[TheForge] anvil from a combo tool?

[Steve Bloom]

At 05:12 PM 2/13/2012, Jerry wrote:
>[snip]This  one looks more like a useable anvil than most but I'll 
>bet it's still not up
>to serious forging.

Funny you should say that....I've seen the combos before (there are 
several at the shop at our conference site) and I would agree with 
your comment based on those examples. I've passed it on to a 16 year 
old who is aching to forge and we baptized it with forging a large 
kitchen spoon (9" x 1" x 1/4" stock - eventually turning into a 14" 
long tapered piece).  It's marginally less alive than my big Swedish 
beast, the face is flat and has sharp edges but it does has a few 
chips on the edge of the face (hence it's hard).  It showed nary a 
trace of the work we did or of any in the past (other than the 
chips).  It reminds me of my traveling anvil (85 lb, wrought base, 
steel plate face, stubby horn and a crooked hardy hole passage - and 
what appears to be Sheffield markings).  As a learner piece (or a 
demo anvil), I think it will serve well.  The lack of a real hardy 
hole will eventually bite but it is light years better than the 
Russian anvils that FABA uses for teaching and those are WAY better 
than the door stop that came from Harbor Freight (the definition of 
dead soft).  For light work (1/2" and less and a hand hammer), it 
ought to do and the young man certainly left with a big smile.

Steve