Author Topic: My new 300 lb baby  (Read 23577 times)

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Offline Twilight Fenrir

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My new 300 lb baby
« on: August 07, 2015, 03:02:12 PM »
Well, I went to a garage sale advertised on CL today... and found myself a 300-ish lb anvil, for which I paid $300 with 5 pairs of tongs :3 There are no visible markings on it, but I believe it's a Peter Wright, based on its shape, and the flats machined on the horn-ward and heel-ward portions of the base, which I have only ever seen on Peter Wright anvils.

It needs some TLC... someone took a cutting torch to the underside of the horn, to slim it down presumably, and left it rough. I actually like that it will have a narrower end, so I'll grind it smooth and be happy there. a bit of one of the edges is chipped away, but it should be repairable with some careful wedling. And the top of the anvil is dished about 3/16". It was used at a local marina in ye olden days, and I'm actually related to the original owner in a round about way :P

Another nice thing about it, is it has the same size hardy hole as my 200 LB Vulcan which it will replace, won't even have to re-size my tooling :D

There is something odd, though... I don't see the line I would expect between the tool steel plate, and the wrought iron body... it looks like it's all one piece o.o Is it possible this is 300 lbs of solid tool steel???

I'm going to paint it black, and write "ACME" on it in white lettering, just because I'm a traditionalist :P But this baby is gonna get a lot of use!



No other pictures available at the moment... I have to dig out my engine hoist to get it out of my trunk :P I can juuust pick it up to maneuver it, not enough to lift it out of there, haha.
« Last Edit: August 07, 2015, 03:35:40 PM by Twilight Fenrir »

Offline oldgoaly

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #1 on: August 07, 2015, 04:03:07 PM »
Looks a lot like mine, there are some numbers on it, I was thinking it was 150-170lbs
well when decipher the numbers it was 300. No wonder it was heavy. I was younger then. might be why I'm so worn out now??? It was rougher than yours, it had cutting torch gouges. 1st I ground the gouges, then I warmed it up some then, using my mig on the highest setting (180/200 amp machine) over filled the gouges. Then with a 9" angle grinder made it smooth again. Has worked well for 25-30 years. The little 1903 Fischer I put on the Bridgeport and milled the tool steel to a nice finish.

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Offline Twilight Fenrir

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2015, 08:43:18 PM »
Looks a lot like mine, there are some numbers on it, I was thinking it was 150-170lbs
well when decipher the numbers it was 300. No wonder it was heavy. I was younger then. might be why I'm so worn out now??? It was rougher than yours, it had cutting torch gouges. 1st I ground the gouges, then I warmed it up some then, using my mig on the highest setting (180/200 amp machine) over filled the gouges. Then with a 9" angle grinder made it smooth again. Has worked well for 25-30 years. The little 1903 Fischer I put on the Bridgeport and milled the tool steel to a nice finish.


Really? MIG wire? And you didn't have any trouble with it??? I was sort of expecting more people to say "No don't weld it!" I see a lot from both ends on people who are pro and anti weld repairing an anvil... But most of them are people "Who have seen...." Not "Well, I did it, and this is how it turned out..." So, that's pretty appreciated insight n.n

My damage is on the edge, so I think I'm going to need something more stout than mig wire, but I'm going to smooth out the top, and see how working on it goes, and if it really NEEDS to be fixed... I'm guessing it will... it's damaged in the same area my Vulcan is, though the way it's damaged is different, so it might be usable as is...

Anywho, I unburied my engine hoist and yanked it out of my trunk, so here are some pictures! I also spent the last couple hours making the horn damn near perfect(ly usable), but my phone died, so no pictures of that yet :P Got to use my giant antique aluminum angle grinder for the first time.... man that thing works nice!

