulcans as all the Vulcans I have had/used had a softer face and a thinner steel top than the Fishers. Vulcans were often sold to schools and so being a tad softer made them less dangerous---lower incidence of spalling due to mistrikes.

However Vulcans also seem to have had lower quality control as I have seen several where there were *bad* casting porosity along the horn's steel face interface---including one on my "wall of shame" where the horn broke off as there was a zone of less than 50% metal at the horn body junction.

I use a 500+# Fisher as my main shop anvil---with 407# Trenton backup and 165# Peter Wright, 138# Hey-Budden and 91# Arm and Hammer as "travel anvils".

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Vulcan anvils certainly aren't as good quality as fisher anvils, but for the most part if you find one, they're still better than the harbor fright stuff that many people are using these days. The small 70 and 80lb vulcans actually had the opposite problem, in that their face was many times too hard, and badly chipped edges are very common on the smaller size Vulcan anvils.

That anvil you have is a nice one, BeverDam, and I wouldnt worry too much about the spot on the horn, if you need to bend something in a small radius, use a bickern instead.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That explains it alright.

No flowers here for a couple months yet though the temp's in the 20's.

The fire in the stove's gone out maybe 3 times in the last 4 months and will be going for another at least.

The sun's shining in the window as I type and it's nice enough to start getting out for fun now. The arm still has me laid up, Deb yells at me if I try to do anything so I'm pretty bored.

All in all things are fine, I'm healing nicely from the last surgery and I'm regaining flexibility in the elbow much faster than after the first surgery.

If the sum of my complaints is a little boredom and the wife yelling at me for doing something, anything. . .

Hmmmmm. No complaints at all at all. :rolleyes:

Frosty

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...