A few years ago I got my anvil out of a dumpster. It came from a school that dropped its metal class. The kits had beat it up fairly bad. I want to weld up the edges and re-grind the face. What kind of rod should I use and what kind of pre-heat.

I wouldn't try welding on that anvil, it's NOT beat up enough to risk the damage you can do to it. No matter how much you know about rebuilding anvils and your experience there's always risk. One of the biggest problems is NOT welding high carbon steel, it'w welding on MYSTERY high carbon steel and hoping to control the HAZ zone.

If you must search out the Gunther method. It's proven over hundreds of anvils and years of use. Of course it is your anvil just please give it careful consideration and use the best methods available.

Frosty The Lucky.

Unless that face plate has delaminated, I'd just leave it alone. 

That's actually in quite good condition; what do you think it needs?  Grinding on the hardened face of an anvil is a terrible thing to do often removing a century of uselife and sometimes turning a perfectly usable anvil into scrap metal.

I strongly suggest you use it for a year before making changes.  As anvil repair has been discussed on this site at least several times a week for years is there a certain reason we need to re-type it all over again just for you?

Don't forget what was published over 100 years ago too:

Practical Blacksmithing;Volume 1, published in 1889; page 111: "For my own part I am satisfied not only that the sharp edges are useless, but that they are also destructive of good work. I cannot account for their existance except as a relic of a time  when the principles of forging were but little understood. I want both edges of my anvil rounded, not simply for a part of their length, but for their whole length."

I was instructed to make nails on the sharp edge of an anvil. Very effective. When i say sharp i don't  mean zero radius but rather a very small/tight radius.

Upon using an anvil which possesses beat up/worn out edges i have to emoy use of a hardie tool/block. Still servicable anvil but may require additional tooling. Nothing wrong with additional tooling. 

Blacksmith depot sells a version of a hardie block just for such purpose.  Sometimes you gotta have a crisp/tight radius when fullering.

I have a small anvil I use atop the very worn Trenton. Mounted to a hardie shank. I can leave that anvil in place and use its own hardie tooling while it remains securely  mounted in the big anvil hardie  hole.

That anvil is in great condition. Good job rescuing it from the dumpster! Don't risk putting it back in.

Thanks for the reply's. I actually looked for anvil repair before I posted, just did not look in the correct spot. Thanks again

the search function on this website can be lacking so we suggest you use a better one and add iforgeiron.com as a term; eg I just ran

 "anvil repair" iforgeiron.com

through Google and pretty much the entire first page of results were IFI hits on the subject.

(the only one that wasn't was a welding forum where the asker was directed to go to IFI!)

An "Aesthetic" sees a tool for what it "is".

A "Pragmatist" sees it for what it can "do".

The same comparison applies to "shiny cars" versus "trusty old trucks", ... or to "girls" & "women".

Wars have been fought over such perceptional conflicts. 

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Based on my limited experience with the fairer sex, ... I'd advise you to use it "as is" .....

 

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