So, here it is pre-any-touching:




I half expect a baboon carrying a lion cub to walk out on the horn in that picture :P



« Last Edit: August 07, 2015, 08:46:06 PM by Twilight Fenrir »

Offline Twilight Fenrir

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2015, 09:24:05 PM »
Relating to welding an anvil... I found this really nice writeup :3 It even goes so far as to offer expected hardness values, with specific rods, on specific anvil conditions... Very nice :D

If only my Arc welding skills were up to snuff XD

http://www.anvilmag.com/smith/anvilres.htm

Offline Aunt Phil

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2015, 11:58:27 PM »
Some disrespectful bustard beat the snot out of that anvil.  He should be strapped to a stump and a hammer & chisel used on him.

I'd have no hesitation running E 70 S6 solid wire with Co2 to build the face back up.  Might cheat a little with some carbon weld out blocks on the edges to make life easier.  You'll want to pay attention to preheat and possibly want to bury it in vermiculite to cool.

You do have the bottom of the horn to learn on.

I wouldn't mess with metalcore wire unless you have experience.  The problem will be where your build is shallow at the ends of the wallow.
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Offline mikeswrenches

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #5 on: August 08, 2015, 06:23:37 AM »
Per Richard Postman, Anvils in America: "...should a wrought anvil have four handling holes and the flats across the front and back of the feet under the horn and heel, you can almost always be sure it is a Peter Wright."

Even with the damage still a good buy.  Hope you enjoy using it!!

Mike
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Offline turnnut

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #6 on: August 08, 2015, 09:27:43 AM »
Aunt Phil,  you sound like I do when I see someone take a nice original old pick-up truck and make it into
a hot rod.  it will never be the same again.

as for the anvil, if only it could talk.

Offline oldgoaly

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #7 on: August 08, 2015, 12:16:17 PM »
please note the iron is supposed to be hot when forming!
yours is rougher than mine was, some nasty stuff done to that poor anvil!
   
 Yours looks to be cast steel, the difference between a 70xx series mig wire and a 70xx arc rod (think the metal, not the flux) is very little.  The real difference is in the thermal shock, the mig is going to be less plus more consistent. The arc rods do vary a little as they burn down, but in the long run it is the preheat and slow cool down that does the most good.

 Now do you need a perfect anvil? you might be best just cleaning it up some with a grinder,  using it, let the next guy worry about it.   
If you are going hard face the surface, built up the low spots with a common rod, then add an even hard surfacing layer!

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Offline Twilight Fenrir

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #8 on: August 08, 2015, 01:12:20 PM »
Some disrespectful bustard beat the snot out of that anvil.  He should be strapped to a stump and a hammer & chisel used on him.

I'd have no hesitation running E 70 S6 solid wire with Co2 to build the face back up.  Might cheat a little with some carbon weld out blocks on the edges to make life easier.  You'll want to pay attention to preheat and possibly want to bury it in vermiculite to cool.

You do have the bottom of the horn to learn on.

I wouldn't mess with metalcore wire unless you have experience.  The problem will be where your build is shallow at the ends of the wallow.
Haha, well, it was in service in a fabrication shop for almost a century... Everything wears out eventually... The cutting torch on the horn seems unnecessary though >_>

So.... you'd recommend building up the dishing? I have a friend with a mill, I was just going to get it decked ^^; Having it decked would let me keep that nice, now ultra-dense steel where the anvil deformed. But, welding it would let me keep the mass...

 I just looked it up, and a 10lb spool of S-6 is only $30... that's not bad at all! :D S-6 is air-hardening steel, right? If that would work for building up the edges as well, I'd be tickled pink! I wouldn't mind spending a day or two just sitting and welding on the thing... The problem would come with pre-heating it... a 300 lb anvil won't fit in my oven, or my forge :P I read a weed burner is an effective way to do it, and I can probably manage to borrow one of those.

That would be a lot of vermiculite o.o I mean, I can get it, but wow... I realize it wouldn't slow the cooling as much, but would wrapping it with fiberglass insulation slow it down enough to be safe? 400 degrees should be under ignition point.

please note the iron is supposed to be hot when forming!
yours is rougher than mine was, some nasty stuff done to that poor anvil!
   
