horn to which side?

Newbie has a question. I'm a lefty and am trying to decide if the horn should be pointed toward my left side or my right side. Is this a matter of preference or do certain techniques require the horn to be pointed towards the arm/hand with the hammer for either a lefty or righty?

walker wrote:
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My anvil stand scoots, so the horn goes anywhere I want it to. Failing that, you can always walk around the thing, right? :-)
GWE

I am a lefty and my anvil horn always points to the right. Right handers turn it around when they use mine. Since most of my hammering is done on the face of the anvil, it seems handier to have the face and the hardy hole to the left. When I use the horn, my right hand holds the stock in place on the horn, and I often lock my elbow against my side to help locate things. That way my left arm with hammer is often over the top of the anvil. The more I think about it, the more reasons that come to mind. There are a few occasions where I have to walk around the anvil, but that doesn't happen often.
Pete Stanaitis ------------------------
walker wrote:
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walker wrote:
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I'd say go with what's comfortable for the job you are on.
I'm right handed and don't care wich way the anvil points most of the time. The exception was when I demo'd making nails a couple summers back. My friend (who's gear it was) had the anvil set with the horn to his left, opposite his hammer hand.Traditional, he said. As a result it was unsafe to leave the cutoff hardy in the hole as there wa a risk of catching ones knuckles between the hammer handle and the cutting edge. This caused a great deal of lost time, put the hardy in, take it out, repeatedly. Dealing with nails that cooled rapidly, this WAS a problem.
My solution was to crank the anvil around so that the horn was under my hammer hand and the hardy was on the tongs side. This allowed me to utilise the face for working my metal and the cutoff hardy for cutting the nails, without risking my knuckles. Production was much improved.
For normal work, do what you can do safely.
Cheers Trevor Jones

I'm a lefty too and mine horn is on the left. I like the fact that I can use the horn and not have to lean over the body of the anvil. Also, this way I can leave hardie tools in place without them becoming a safety hazzard.
But, honestly it doesn't matter. Though some old-timers and know-it-alls will tell you that the horn is "supposed" to be opposite your hammer hand. DO WHATEVER WORKS FOR YOU.
A survey needs to be done but I find that there are more left handed blacksmiths than lefties in the general population. One blacksmith hammer-in I went to had approx 27 smiths doing demos, and I counted that 10 of them were lefties. That's 37%! The general population has only 5%-20% (depending on criterial used) of lefties.
Gobae - The Smith http://blacksmithforum.oakandacorn.com
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I wonder if some of the left handed blacksmiths are that way BECAUSE they left the cutoff hardy in the hole. We teach from day one to always remove the cutter from the hardy. When I make nails (and I do make them fairly often at demos for the public) I put the cutoff hardy in the vise, so It's not an issue.
Pete Stanaitis -----------------------------
snipped-for-privacy@nycap.rr.com wrote:
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snipped-for-privacy@nycap.rr.com wrote:
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I'm another skuzzy leftie, my anvil horn is to the tongs side, mainly for convinience as I use the top a lot more than the horn. My work area is a bit cramped, so I set up the fire in the corner, the anvil against the wall so the treadle will swing out over it, then the triphammer at the end. It seemed logical; fire to triphammer to anvil to fire... billet. Do what feel right to you, just leave space for jumping back should the work get away. Safety first, last, always.
Charly

I feel so perverse!I actually prefer facing the heel with the horn pointing away from me.The best way is the way that suits you best,safely.Finding out which way suits you best is part of the fun!
People do not know,because people do not do.

Thanks for all the responses.
I've been working with the horn to my tongs (right) side because it just fills right for most things so I guess I'll stay that way.
Reason for the question was that I was getting ready to order a new anvil (from either Old World Anvils or Euroanvils) because my old Vulcan is a piece of crap! I found it in a flea market for cheap cheap. The face of this POS has been chipped all the way around it so there is no real edge/corner, there is also NO flat surface on the face, and the horn has about 3 inches broken off of the end of it. But it has served it's purpose because it has given me something to pound one for a while without costing me much money.
The Euroanvil I was looking at came with a small shelf and I was told that the shelf should be on the opposite side of you from the anvil. I just wanted to make sure that if I ordered one with a shelf, that the shelf would be oriented correclty.....depending on the direction of the horn.
But I have since decided to go with the Old World Anvil two horn classic (with no shelf) since they have them in stock and can ship immediately.....it's in route now!!
From what I read both are good anvils so I don't think I can go wrong.
Thanks again for the input.
Walker

New anvil....cool! I'd appreciate a review when you get yours in.Good luck with the new anvil!
People do not know,because people do not do.