Anvils and forges

[kjmillig]

Maybe this has been discussed before.
Where can I find an anvil of usable size (50#?) that won't break the bank? I saw a farriers catalog that wanted about $10/pound for new anvils. I can't pay $500! :shocked2:
Where can I get/how can I build a forge that I can move with a pickup or van?

 

[BillinOregon]

KJ: I'm not anything close to an expert, as all I do is make useless lumps of metal out of nice old Nicholsen files. My equipment is commensurate with my skills. I have a Harbor Freight 110-pound Russian cast steel anvil (NOT the Chinese cast iron), but it has a soft face and a horn so broad it is only marginally useful. To go with that, I have a Tim Lively-style washtub forge with an old hand-cranked Champion blower. The forge is an oval washtub about 24 inches long. You run a tuyere through each end at the bottom, , cap one end, then pack the sides with a clay/sand mixture to form a long trough over the tuyere. Hook one end of the tuyere to your blower, load her up with charcoal and off you go. With good charcoal I could probably reach welding heat, but it is no problem to get to non-magnetic. You can probably assemble the whole shebang for under $200, including the anvil.
I'm sure Mike A and some of the other real artists will pipe up.

 

[J.M.]

Hi KJ, I'm a newbie to blacksmithing and bladesmithing, and am slowly acquiring equipment. I was able to meet a local fellow who has become a good friend/mentor, he has 40+ years of smithing. He has helped me find equipment through his informal "grapevine" of contacts. You might want to ask around your area and see what turns up. In the last year I have acquired 2 anvils, a propane forge and a rivit forge and a post vice for aprx $500, and I am pretty confident I could actually make money if I ever decided to sell the stuff. Good luck, half the fun is meeting new people and hunting/scrounging stuff!

 

[ameling]

Other blacksmith's are usually one of the best sources for anvils, forges, and tools. Check out the ABANA (Artist Blacksmith Association of North America) for links to chapters near you. I know Texas had a big group - called the Texas Blacksmith Association or something like that. There should be a gathering every month or so near you.

And you might try looking up a cowboy/old west organization called Marrow Bone Springs - just south of Dallas. I know they have several members that blacksmith, and have a complete shop in their old west town. They have a web site with lots of pictures, and you should be able to contact them with questions.

Also check out Centaur Forge in Burlington WI. They are the largest horse shoeing supply company in the US. They have a free catalog that is the "candy store" for blacksmiths. Half is horse shoeing stuff, and the rest is tools, anvils, forges, and tons of books and videos. They have a web site and online catalog.

Check out the various antique stores and malls near you. Some dealers carry a lot of tools and equipment. A little looking and asking should lead you to them. And don't forget the modern welding/repair shops. Many have an anvil and some forging equipment around - quite often shoved into an unused corner of the shop.

A good site to visit would be the Neo-Tribal Metalsmiths. They mostly do knives, but are a great example of how much you can do with very little proper equipment, and what you can improvise.

A lot of blacksmithing stuff is also listed on ebay. Shipping can get prohibitive because of the weight, but you can also get some pretty good deals. And you might find an anvil listed by somebody near you - where you could pick it up in person and save shipping. And "talk shop" of course.

In the end, an anvil is just a big flat surface, and a forge is just a source of heat. I've done simple blacksmithing of small stuff using a campfire and blow-tube, a splitting mall stuck in a stump for an anvil, and a smooth-faced claw hammer. You use what you have available. A proper anvil does have that horn on it, but you do most of your work on that "flat surface", and can work around not having that horn. So scrounge around. Even a flat granite rock will do - like the Vikings used.

Hope this helps.

yhs
Mike Ameling - alleged blacksmith and known iron torturer

 

[paulvallandigham]

Have you contacted Centaur Forge, of Burlington , Wisconsin. They are a clearinghouse of blacksmith equipment. Yes, the prices are costly, but they have it all. Check their online store.

As far as getting started, you can make do with a piece of railroad track for an anvil surface, and you can make a forge out of many materials, some already described above. There are various organizations and associations where you can get information, training, and find used equipment for sale. The knifemaker's guild, several Ferrier's organizations, and blacksmith groups exist throughout the U.S. Do a little looking on your computer with whatever search engine is at your disposal. There are books and magazines on decorative blacksmithing, the most common work is still being done by farriers, ( horseshoeing) and then some of the most interesting research into metal working is and has been done by the knifemakers. Look for Blade magazine on your newstand. If you live near any Amish community, there are always working blacksmiths, and wheelwrights working in these societies. A friend of mine and I drove down to a wheelwright near Arcola, Illinois, to order a couple of wheels to be made for a replica cannon. It turned out that this same wheelwright also made the wheels for the Budweiser Beerwagon that is seen in the company's commercials, drawn by the famous Clydesdale Horse teams. Keep an eye out for any demonstrations or displays on weekends in your area that feature old time crafts. There are almost always a couple of blacksmiths at these fairs, and they can steer you to the local groups, and people who may have tools and equipment to sell.