 Yours looks to be cast steel, the difference between a 70xx series mig wire and a 70xx arc rod (think the metal, not the flux) is very little.  The real difference is in the thermal shock, the mig is going to be less plus more consistent. The arc rods do vary a little as they burn down, but in the long run it is the preheat and slow cool down that does the most good.

 Now do you need a perfect anvil? you might be best just cleaning it up some with a grinder,  using it, let the next guy worry about it.   
If you are going hard face the surface, built up the low spots with a common rod, then add an even hard surfacing layer!


Good info, thanks :) I'm much better with a MIG welder than an Arc welder anyway, so that would be ideal.

A perfect anvil? No, not at all. But I want it to be as good as it can be. I do NEED to clean up the edge that is all chipped away though. That's the edge I'm going to be doing a lot of work on (And presumably the edge the previous owners did a lot of work on :P) So it needs to be addressed one way or another. I could live with the dishing... but, as I said above, I have a friend with a mill, so I don't have to live with it :P

Anywho... here's how the horn restoration went! It's not 100% done, but it's certainly good enough for my purposes. The few hash marks you still see on top of the anvil are barely able to be felt when running a finger over them. I tried to remove as little metal as possible. But, all that ugly cutting torch work has been made lovely and usable. I didn't like that the top of the horn was flat near the base, so I rounded it over. I've never seen an anvil with a flat there, so I'm assuming that was wear. I don't care about the cutting ledge. It can stay how it is for now. I might dress it up a little bit in the corner. (Note: it rained overnight, the odd splotches are just water :P I oiled it down before I went to bed to prevent rust.)



« Last Edit: August 08, 2015, 01:16:24 PM by Twilight Fenrir »

Offline Aunt Phil

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #9 on: August 08, 2015, 01:46:12 PM »
T F, Loose rule of thumb is E 70 S6 wire run with Co2 will give you a deposit damn similar to 7018 rod.

Right now, the best price on that wire in 10# spools is http://www.htpweld.com.  Their website is a pain in the ass, but nobody has quality wire at their prices. 
Your citation of 10# spools concerns me.  What machine will you be attacking the divot with?  10# is generally an indicator of a small machine or worse a 110 volt machine with a low duty cycle.  A job of this nature and mass is something you don't start & stop, it's a continuous weldout. 

Concerning preheat and post cool, there are tricks of the trade.  The first is minimizing heat loss in the process.  I'd look at first isolating the anvil from contact with heat conducting material.  The cement board sold in places like Homer Desperate is an excellent isolator.  I'd box the anvil with such or a drywall lined plywood box that would allow me to insulate the base and probably half of the anvil itself with vermiculite or even Kitty Litter (new) and then get about cooking it with a propane torch.  That would be done after securing the weldout tabs to the anvil itself. 

Make the box in 2 pieces so you can sit one atop the other in the manner of a beehive and when you finish the welding, set the second in place and fill the top box with vermiculite.  That will give you the slowest cooling you can achieve in a field weld situation. 

I've never been a fan of fiberglass blanket for such situations, and have fought a few Enginitwits over the issue.  You get into some very interesting air flow dynamics when you heat up a large mass of metal and blanket insulation can actually create cooling vortexes around the hot metal.  Boxed and poured in insulation always delivered better results in my world.

Air/Propane torches, I'll just admit I'm spoiled.  I own torches up to 250kbtu, and will say absolutely, short of a coal fire they are the least expensive heat for the purpose.  I've worked with propane torches that run on liquid propane and compressed air on large weldments, and thankfully no longer have to.  Bottom line, you can make your own air/propane heater with a MIG contact tip and a few pieces of pipe or use a cheap Horrible Fright weed burner.  Just be aware you ain't sliding the job with a single BBQ tank, these torches will outrun a BBQ tank, especially a tank with a trilobal handled OPD valve.  I would love to drown the SOB who came up with that contraption so I could watch the air bubbles leave his mouth and nose.
Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance!

