

Poor hammer control will leave this anvil a scarred mess. For a beginner or hobbyist, it a good value and will quickly encourage good hammer control.A belt sander is useful to level the face. Plan on 1-2 hours of grinding, at least two complete grinding disks will be used up. For $80, it is a serviceable, but ugly, anvil.This will not make it perform better but it will certainly look better! I may also grind the surface down so that it does not look like a toad’s skin. I may spend more time on this anvil and grind the horn to a better cone-shape. The anvil stood up well under heavy blows, as long as the blows hit the hot steel. I would estimate the hardness at between Rc 35 and 40. Clearly, the face on this anvil is not fully hardened. Later, a second blow missed with similar results.

#50 LB ANVIL FOR SALE FULL#
After several heats and working the hawk blade with the pi en end, I made an errant blow, not a full hit but I missed the work piece and hit the face. Once the spike was hot, I went at it with a 2# cross pein hammer. The stand stood its ground through the pounding. This is a temporary mount but was sufficient to reduce the ring to a heavy thud. Once the anvil was placed on the frame, I bolted it down with 4 each ½” lag screws and 2” washers. I removed the top 2”x 6” and replaced it with a 2” X 8”, donated by a local construction company who was building a house down the street. I did not have a proper stump to mount the anvil on so it was put on the 2”x 6” A-frame stand that held my 70# farriers anvil. I chose to work on a RR spike tomahawk head because it was a fair sized cross section to pound on. The anvil face and horn were now reasonably smooth (Fig. I then took to the face with a belt sander, 100 grit, and smoothed out the grinding marks (Fig. I would recommend a heavier chamfer or radius on the hardy hole so that the corners do not interfere with inside corner radii on tools. NOTE: This is probably a 28-29mm hardy hole. The hardy was a sloppy 1-1/8” and my hardy tools did not fit well in this hole. A few surface flaws remained in the side of the horn after grinding and these were also left in place. I decided not to grind these out, as they probably do not pose a potential problem worth all of the effort that would be expended removing them. Grinding also showed some flaws around the hardy hole (Fig. The grinder quickly removed the milling marks. Grinding with the belt grinder will remove the swirls from the disk grinder I would estimate it at between 50% and 75%. I tried the hammer drop test and, while the anvil had a high pitched ring, the rebound was not spectacular. The horn is designed for castability, not the needs of the smith (Fig. It will take a lot more work on the grinder to get this horn to a true round shape. 5).Ĭertainly a better finish but the shape still looks like a ducks bill. I took up my 4.5” grinder and went to work on the horn and the face.Īfter about 20 minutes, they looked like this (Fig. 4) that left the surface more like a fine file. The face of the anvil bore the milling marks (Fig. I have named this anvil “The Toad” for obvious reasons. As you can see, Russian steel foundry technology is not represented here at its best. I noticed a line, under the face, that suggested that this anvil had a tool steel face cast into it(Fig. Not much effort was spent dressing up the parting lines on this casting. The ridge running down the horn is the parting line, the place where the cope and the drag meet (Fig. This anvil is like most things from the former Soviet Union: blocky and graceless. Once out of the crate, it was obvious, this was an ugly anvil The anvil came in an open wooden crate that, for the most part, kept it confined sufficiently to prevent any shipping damage. The following is a review by a hobbyist who bought one. The 110# Russian cast steel anvil now being offered by Harbor Freight has generated a lot of interest in the Blacksmithing community. This is significantly lower than the low cost Czech imports or even used beat up anvils.Ĭarefully note that these ARE NOT the same as the similar looking Chinese cast iron "Anvil Shaped Objects" also sold by Harbor Freight. These NEW anvils are currently being sold at the amazing price of $1/pound or less delivered in the U.S. There has been a lot of buzz about theses anvils on various Internet forums and we thought we would clear the air. This is a report on the 110 pound (50 kg) Russian cast steel anvil currently being sold by Harbor Freight. Product Report by Robert Nichols AKA quenchcrack Russian Cast Steel Anvil: anvilfire product reportīlacksmithing and metalworking questions answered.
