Randy

In teaching a forge welding class at NESM one of the projects I showed was doing a forged welded hammer.

 Hammer1Sm.jpg   88.16K   31 downloads

I had an old one that was made this way and you could see the lines where the welds were so the process was visable. As often the smiths didn't have readily available material and choice of sizes, they had to create their own. This one was made from 1/4" x 1-1/4" flat stock, hot rolled mild steel. The same process was used with wrought iron. This was folded back and forth as shown in the drawing to make a stack to achieve the desired thickness.

 4gHammer.jpg   79.44K   39 downloads

The one end was left long for a handle. It was then faggot welded together. A faggot is a stack or pile of metal. Then I used leaf spring for the high carbon face and cross pien. This weld is known as a jump weld. In the old days they would cut barbs in the edges of the high carbon pieces and with the hammer hot would hammer the steel in place for forge welding. I used a small tack weld on opposite corners to hold the pieces in place for welding. Then the eye was punched in and the hammer was heat treated. In the photo I'm jump welding the high carbon face onto the hammer.

 RAMWeldSm.jpg   77.23K   30 downloads

First some information: I didn't put this in the knife section as I'm not looking at making any more knives, but some larger sculptural pieces. So the piece will not be heat treated. A finished product/billet of about 2" square by say a foot long when completed. Just a layered billet not mosaic damascus. I don't have any problem forge welding and I do it in the coal and gas forges. It's okay if the finished layers are 1/8" thick or more. So this is for looks, not function. I have done some damascus/pattern welding over the years so know something about the process.

Question: What materials would give me the best contrast? I should add that I don't plan to order the material from a knife dealer but will just go to my scrap pile or scrap dealer. So info in that regard will be most helpful. I did hit the other posts and they were knife related, didn't really say much about contrast or if it was more along the art lines didn't say what the materials were.

Any help and details are greatly appreciated.

Looks like a lot of these items are cast, but looks like a lot of hand work, too.

http://heinztools.com/index.html

I wish he had more information about his processes. The antique ones are interesting, too!

It may awaken your creativity any way.

I just received a good question from another reader of IFI in regards to cylinder safety issues and I thought it would be good to post it here:

"I know a couple of smiths that are using 6"+ diameter air cylinders in a hydraulic setup with a pump putting out 2500.
From my understanding the air cylinders have a thinner wall and are not made for that kind of pressure. There is a rumor that this setup is dangerous and the cylinder can fail in the form of exploding, cracking and hydraulic fluid shooting out, etc. Though I am having a difficult time finding out any information about the kind of work loads these two cylinders can endure.

Any suggestions or literature that I can read up on?"

Here was my response:

"I've never heard of such a thing. The ones I have the walls are over an inch thick, more than enough to handle that pressure. Maybe Batson's book has info about this issue, but I don't remember.

Just asked a guy at work and he said that those are AIR cylinders, NOT a hydraulic cylinder. So you're right about the air clyinder, but hydraulic cylinders are made for that pressure. The air cylinder is used for the air hammers, but should never be used on presses.

See, I learned something today, too."

Any other input and where literature can be found regarding this issue is appreciated, too.

Sure wish Grant was still around. I know we'd get a good, detailed response from him.