The Daily Yardman Thread

[BlazNT]

Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild

BlazNT (24) , Boobala (19)
I am winning Boo. Better step your game up.

 

[willys55]

Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild

20 paragraphs later, and the answer was not there....so I must do some research and find these answers....must climb high into the mountain and ask the guru for enlightenment

 

[Boobala]

Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild

BlazNT (24) , Boobala (19)
I am winning Boo. Better step your game up.

Don't make me stay up all night just to whip your arse !! ..:laughing: ..:laughing: ..:laughing:

 

[Boobala]

Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild

20 paragraphs later, and the answer was not there....so I must do some research and find these answers....must climb high into the mountain and ask the guru for enlightenment

Just saw the GURU at the bar, had a gorgeous sweetie on each arm, and he was spending money like he owned Fort Knox !! it might be awhile before he even knows you exist !! ..:laughing: ..:laughing:..:laughing:

 

[BlazNT]

Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild

Yes it is your bed time. Go to bed and just let it happen.:laughing:

 

[bertsmobile1]

Re: Anvil

Here's an anvil report:

First................

Note to self: Don't get so excited when you finally find an anvil you can buy (even if you KNOW it's going to be a deal!) that you forget everything you have ever learned about anvils!

Second note to self: If you see what looks like surface rust from sitting unused for who knows how many years in an open barn, but seems to have a little 'extra' oxidation to it, try to remember that the farm where you found the anvil, did have a barn fire a number of years ago and the anvil might have originally been in THAT barn!

Third note to self: Calm Down!! Take a few deep breaths and don't make a fool of yourself by tearing your pocket off trying to get your wallet out when the anvil's owner agrees to the ridiculous low price you've just offered him.

General Report:

Wire brushing quickly removed the surface crud on the anvil, but revealed a rather bright red oxidation that is often associated with steel and iron that has been exposed to fire. I took a picture and honestly, neither the anvil nor the air are as red and horrible looking as the camera's flash make them seem. . . . I was wearing a mask, or I think I'd have succumbed to the cloud of dust. I finally gave up and left my air-filtration system in the shop running. (That sounds fancy, but simply consists of a 20" window-fan hanging from the ceiling with two 20" furnace filters taped to the intake side. - Hey, it works, don't knock it!!)

I tried a static hammer drop test on the anvil and then a marble and finally a harden steel rod. None demonstrated the rebound that I thought they should. Especially the horn, it even sounds dull when struck with a hammer. I'm concerned that I may have purchased a very heavy lawn ornament.

I have already sent an email to a local blacksmithing association and asked if anyone knows how to re-temper an anvil. I'll cover their answer in future reports. (I have seen two anvils with what appears to be a thick slab of steel welded onto the top face. That could be the answer..)

Warning! Learn from the mistakes of others! Meaning: Don't be a dumbass like me!

Roger

Drop tests are not really good.
Two distinct types of anvils.
Blacksmiths Anvils
Tool makers Anvils
A smiths anvil does not need to be particularly hard as you work red hot metal on it and any hardness or tempering gets locally destroyed.
What is important is it is the same hardness from one end to the other and flat.
Smiths anvils are generally wide and very heavy.
Typically they are made from malleable iron ( SG iron to some )

Toolmakers anvils are steel, have very sharp corners and are very hard, but only on the working face as they are generally used on cold steel.

If it had been outside in a forest fire it may just have gotten hot enough to change the microstructure but you need a lot of heat to get it up to 900 C then hold it there for long enough for the heat to soak through .
Remember it was in a barn where animals piss & poo and pissing on an iron or steel item will cause rust to accelerate.
Then you get condensation and unless the barn always had a lot of animals there overnight to keep the air warm , moisture will condense in all the microcracks & surface imperfections causing it to rust even faster.
If you want hard face, take it to a welding shop and get some hardfacing laid on the top then get it ground flat.
When finished, dip it in a tub of molassas for a week to passivate the surface
Get a grade 5 bolt and flatten the head
If it leaves an impression then the face is too soft
If you just ruined the bolt the face is quit hard enough.
Remember the anvil needs to be softer than the hammers you use on it but harder than what is between them.

 

[Boobala]

Re: Anvil

Drop tests are not really good.
Two distinct types of anvils.
Blacksmiths Anvils
Tool makers Anvils
A smiths anvil does not need to be particularly hard as you work red hot metal on it and any hardness or tempering gets locally destroyed.
What is important is it is the same hardness from one end to the other and flat.
Smiths anvils are generally wide and very heavy.
Typically they are made from malleable iron ( SG iron to some )

Toolmakers anvils are steel, have very sharp corners and are very hard, but only on the working face as they are generally used on cold steel.

