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TIRE HAMMER at long last


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It's been two years or so since I bought the Ray Clontz/Clay Spencer tire hammer plans. I've taken two classes with Clay since then and talked to him a bit about the hammer. I even bought my anvil post and backbone. I just haven't had the time to build the tire hammer. I was able to purchase the Ron Kinyon style air hammer from Phillip Patton of Patton Blades in Fort Wayne Indiana, and have used it quite a bit.

A while back Clay called me and I mentioned the tire hammer in passing. I mentioned having already purchased my anvil post and he asked how much I got it for and if I could get more.

Long story short, he put me in touch with the coordinator for a hammer build in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I was able to obtain anvil posts for the entire build of 19 hammers. The posts were 6 1/2, 7 1/4, and 7 1/2-inch round and two six-inch square posts. I also built all of the treadles for the hammers.

Anyway, I got to attend the build this past weekend and of course, got a hammer. I got "number 16" so mine is hammer #366.

I'll try to get more pictures of the build and the hammer in the shop. I'm going to get the hammer unloaded tomorrow and then I'll be out of town again for a while. I'll position it when I get back in town.

For now I just need to get it off and put it in the shop.

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Anyway, that's the latest and greatest at the Fiery Furnace Forge Blacksmith LLC.

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We got it off today! I took it up to the steel yard and they used one of their lifts to put it on our trailer. We then used our animal hoist that fits in the truck hitch to lift it off the trailer and place it on boards with rollers. Since I am on gravel, dad and I put 1x10 boards down and then used 1-inch round bar as rollers.

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This is the anvil post and bottom die! We went with professionaly heat treated S-7 dies. Additional dies were $20 a set, but I have a lot of 4140 stock that I can make more dies out of. The post on my hammer is either 7 1/4-inches or 7 1/2-inches. The base plate is 2-foot square and 3/4-inches thick.
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I was able to obtain anvil posts for the entire build of 19 hammers. The posts were 6 1/2, 7 1/4, and 7 1/2-inch round and two six-inch square posts.

Dave -that is an impressive array of hammers. Are the anvils nested tube (6 1/2, 7 1/4 and 7 1/2)? I need to come up with an anvil for a treadle hammer and these look slick. -tks grant
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We did weld the plates with the tire still on the rim. They did it just as Doug said. Tire broken loose and held back with wooden wedges, then wet rags between the rim and the tire. 19 tires welded and no explosions......at least none that the weld team confessed to! :D Doug?

The anvils are solid, which is recommended for power hammers and some treadle hammers. The tire hammer plans call for a minimum of 6-inch round or square material. The three measurements I gave were the size solid material I was able to obtain. The availability of that type material at my steel yard is spotty, so I picked up what they had which was 6.5-inch, 7.25-inch, and 7.5-inch solid round. The guys on the frame assembly teem just had to deal with the differences.

Having said that, the Kinyon air hammer I own is made from large round tubing with something like 1.5-inch wall thickness. It is filled with sand. It has a 60 pound ram on it, and there is no sign of failure in the anvil post.

I would ALWAYS recommend solid though. Extra mass = better hammer!

I delivered all of the posts to the build location 11 hours away, payed a hefty cut fee to have these sawn to length, and when it was all said and done, the material cost the class a total of 45 cents per pound. (Covering material, travel, and time.) That was less than half of what the next cheapest option was.

I don't know what happened to my pictures but I don't have time to fix them now!

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Hello Dave,

Beautiful machine. It looks as maintenance free as anything could get. It's good to see your arsenal of equipment increase so well. I don't think anything on that is going to wear out very soon if ever at all. It looks like all of you had a good time at that workshop including everyone taking a hammer home. Thanks for showing the pictures. It is very inspiring. Spears.

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I delivered all of the posts to the build location 11 hours away, payed a hefty cut fee to have these sawn to length, and when it was all said and done, the material cost the class a total of 45 cents per pound. (Covering material, travel, and time.) That was less than half of what the next cheapest option was.


At-a-boy Dave. Nicely done! -and thanks for sorting out the different diameters of anvil posts. -grant
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  • 2 weeks later...

I poured a smalle concrete pad for the hammer today: three feet by four feet. It is six inches thick and I used rebar reinforcements. I drove nine pieces of rebar two feet in the ground and then put six pieces, criss-cross suspended in the center part of the pad.

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Hopefully it will be stout enough!

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Hopefully it will be! I may actually be able to pour the entire shop pad before too much longer. That'd be nice!

It's been curing, but rather slowly. I had three good solid days with the weather above freezing, but it's turned cold again. It's set up enough to put the hammer on it, but it needs more time before I use the hammer.

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well done, I was able to take a hammer class a couple years ago, I got number 300!! Clay is a great guy and my hammer has held up very well, just one weld on the switch box broke, and one set screw fell out on the upper arm assembly, watch for them loosening up! Clay also has a tool schematic on this site I posted somewhere, tools..egad..must have more!!!

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  • 2 weeks later...

So today I got the hammer bolted down using 1/2-inch expanding anchors. They are about 3-inches deep in the concrete. So far, after pounding out a pair of tongs, everything is still solid.

General overview of the forging station. Pretty much a 10x14-foot area.
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The tire hammer in place, turned slightly, as Mr. John B suggested. (which does make it faster and easier to get to.....good idea!)
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I used four layers of school bus rubber matting under the hammer. After the bolts were tightened, it ended up being about 1/2-inch thick.
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A happy blacksmith.
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I've made an edge of the anvil tool for it so far. I'll be making lots of tooling for it as the need arises.

I'm still trying to figure out how to move the air hammer over a bit. That's not going to be fun!

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