Alternative anvils

S

Sharp_newbie

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Aug 12, 2007
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701
Any suggestions would be appreciated. i am currently driving my ATV up and down the old railway looking for a rail, but no luck so far.

what else could make a good anvil?
 
Old excavator hammer bits, bucket pins, any solid heavy flat chunk of decent steel. Scrapyards are cool places to scrounge. My anvil shaped object has been relegated to tool holding and bending on the horn, all other beating takes place on my 6 1/2 dia x 4 ft former excavator breaker hammer....made to take a beating!
 
Really anything big and heavy made of carbon steel. All it needs is some kind of flat spot, or a way to grind in a flat. Wayne Goddard talks about all kinds of things in the $50 knife shop. I'd avoid the ASO's (anvil shaped objects) available at Harbor Freight and similar importers. They're generally cast iron, and not durable enough to even mess with.
 
If you're just looking for a flat piece you could always harden a piece of plate and attach it to something heavy like a section of I-beam.
 
Look in the phone directory (or online) and find the nearest railroad maintenance yard. They will be glad to give you a piece of old track. It might be an hours drive, but worth it. Other good anvils can be made from a section of rail car axle set upright in concrete. That is called a post anvil, and is actually a good type for knife forging.

As said, scrap yards are a knife makers paradise. All kinds of things will make an anvil. If it is mild steel (say a 400 pound piece of 24X12 I-beam) order a block of steel (anything from 1050 to 5160), about 3X6X2", and harden it.Draw a 500-600F temper. Then weld it to the top. You will have a workable Japanese anvil.
Stacy
 
Odds are your not going to find a piece of RR track lying beside a RR track. Go to the nearest rail yard and seek out the maintaiance facility. Thats where I got my piece of track. Just tip the guy a few bucks. You may need him again.
 
My first knives were forged on an I beam with a heavy flat plat welded to the top. Also had braces welded between the two sides to strengthen. Much louder than my anvil though.
 
another easy one i've seen in the past is to get the biggest darn sledge hammer you can find, cut off the handle and set the head 3/4 into a bucket of concrete

works ok as a temporary solution.
 
I have built several anvils out of RR track. The trick is to get the heaviest piece or track that you can find and turn it upside down. The bottom of the rail is usually perfectly flat and makes a better surface than the domed top. I recently built this 460 pounder out of chunks of mild steel with a section of a forklift fork welded to the top of it. The fork is 4140 steel hardened to 50-52 rockwell. 1st I drilled a 1 1/4" hole near one end and beveled that end, I use this to drift hawk heads. I happen to have a heat treat facility locally (not precise enough for blades) that hardened the fork for me for 40 bucks. Fork lift forks are usually free from equiptment repair places.. The mild steel base was made from scraps that I got at work... I still have a few pieces of the fork hanging arround..
 
In this part of the country we have a lot of coal mines so there's a lot of parts from equipment.

I saw a big (4")round pice from a hydraulic ram about 6 feet long...

Would have made a great anvil if it was cut short and put in a 5 gallon bucket of cement.

Shane
 
Forget cutting it short. Dig a 4 foot deep hole with a post hole digger and use cement to set the ram. grind the surface with a belt sander or angle grinder if needed. Rubber band a heavy trash bag over it when not in use.
Stacy
 
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