If it had been outside in a forest fire it may just have gotten hot enough to change the microstructure but you need a lot of heat to get it up to 900 C then hold it there for long enough for the heat to soak through .
Remember it was in a barn where animals piss & poo and pissing on an iron or steel item will cause rust to accelerate.
Then you get condensation and unless the barn always had a lot of animals there overnight to keep the air warm , moisture will condense in all the microcracks & surface imperfections causing it to rust even faster.
If you want hard face, take it to a welding shop and get some hardfacing laid on the top then get it ground flat.
When finished, dip it in a tub of molassas for a week to passivate the surface
Get a grade 5 bolt and flatten the head
If it leaves an impression then the face is too soft
If you just ruined the bolt the face is quit hard enough.
Remember the anvil needs to be softer than the hammers you use on it but harder than what is between them.

Bert NEVER ceases to amaze me with his wisdom and knowledge, I truly enjoy his in-depth explanation of any and all subjects put before him, I actually think BERT IS GOOGLE !! C,mon Bert tell us ,... you are GOOGLE ...aren't you ?? I have every hope that Bert will be more active in participation of the MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild thread. I think he puts his answers out there boldly and retreats from no-one. He is THEE GURU !!! Never depart Bert ... We admire you sir !!

 

[Roger B]

Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild

what would it take to restore it back to its hardened condition, or is that even possible?

That's what I'm looking into Doc. I contacted a local blacksmithing group and am hoping to hear back from them soon. That's the only hope I've got, I'm afraid.

Rog

 

[bertsmobile1]

Re: Anvil

Bert NEVER ceases to amaze me with his wisdom and knowledge, I truly enjoy his in-depth explanation of any and all subjects put before him, I actually think BERT IS GOOGLE !! C,mon Bert tell us ,... you are GOOGLE ...aren't you ?? I have every hope that Bert will be more active in participation of the MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild thread. I think he puts his answers out there boldly and retreats from no-one. He is THEE GURU !!! Never depart Bert ... We admire you sir !!

I have a firm belief that on the web ALL MEN ARE EQUAL thus credentials are not important, which is why I don't use any on the forum.
As none of you have ever met me I could be what I say I am or a 12 y/o girl with excellent computer skill trying to put one over a bunch of silly old fools.
Thus all responses should live or die according to the merit of what is being presented.
However as you have asked did 12 years of tertiary education Materials Science majoring in Metallurgy followed by a few diplomas in NDT, Ceramics, Accoustic Emissions & Thermionics followed by a Dip Ed ( adult ).
And after all that schoolin I still never managed to learn to spell.
However this is both the lucky and unbelievably GREEDY country so manufacturing died from the 60's on thus no work for me & I got into transport by accident, found people were happy to pay good money for being molly coddled and did that till we closed the partnership.
So technical stuff is my hobby,
For a while I got called Sticky cause my life revolved around 3 M's ( 3M made sticky tape down here ). My wife, Motorcycles & Metallurgy.
Still a member of the ASM , AIMM, ASTTM, WCC, Foundry was where I ended up before going into transport, but not the way I wanted to as I ended up closing down a lot of plants where I had worked while doing my part time degrees & diplomas.
So yes I am a bitter & twisted technophile.
A really great country blessed with raw materials obsessed with making the quick buck from retail or land ( which we pinched from the blacks in the first place ).
Sydney is now the 3rd most expensive property market in the world.
Land in Sydney is more expensive than on Manhattan Is and that is in a country the size of the lower USA with a population around that of California.

On topic.
My anvil is a lump of rail line attacked with a cutting torch followed by some "dressing" with an angle grinder, so not pretty.
When the railway workshop closed down I had hoped to get my hands on some good anvils but the obscenely wealthy paid well over $ 1000 to put them in their gardens and watch them rust into uselessness the sell them for scrap.
People who do not actually work, seem to feel guilty about it so they surround themselves with the trappings of hard manual labour.
From the same workshop , interiour designers outbid all of the local small foundries for the cope & drag patterns, thus ensuring no one could carry on making parts in small batches.
The "designers" mounted the patterns then framed them and sold then off as "Wall hangings" , again till the idle rich became bored with then then they tossed them in the street for garbage collection.
We had a pattern maker in the club who ended up making white boards for a living as accountants paid more for a sheet of laminated MDF in a pretty frame than he got paid for a pattern that took weeks to make.

 

[Roger B]

Re: Anvil

Bert NEVER ceases to amaze me with his wisdom and knowledge, I truly enjoy his in-depth explanation of any and all subjects put before him, I actually think BERT IS GOOGLE !! C,mon Bert tell us ,... you are GOOGLE ...aren't you ?? I have every hope that Bert will be more active in participation of the MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild thread. I think he puts his answers out there boldly and retreats from no-one. He is THEE GURU !!! Never depart Bert ... We admire you sir !!

Boo - Bert ain't "Google", Google just searches for stuff... Bert is WIKI!! Wiki knows everything!!!

(Of course we admire him, but you shouldn't call him "Sir", he'll get all huffy on you and reply: "Sir? . . . Sir my arse!! I'm as good as you are any day!!") At least that's what we did in the Navy when some newbie - non-qual, made a mistake and called an enlisted-swine, "Sir"....

Bert is GOOD!! - - - Bert is GREAT!! - - - Yea BERT!!!

Roger