July 9, 20187 yr So Im using my buddies anvil while he is out of the country for the year. The anvil fave has great rebound and has been working great.... Until I tried to make my first bottle opener. I noticed the horn was a little blunt and off center so I was trying to shape it a little to get a better point, when I realized that a large portion of the horn is resin. It looks like the casting was not lined up correctly so the used resin to fill in low spots. Is this a common thing to happen? And what would be the best way to fix it?
July 9, 20187 yr Welcome to IFI, Jpierce1020! If you haven't yet, please READ THIS FIRST!!! So, are you saying that this resin was part of the original construction? Like, with paint over it? That is NOT a good sign. Also, how were you "reshaping" the horn? Not grinding it, I hope. Once ground off, that metal is not getting back on the anvil.
July 9, 20187 yr There was a video posted or mentioned reciently of a HF anvil being cut with a water jet and it had resin or putty filling a void in the casting and hidden by paint.
July 9, 20187 yr Welcome aboard J, glad to have you. If you'll put your general location in the header you might be surprised how many of the gang live within visiting distance. As a point of courtesy NEVER modify someone else's tools without their permission. Taking a grinder to someone else's anvil without specific permission could get a hammer taken to you or at a minimum banned for cause. Forge a bickern to do what you wish and gift it to the anvil's owner. Frosty The Lucky.
July 9, 20187 yr Author Hahaha. Thank for the advise. I did get permission first. But those are wise words to live by. By the way my location is Colorado Springs, CO
July 10, 20187 yr Common practice on many chinese cast products. I have a cast well hand-pump from (big cheap tool supplier not harbor freight) that had a ton of skips and holes in the casting just slathered over with bondo and hidden under paint. The products were so bad that the supplier pulled the product from their site shortly after it became available. Because it was just decorative for my use I didn't return it--I had the option for money back but they wouldn't supply another. Wife wanted her planter box decoration. These were being sold as usable pumps. Doing the same on an anvil isn't just skuzzy..it's downright scam. However, the profits still tend to outweigh the costs. There was a place near me that got the rejects from HF--basically HF would check a few in the box and reject the whole pallet-load if something like 10% failed from their random testing. This place would sort out the working ones to sell on a secondary market. They had thousands of boxes--truckloads--mountains--of rejected crap. FYI, the things that seemed to have a high failure rate were air tools in general and those portable air tanks. Must have been over a thousand of those air tanks when this place sold out at auction when they retired. The air tools were usually rebuilt by these people, taking several bad ones to re-assemble as one working version. Just a reminder of 2 things NEVER to buy at HF, no matter how tempting. Pricing that seems too good to be true usually is.
July 10, 20187 yr I have bought one air tool at HF which so far has performed very well for me. Granted, I've only used it a few times, but I got a nibbler for sheet metal. Compared to tin snips I'll take the HF nibbler any day of the week. Of course it could fail the next time I use it, but I've been happy so far.
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