Tool Talk
Blacksmith and Metal Working Forum => Blacksmith and Metalworking Forum => Topic started by: keykeeper on April 21, 2012, 04:56:59 PM
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Picked this up today at at "antique mall". I think I have found my newest, favorite Indestro Mfg. Co. tool!! WooHooo!!!
Four pounds of Indestro beauty. I'll have to find me some 3/8" shanked hardy tools!!!! Now where did I put that 2 ounce hammer????
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That's a sweet little Anvil!
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Oh,great. Something I would have never thought to look for.
Now I will probably find one at the flea and have to lug it across the parking lot -P
I wonder if they actuly made them or had someone else make them?
And do you suppose there are Indestro tools to put in the hole?
hmmm
What a giant can of worms that opens up....
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Indestro anvil?! Who knew? Now I have to look for one of these as well as a Stiletto anvil...
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keykeeper,
You are in the right section.
Nice score, did not know that Indestro made Anvils... at any rate it's a "real looker".
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It's cast iron so don't actually use it.
Likely a promotional or give-away or souvenir of some sort.
SWEET!
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One on worthpoint only weigh's 3.86 pounds LOL
Yours is the only one I found that is plausably the original paint...
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Nice...
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It's cast iron so don't actually use it.
I think it is cast steel. Wouldn't cast iron have parting lines from the casting process? The face also looks to be milled flat, indicating some nice finishing.
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Cast steel anvils were made exactly the same as the cast iron ones, although I think there was more work involved in the foundry process. All the swedish cast steel anvils have a parting line, though some are dressed up better than others. The test is, how does it bounce a hammer or ball bearing? Even mild steel will bounce more than cast iron, most small anvils are cast iron and were made for just light bench tinkering.This indestro looks like a bench anvil. most promotional anvils were less than 4-5" and didn't have a hardie hole.
Graeme
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Perhaps better to call them cast semi steel, 'cast steel' is a material, not a process, it is a subset of crucible steel. Making a vise by 'casting' with steel is usually actully casting with a blend of cast iron and remelted steel. It is , in theory possible to cast actual steel, but it is not easy, and I suspect very few vices are truely pure steel that has been cast....
There are also different kinds of cast iron, which is mostly why sometimes a cast iron vise will be reasonably durable, and others break with the slightest tap..
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Cast steel is indeed a term that was used for discribing tool steel made in a crucible and poured into a ingot mould then forged into tools etc. In the early 1900s as the ability to make large steel casting( exceeding 60,000 psi tensile strength) direct from the furnace evovled, so did the confusion with the term "cast steel" used for forging tools and the "steel" used for making steel castings used in heavy industry, that American industry in particular started to use the term "crucible steel" to identify tool steel. Yes making steel castings is more difficult than making cast iron castings but it has has been done by industry for well over 100 years. Columbian Hardware in 1905 advertised their anvils as "all steel - that ring true" but their vises were only malleable iron. Sorry for the long rant,but I hope I have lessend the confusion.
Graeme
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My 70 pound Vanadium Steel anvil is cast steel. Rings like a bell and has excellent rebound. It was made in the 1940's, according to Anvils in America.
I will have to test the little Indestro to see how it does, but it just doesn't have any characteristics of being "cast iron".
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My 1928 Fisher Norise anvil is cast iron and it has a hardened steel plate forge welded on the horn and face. I love it, it has a nice thud instead of a ring.
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>but it just doesn't have any characteristics of being "cast iron".
Could be anything, if it was a small production run, it could have for instance been contracted out to some foundry that was making pipe, so perhaps gray iron....
It is small enough that it could even have been die forged, tho it would be overkill, if it was made in house it might be simpler to make it with machines that already existed in house...
Does it have any rough fractured edges along the inside edge areas? cast iron usually leaves little brittle sharp crispy edges on areas that haven't been cleaned up by grinding...
Also, if it was cast, it may have dimples on the bottom ....
(At least one reference i have seen shown anvils being cast upside down)
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I'd have gotten it. Put it down at the end of the bench, use for sheet metal and such. The Fisher anvil was known as the silent anvil. Mine is a 1908, and has a nice thunk instead of the ring. Even 110 years ago people were getting fed up with the noise. Working with a good steel ringing anvil is almost as bad as listening to hard rock. Makes a guy say, "HUH" a lot.