Ten Buck Anvil

[CedarEater]

I have been keeping an eye out for an anvil lately for the purpose of peening out mushrooming on axe heads. The cost of an anvil is a bit more than I am willing to drop for a tool that will be used infrequently and not for my profession. So, I stopped by the local metal recycler and inquired about anvils or some other chunk of steel that might be suitable for my purposes.

He sold me this piece of railroad track for $10.




I cleaned it up minimally with the cup brush in a drill.




Drilled some holes in the base of the track. Low speed with a little bit of oil on the drill bit is the way to go when drilling holes in railroad track, just in case anyone was wondering.




I then bolted it down to something solid, this maple round, to keep it from bouncing around.




Inspector approved.




In the future I could cut and shape a horn on one end but for now it is sufficient for my peening purposes.

 

[Pondoro2310]

I've had one of those for years, they work great for light duty.

 

[300Six]

Track often has a date stamp on it. Take a good look along the web of this thing to see if you can determine the age. Older track was smaller in depth than modern, by the way. I only noticed this after comparing track from the CPR completion of a country-wide rail system (stamped 1886) display and reading a much more modern piece.

 

[FortyTwoBlades]

I have a little section of it as well, and it does the job for light work for sure. Hard to argue with that price! Just be mindful not to accidentally strike the face of it since they're usually soft enough to dent a little.