Fly Press Weld Repair?

One of my neighbors had a yardsale yesterday and one of the items he had was a small fly press that had suffered a serious break in that the front of the base was broken off roughly at the axis of the ram or through the pass through hole - the broken off part is gone. He wanted $10 for it and it may have been worth that much as scrap metal but I know I could never bring myself to scrap something like that. Considering the price that folks are getting for working ones - $1,000 plus, it may be worth repairing if it could be made strong enough. I think I would preheat it in a fire and then weld with nirod ( I have a bunch that I scored from either my local dump or scrapyard - I forget which so no cost there) using a block of steel as the replacement part. My thoughts would be to planish each pass and then put the whole thing back in the fire when done and let it cool slowly. What do you folks think?

Welding like that could work and it sounds like a good plan. I would look at machining the broken edge flat and bolting a new front piece on it. in addition to the new front I would support the entire bottom of the press with a piece of plate steel, 3/4" or so thick, bolted up into the bottom.
Is there any evidence of something being driven into the hole and splitting the front off? Seems odd to break off the front part at the hole, I have heard of them breaking where the back meets the base...
Another option would be to remove the rest of the table and make a rectangle socket that will hold a new removeable table, this type of flypress is not as common. They are set off the front of workbench and allows you to work on the outside of a ring.

Weld using oxy-acy, cast iron rod and flux. Preheat is definitely required.

Here are some pics of one of my flypresses. The hole is 2"x 3 1/2" and is is a fairly small press with a 1 11/16" dia screw. Made by Sweeney & Blocksidge. This type is what I would convert yours to if it was mine.

I went back to check on the fly press and found out the handle is missing although he previously thought he had it in his scrap pile. I also learned that he broke it using it as a demolition ball, swinging it from his excavator! I still may buy it for a yard decoration as he only wants $10 for it but I think that restoring it to a functioning tool is more than I want to deal with considering the broken part and the missing handle.