 

[benvenuto]

my thoughts on anvils are HERE
go for one of the smaller size czech anvils (much better quality than russian) from one of the suppliers I have linked to, and make one of Mr Ron Reills smaller sized gas forges (single burner)

 

Darren Ellis[url] http://refractory.elliscustomknifeworks.com/[/url]
sells all of the supplies (sometimes hard to find in small quantities) one needs to make your own propane forge and sells finished forges as well as well as other supplies.
As Mike Ameling noted ABANA is a great resource for do-it-yourselfers and Mike - as the webmaster for the NTM site and good friend/collaborator of the founder Tai Goo - thanks for the mention...we strive to help! BTW - Tais Forge-B-Que made from an old BBQ is also a great and cheap forge setup for those wanting to use charcoal or coal

 

[chipper]

An anvil can be just about any piece of iron set in concrete in a plastic bucket if you really want to go cheap. Stick a prebent tire iron in the wet crete and you can use that for a horn.
For a forge, the easiest is a bunch of fire bricks. They cost about $3.50 a piece at the local lumber/hardware store. 8 is a good number to start with. The air pipe that feeds air into the bottom or side of the pile of bricks should be black pipe.
The blower can be a shop vac. a hair dryer or the blower out of a dishwasher. If you buy a dimmer switch for house hold lights and mount it into an outside type receptical, you can use it to control the speed of the blowers. I have a dimmer switch rigged up that I use to contol my soldering iron and a bunch of differnent stuff, I wired in a standard recepicle so I can plug in any 110 device and dim it down if I need to.

Think cheap and you'll find what you need pretty quick. You will of course want to replace all of this stuff later on.

Regards

 

[BEMRON]

I picked up most of my stuff at farm/real estate auctions. Over the course of a year or so I managed to come up with a forge, about 24 inch diameter, that had one leg rusted off, a hand cranked blower that was full of dirt, a descent post vise and 75 pound anvil. Lots of cleaning to get blower working but now have everything going fine for a beginner like me. Less than 200 bucks including a couple pairs of tongs and hammers. Ron

 

[Ohio Rusty]

Habor freight sells anvils. They have smaller ones and larger ones. I have a 55 pound anvil I bought there new for $29.00. It serves the purpose without having to spend alot.
Ohio Rusty

 

[Smk50]

I am also looking for and anvil, with a twist. A customer of mine has a small anvil(he collects anvils) this one is small with a small horn on one end and a vise on the other. I would like to find one of those,yet I dont even know the proper name for it. He wasnt much help as he goes to just about all the sales and this is the only one he has ever seen. AND he wont part with it!

 

[user 2647]

Grizzly industrial has 55 lb. anvils for $57.50 and 100lb. for $125.

 

[44-henry]

I've bought two anvils over the last year and a half at garage sales without even looking for them. Both are under 100 lbs (barely) I paid $20 for one and $50 for the other which had a much better face than the first, but it did come and assortment of hardies which was nice. It kind of depends on your area, I live in the Midwest where anvils were quite common and still show up frequently at garage sales and auctions.

 

[blacksmithshoppe]

I am also looking for and anvil, with a twist. A customer of mine has a small anvil(he collects anvils) this one is small with a small horn on one end and a vise on the other. I would like to find one of those,yet I dont even know the proper name for it. He wasnt much help as he goes to just about all the sales and this is the only one he has ever seen. AND he wont part with it!

I see them on Ebay all the time, you might check there,
Jeff

 

[Ole]

You can get a good anvil at Cliff Carroll's Horseshoers Supplies in Larkspur Colorado. They ship and make a fine anvil that is easy enough to carry around for a farrier and has some nice turning curves for bending heals of horseshoes or anything else. Good Luck

 

The Grizzly anvils make great boat anchors, and that's about it. They're dead iron and soft.

The Cliff Carol 70# are a good farriers anvil and they are reasonably priced. Jim Keith Tools in Tucumcari, NM sells them with free shipping. My old man, who's been shoeing horses for 40+ years, sold his NC anvil for a Cliff Carol. He said they had a much better horn. I've been happy with mine. They are a great starter anvil and aren't to heavy to haul around.

NC makes a good propane forge. There are others on Ebay regularly that look good, but I can't vouch for them. The washtub coal forge mentioned above works well. I built one for pretty much nothing but time and spare parts and still use it for things the propane won't do. Coal can be hard to come by. Check with and join your local ABANA chapter. Great place to learn, and a great place to meet a bunch of scroungers who'll tell you where to get stuff.

Sean

 

[BillinOregon]

Sean: I use charcoal in my washtub forge. Occasionally I can buy bags of commercial charcoal, but I scrounge a lot of it out of the ashes after I've burned prunings and such from around the yard. I take particular pride in ruining a nice old high-carbon file with scrounged charcoal from my own yard. :winking:

 

Bill,

I live in an area with darned few hardwoods, but lots of fir and pine. In the store, it's only brickets. I scored about 60 gallons (in buckets) of WY coal from a local smith a while back and I'm still working through that. However, my coal useage was curtailed by a pregnant wife this summer. The smell of coal burning and most anything else made her sick as a dog. Propane's not PC, but it's easy and don't stink as bad. I don't think it smells at all, as it reminds me of being a kid in my dad's shop while he made shoes. Then again, the smell of diesel fuel and atrazine reminds me of my farmer grandfather.

Sean

 

[JAFO]

Try searching the net for a 'forge council'in your state. These are blacksmith clubs that meet on a regular basis. Usually once a month. I'm a member of both the Alabama Forge Council and once I move next month will become a member of the Florida Forge Council. You can get some good tips and tools from these guys. I even got my 7 year old grandson involved and all the folks were great with him.

 

[chipper]

Bill,

I live in an area with darned few hardwoods, but lots of fir and pine. In the store, it's only brickets. I scored about 60 gallons (in buckets) of WY coal from a local smith a while back and I'm still working through that. However, my coal useage was curtailed by a pregnant wife this summer. The smell of coal burning and most anything else made her sick as a dog. Propane's not PC, but it's easy and don't stink as bad. I don't think it smells at all, as it reminds me of being a kid in my dad's shop while he made shoes. Then again, the smell of diesel fuel and atrazine reminds me of my farmer grandfather.

Sean

I switched over to using strickly coke. The smell is gone and the black smoke only happens for a second or two at startup. You should give it a try. I start the fire with wood charcoal and I toss in a chuck every once in a while to keep things going.

Regards