[TheForge] Re: Peter Wright anvil

[Ralph Sproul]

Mike, Thanks for yarning and not yawning.  :-)

Ralph

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mike Spencer" <mspencer at tallships.ca>
To: <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Saturday, December 04, 2004 12:07 PM
Subject: [TheForge] Re: Peter Wright anvil


> 
> Ralph Sproul wrote:
> 
> > I ask because the two larger anvils have so many punch marks on the
> > side of the numbers that it is hard to read them.  It looks as
> > though someone did punched copper lanterns on the side of them.
> > Someone suggested to me at one time it might have been to check the
> > hardness of a punch or chisel.......but that didn't make sense to me
> > it being wrought iron and all.
> 
> Yarn time.  Years ago I spotted a blacksmith shop in Blockshouse, NS,
> and stopped to meet the smith.  The smith (long since deceased) had a
> fire going and was 2/3 of the way through a bottle of rum, which lent
> a certain ambiance to the conversation.  To make conversation, I
> remarked on his anvil face, which looked shiny and very well used.
> 
> Me:     I guess that anvil face is pretty hard.
> 
> Smith:  Hard?!  I'll say that anvil's hard!
> 
> Whereupon he grabs up a freshly sharpened jack hammer bit from the
> hearth, raises it high over head and smites his anvil...and misses,
> coming within a hairsbreadth of castrating himself.  Without a pause
> he repeats the mighty blow, this time hitting the anvil face squarely.
> And raising a nice little pucker mark in the face.  Without missing a
> lick he says, "That point is *hard*.  I just hardened that point."
> 
> And he was right, the point was undamaged after its encounter with the
> anvil.  However, that had led my eye to the anvil again and I noticed
> that the side was covered with little square puckers just like the new
> one in the face.  Long story short, he explained that that was how he
> always tested his bull points and demonstrated, leaning on the anvil
> with one hand, reaching over and whacking the point into the far side
> of the anvil body with a roundhouse blow.
> 
> So whether it makes sense of not, I think anvil pox is/was caused by
> testing freshly hardened bull points.  My 2/2/25 PW has a sizable
> patch of anvil pox but not enough to obscure the weight marks.
> 
> Still yarning:  That same rum-fueled smith had a gas welding rig
> consisting of an oxy tank and an acetylene generator on a dolly.  I
> only recognized what it was because I had once rented an old farmhouse
> with an old acet generator in the cellar for lighting.  Says I, "Isn't
> that a bit dangerous?"  Says he, "She blows up once in a while" and
> points up to the remarkable, high arched and plastered ceiling. There
> was a big sunburst of soot on the plaster right over the gas rig.
> 
> 
> 
> - Mike
> 
> -- 
> Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada       .~. 
>                                                            /V\ 
> mspencer at tallships.ca                                     /( )\
> http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/                        ^^-^^
> 
> -- 
> 
> 
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