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I Forge Iron

I'll just leave this here.....


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That's an interesting combination. I feel like the vise would get in the way being put right in the sweet spot, but maybe not.. It looks pretty new, so I'm going to guess it's cast steel and that's how they get away with having a hole straight through the center of mass.. I've never seen anything like that before. Granted that's not really saying much, I haven't seen a lot of things before. I wonder who made it.

By the photo being from 2011 I'm guessing it's not yours? Did you learn anything more about it wherever you came across that picture? 

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The more I think about this anvil......

I see and think.... Portability first, I think it may have been used for a traveling show of some sort, and they worked from the opposite flat side, using the vise as needed, on the spot. Now, horse shoeing, I don’t think would take that kind of portability? not to mention with horse showing you just need he basic is... nothing complicated like a vise.

So I am thinking that even a traveling “horse” show this wouldn’t be used... 

I could Totally see it being used in a circus... or even a old time traveling rennaisance fair of some sort, where you would need the vice and anvil.

 

or.. it was just some guy who only had a small room to work with and had an opportunity to keep smiths like us guessing what the Heck did you Do???


 


 

 

1 minute ago, ThomasPowers said:

Might have been some smith's "masterpiece".

Wished there was a thumbs up, I didn’t see this before I posted...

I’m out in my shop leaning way over my bench because it’s the only place I can get a signal...

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Huh. I saw that somewhere on the interwebs last week, don’t remember where. My thoughts went somewhere between “that’s really neat” to “that’s a good way to combine two things and make them not work as well as they do apart” ...as in the sum is possibly less than the whole of the parts.

Really nice execution though. 

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9 minutes ago, MarcBaldwin said:

Huh. I saw that somewhere on the interwebs last week, don’t remember where. My thoughts went somewhere between “that’s really neat” to “that’s a good way to combine two things and make them not work as well as they do apart” ...as in the sum is possibly less than the whole of the parts.

Really nice execution though. 

I’m thinking if you worked from the opposite side, you wouldn’t know the vise was even there...   it makes me feel like it was made for speed work... and someone that had a specific thing to make repeatedly?  
 

and 3 pritchels..... is weird. 
 

my dad once said, buy a clock... dont but a phone radio clock.....

im like sure Dad... as I type away on my iPad.

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If you google "combination anvil vise" and click on images you will see quite a few "franken tool" combinations.  Most have the vise portion mounted at the heel of the anvil but a few are on the side like the one you illustrate.  Some are even anvil/vise/forge combinations. 

My impression is that trying to combine different but related tools was a thing in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. 

How well they worked is another issue.  I suspect that like modern multitools they were adequate but separate, dedicated, single use tools work better.  In the case of your example because vises and anvils are usually mounted at different levels one or the other would not be at the optimum level for use.  In fact, your example may be in such good condition because it didn't work out as well as the original purchaser thought it would and has had very little use over the years.

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

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