Offline Aunt Phil

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #10 on: August 08, 2015, 01:55:30 PM »
Aunt Phil,  you sound like I do when I see someone take a nice original old pick-up truck and make it into
a hot rod.  it will never be the same again.

as for the anvil, if only it could talk.

The only thing worse is the commercial shop specializing in doing that work for little rich boys who are clueless on how to do their own work.  There was a shop in Rochester that engaged in such destruction.  He was sure a continuous weld couldn't be made across a roof without warping, so he just dabbed birdshit on and filled in with Bondo. 
I was called sadistic for enjoying watching his jobs come apart from the vibration of the mega engines stuffed between frame rails that weren't designed for the task.  Yes, I did laugh when he set his shop on fire with a contraption involving sparkplugs in the tailpipes that shot flames out of the pipe.  Then I built a better flame unit using propane and a small blower to induce air to the exhaust stream.

Now if I could just figure out a way to turn the vehicle exhaust to a brake light activated soap bubble generator I could put a Clean Air Technology sticker on my van and annoy a lot of people.
Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance!

Offline Twilight Fenrir

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #11 on: August 08, 2015, 02:34:08 PM »
T F, Loose rule of thumb is E 70 S6 wire run with Co2 will give you a deposit damn similar to 7018 rod.

Right now, the best price on that wire in 10# spools is http://www.htpweld.com.  Their website is a pain in the ass, but nobody has quality wire at their prices. 
Your citation of 10# spools concerns me.  What machine will you be attacking the divot with?  10# is generally an indicator of a small machine or worse a 110 volt machine with a low duty cycle.  A job of this nature and mass is something you don't start & stop, it's a continuous weldout. 

Concerning preheat and post cool, there are tricks of the trade.  The first is minimizing heat loss in the process.  I'd look at first isolating the anvil from contact with heat conducting material.  The cement board sold in places like Homer Desperate is an excellent isolator.  I'd box the anvil with such or a drywall lined plywood box that would allow me to insulate the base and probably half of the anvil itself with vermiculite or even Kitty Litter (new) and then get about cooking it with a propane torch.  That would be done after securing the weldout tabs to the anvil itself. 

Make the box in 2 pieces so you can sit one atop the other in the manner of a beehive and when you finish the welding, set the second in place and fill the top box with vermiculite.  That will give you the slowest cooling you can achieve in a field weld situation. 

I've never been a fan of fiberglass blanket for such situations, and have fought a few Enginitwits over the issue.  You get into some very interesting air flow dynamics when you heat up a large mass of metal and blanket insulation can actually create cooling vortexes around the hot metal.  Boxed and poured in insulation always delivered better results in my world.

Air/Propane torches, I'll just admit I'm spoiled.  I own torches up to 250kbtu, and will say absolutely, short of a coal fire they are the least expensive heat for the purpose.  I've worked with propane torches that run on liquid propane and compressed air on large weldments, and thankfully no longer have to.  Bottom line, you can make your own air/propane heater with a MIG contact tip and a few pieces of pipe or use a cheap Horrible Fright weed burner.  Just be aware you ain't sliding the job with a single BBQ tank, these torches will outrun a BBQ tank, especially a tank with a trilobal handled OPD valve.  I would love to drown the SOB who came up with that contraption so I could watch the air bubbles leave his mouth and nose.
Ah crap, yeah, I've got a 120 volt Lincoln Electric 140 amp welder. I've never hit the duty cycle limits with it, so I didn't really realize it had one :P After your comment I looked it up, and it's 20% X_X For the record, I was only looking at the 10 lb spools because I figured that would be all it would take, and I blew all my money on the anvil, so I'm kind of broke :P My welder does take 30 lb spools, I have one on there now. Still, good catch on that one, thanks.

