One of the best smiths in the SCA always uses just a stake anvil stuck in a tree trunk round when demonstrating at an SCA event. It may take a while to become a good, or even barely competent, smith and a lifetime to master the craft, but: Hit metal, you're a smith.įollow the First Rule in The Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy: Don't Panic!Įarly smiths managed quite well with any old hunk of iron stuck on a stump - or whatever else was handy, even a sorta flat rock and no iron but the hammer. To the person looking for an anvil: (Iggy? I'm losing track of the thread, but I won't let that stop me:)įar as I'm concerned, one is a smith the first time he/she smacks a piece of metal with a hammer. Spark testing the welding rod looks to me like it's 4140. Otherwise the rail end will "batter" and he'll have to weld it up using special 1/4" welding rod later. Using a rose-bud he quickly heats up a circle about 2+1/2" in diameter to austenite and lets the rest of the rail quench it.
When the rail is going to be part of an old-style bolted-together rail joint (using "angle bars") the factory already did it but, if it's been cut the RR "track welder" heat treats the upper surface right near the end. :) The second train doesn't seem to do anything to it. Looks like it won't last a week at that rate. The first train to roll over it squashes the crap out the surface. Railroad rail is like 1075 to 1080 pearlite just like the soft upper half of a cold chisel. :)īrand-new I know it's soft stuff so would the face need to be heat treated for use as an anvil since it hadn't been work hardened?Ī new rail would need heat treating like what was suggested for the 4140 plates?Ĭouple facts for the fun of it. So how does rairoad rail's steel itself work out for an anvil? Not so much asking about practice as theory here. You will want to harden the face, at least when you are done.Īlternately: Have you looked at the Harbor Freight 110 pound cast STEEL anvil for around $80? (It's the only one they have that isn't cast IRON) As a first or occasional use anvil, I think it is hard to beat and a lot less work!!! If you already have the 4140 billets, I would simply weld them together to make yourself an anvil. I'm not saying "don't do it", just that there are limitations. Weyger's book, "The Complete Blacksmith" shows how he made an anvil from railroad rail. Personally, I think the main problem with using railroad rail is the thin waist that you will get. I have heard that the latest, realy heavy duty main line rail weighs 150 pounds per yard, so an anvil made from that, maybeĢ4 inches long could weigh in at 80 or 80 pounds. It will have to be clamped down tightly or it will bounce all over the place. This is pretty light for an anvil that would be used by a blacksmith. So and anvil make from it, assuming it was 18" long, would be less than 55 pounds, after removing part of it by grinding, cutting, etc. Main line rail starts at about 110 puounds per yard.
Railroad rail is gaged by weight in pounds per yard. I would not start with "light duty rail". Now, if this is a "waste of time", I would rather not do it and could look for a real anvil at industrial liquidations or some such, when I need one. I also have a "hardfacing rod" in very small quantity. I have a decent quantity of various oil hardening tool steel filler rod, which I could use if so advised. Grinding will be done with a 3 HP grinder. If grind a part of the rail approximately flat, and then weld a piece of 4140 to the flat top of the rail (to form a flat part), and grind another billet to some horn like shape, and weld it to the anvil also, how usable would this be for small scale aplications? After a recent discussion in, I decided to take a quick peek here and ask a question.
I do, however, have some things such as billets of 4140 steel of various sizes and a piece of LIGHT GAUGE railroad track (20 lbs or so). Because of the above and lack of space, I would like not to spend too much on a real anvil. I am not a blacksmith, but would like to have a anvil like object for pounding stuff.
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