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power hammer flatter idea


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hello everyone, please if this has already been brought up. from my understanding, a typical flatter for the power hammer looks like the photo attached. is it possible to, instead of having a half cylinder on top, have a completely rounded top(like half of a large ball bearing)? I would think this would make you not have to be perpendicular to your piece if its a taper, and if your are slightly off, the rounded top would prevent it from flying across the shop.

thanks

ethanth?&id=OIP.M0c57ee046f33b2dbac599a4d8799

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Greetings Ethen,

I love it when our youth come up with ideas.. If you think about it a little longer the impact surface on a ball would be quite rough on the top die.. The nice thing about the flatter pictured is that you can use it round side down to draw out the metal.. 

Forge on and make beautiful things

Jim

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I have a flatter just as you describe for occasional use on a compound taper.  As Jim mentions it is harder on the top dies and the top gets beat up much faster.  Mine is round so unless the part is small you need a small step over.  For most things I feel  the standard flatter is better but it is a nice tool to have kicking around.

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Most of the 'flying off across the shop if you are slightly off' occurs when you are either not hitting hard enough, or the metal is not hot enough.

With regard to your query though...you are thinking this from the wrong point of view. If your proposed domed top flatter allows you a clean strike when it is slightly off...your workpiece is going to be knocked out of true instead. The top tool of the hammer is what ensures that your hand tooling remains in plane with the bottom tool and work piece.

If you are trying for a compound taper in one pass I would make a dedicated tool with the appropriate angles so the workpiece arrives consistently at the desired plane with all the tooling in full contact. Obviously it will be trying to bend like a banana so keeping it straight would be the main concern.

My fuller/flatters are all D section and I have various widths, thicknesses and radii, which I find more versatile. But the advantage of the one you show is an ability to accommodate steeper tapers with a lower (centre of gravity/leverage) strike point which means the flatter conforms to the taper more rather than trying to flatten it out. But with either you must remember to start from the tip and and work up the taper to maintain the rough forged taper rate. From thick to thin tends to flatten it out.

The best (fastest, most efficient, most repeatable, less likely to make a mistake) way of forging a taper on a power hammer though, is to have a dedicated wedge tool which means you can hit it very hard and get the job done the fastest. I have a series of them at different ratios based on 2mm:100mm...9mm:100mm and so on.

Alan

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 18 May 2016 at 11:38 PM, rockstar.esq said:

Ethan,

Your question taught me a lot, thanks for asking.

I am sorry that you (and with no response, apparently also Ethan) did not gain anything from the answers...but I am curious...what did the question teach you?

Alan

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Ethan what you are describing is sometimes called a fried egg tool.  :)  I use one with the dome offset to one end to help make and flatten tapering blades. As Allan notes it does want to make the steel banana. The blades are mostly forged pryor to this step.

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The tool shape I would use to form and flatten a compound taper like a blade would be a standard D cross section fuller/flatter which has a wedge shape along its axis. Awkward to describe but ...the D profile would measure say 75mm (3") across the flat, 100mm (4") along the the flat, and the Dee would be 50mm (2") high at one end and 45mm (13/4") at the other. The radius of the D is constant, the flat is the plane that tapers.The dee section allows it to conform to the taper along the blade steeper and the wedge controls the taper across the blade. The above dimensions would give you a 5:100 taper across the blade and enable you to forge quite close to the edge without hitting the bottom pallet.  

I have used these frequently in the fuller mode, with the handle at right angles to the axis of the fuller, to spread a taper in order to conserve material and gain the maximum spread of a fish tail taper without increasing the length.

For forging blades I would have thought the "fried egg" tool does not allow you to get close to the edge and is constantly trying to flatten the cross sectional taper...the strike point being always over the back edge of the blade.

I do have a number of "fried egg" tools as you describe, but find them pretty uncontrollable in flatter mode...running in dimples the other way up without creating any folds is their usual use by me.

Alan

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I  would agree that a tapered flatter is a better tool for compound tapers than the fried egg tool.  It does tend to flatten a taper as Allen states.  I should probably make some  but  In most  cases just holding a regular flatter diagonally works for a compound taper.  Things like a blade that come to a feather edge are an exception.  The tool I do have would be more useful if it were square rather than round.

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The feather edge issue is difficult enough with all the control of a hand hammer at our disposal.

And of course for an occasional use we can normally get by with what we have to hand rather than tooling up for a batch production. The fried egg tool (good name that, haven't heard it before) could be used dome side down to run down a blade edge and forge it to a wedge cross section...just very carefully!

Alan

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The ones I use for blades are rectangle in foot print, with the dome offset toward the distal end of the blade so it helps to form the taper, the tool is narrow enough that I can work the edge of the blade with the dome near the center so it is not crushing the spine of the blade. I have not set up to make production runs of blades to be the same so having a compound bevel that is not constant is useful though probably not as effeicent as what Alan described for a true production run. My intent in commenting was to give an example of a use for a tool such as Ethan suggested not to really get into the specifics of the tools I use. These tools are as forged so not hardened and the dome does degrade fairly fast but they do not mar my top die.

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I make virtually all of my power hammer tools from mild steel...the punch-and-drifts and any hot sets are from Progen of course.

Probably your dome degrades to form a wedge fuller spine (as I tried to describe) if you are using it at the same angles...offset it is already halfway there.

Alan

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Alan,

Sorry it's been a while since I was at a computer.  I think you may have read my comment as sarcasm (and potentially offensive).  Please accept my apologies for any misunderstanding as I was writing the plain truth.

I learned that the top die of a power hammer is potentially damaged by a top tool that focuses to much force onto a small area.  Prior to his question, I'd have thought his idea was pretty good. 

Your comment taught me that having dedicated taper tools was a better way to go for consistent results.

I don't have any power hammer experience, the replies taught me that it takes a different approach compared to working free hand.

If I'd posted a question that elicited a pat-on-the-head response about being young and inexperienced, I don't know that I'd be in a hurry to respond either.  Ethan asked a great question, about something I know little about.  All I had to offer was the support of a fellow student - so I did.  What I wrote was specifically intended to support Ethan, while allowing others to save face.  It genuinely never occurred to me than anyone would read that as sarcasm.

Still, I appreciate the opportunity to clear up the misunderstanding. 

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:) I was not offended. Somewhere amongst the rewrites the smiley went missing.

I realised that you had probably learnt something from the responses prompted by Ethan's question...I was just amused at your backhanded way of saying it.

I am however surprised that you thought the responders were patronising, that anyone had lost face, and that Ethan was in need of token/moral support. I thought the question had been taken seriously. The fact that everyone had taken the time and trouble to post informative responses indicated that Ethan was being very well supported by the responders.

Any way...this is the third time I have typed out this response...I must remember to copy this one before the forum software loses it again.

We can both be pleased that a good result (of your question-praising comment and my response) is that the thread was resurrected and even more useful information was exchanged.

Alan

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