But, this is still very do-able... the master blacksmith from whom I apprentice has a very large mig welder, and he actually has repaired several anvils. So I suppose I'll just have to enlist his help with it. I was just hoping I could do it on my own ^^; (Except for decking the top, which would require his machinery)

I have an oxy/propane cutting torch... but I'm guessing that's not what you mean... Still, if I'm gonna be stuck doing it at my master smiths, I'm sure he's got the means to do it. I'll double check with him on how he does it before I let him get anywhere near my baby :P He has some questionable techniques some times >_>

Vermiculite it is n.n I've got a magswitch welding ground, so I don't have to weld tabs onto my anvil... It's a pretty handy little unit.

Any particular way the welds should be laid down? I've read about doing it cross-hatched, I.E. lay down a layer length wise, then a layer width wise, then length, etc... With peening it between.

Offline Aunt Phil

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #12 on: August 08, 2015, 03:01:31 PM »
OK, I don't think you're grasping the concept of weldout tabs. 
Building up an edge, is a major pain compared to welding a seam.  The cheap and dirty workaround time saver is to tack what amounts to a shelf outboard of the edge you're trying to build.  This makes for a much easier buildup and when you're done you just cut the excess away.  My preference runs to using carbon because I have less cutting away to do, but steel will work fine.

About that magnetic ground, hang it on the side of a refrigerator, it will do you more good.  Those things were never anything more than another way for a tooltruck driver to mine more money out of some body pounder's pocket.  I know, you have the good one and it really works well etc.  Hang it on the edge of a piece of steel and watch the microarcing as somebody else welds.  Then tell me how good the ground is.  If the contraption worked, somebody would make one for pipeline welding, and pipe weldors would buy them by the truckload. 

Your O/P cutter is NOT a heating torch.  Think Turbotorch on steroids or slightly downsized weed burner.  I don't have a pic on this computer, I'll try to remember to snap one later and post it. 
Remember, cutting torches only have to melt a tiny pool to get the cut started, then the iron becomes the fuel that makes the cut happen.  That is why a cutter will generally have a chisel in his pocket and a 4 pound hammer.  You use the chisel to build a feather of steel to start the cut easier.  Saves a lot of fuel and time too.  It's also easier when you have old eyes and lets you cut where you want to start.

Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance!

Offline Twilight Fenrir

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #13 on: August 08, 2015, 04:52:44 PM »
OK, I don't think you're grasping the concept of weldout tabs. 
Building up an edge, is a major pain compared to welding a seam.  The cheap and dirty workaround time saver is to tack what amounts to a shelf outboard of the edge you're trying to build.  This makes for a much easier buildup and when you're done you just cut the excess away.  My preference runs to using carbon because I have less cutting away to do, but steel will work fine.

About that magnetic ground, hang it on the side of a refrigerator, it will do you more good.  Those things were never anything more than another way for a tooltruck driver to mine more money out of some body pounder's pocket.  I know, you have the good one and it really works well etc.  Hang it on the edge of a piece of steel and watch the microarcing as somebody else welds.  Then tell me how good the ground is.  If the contraption worked, somebody would make one for pipeline welding, and pipe weldors would buy them by the truckload. 

Your O/P cutter is NOT a heating torch.  Think Turbotorch on steroids or slightly downsized weed burner.  I don't have a pic on this computer, I'll try to remember to snap one later and post it. 
Remember, cutting torches only have to melt a tiny pool to get the cut started, then the iron becomes the fuel that makes the cut happen.  That is why a cutter will generally have a chisel in his pocket and a 4 pound hammer.  You use the chisel to build a feather of steel to start the cut easier.  Saves a lot of fuel and time too.  It's also easier when you have old eyes and lets you cut where you want to start.
Haha, got it...

Also... holy crap, that's a brilliant way to start a cut! I've never heard that one before, lol. I mostly use my torch for spot-heating small stock to bend, but it does get a fair share of cutting done with it too. I will have to remember that trick.
« Last Edit: August 08, 2015, 04:58:15 PM by Twilight Fenrir »

Offline oldgoaly

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Re: My new 300 lb baby
« Reply #14 on: August 08, 2015, 04:57:08 PM »
yes CO2 shielding gas is better!
It was an all day project, but looking back it was worth the work.

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