E.F. Thumann

Is the wear on the frame side pretty serious? Or primarily on the gib side? If it's primarily on the gib, then machine a new one incorporating the correct skew to straighten out the ram travel(ie thicken the gib at the bottom to take out the majority of the play). My 2 cents.

Look at the play the ram has in the guides! Must be 1-1/2" side to side.

I think you dealt with the whole thing with aplomb, John. It's not easy conveying expertise online. One guy can have no experience whatsoever, and another can have boatloads (I still remember the pics of you rebuilding the giant clutch for a monster press!), and yet it all comes off as "equal" in a forum. We all appreciate your expertise and advice, don't be put off.

Not knowing what the internal mechanism of the hammer is, if there is a "slack belt clutch" setup inside, and the motor is 3 phase, you may be running it reversed. When the clutch is on the drive side of the belt, the treadle is harder to push, and can "pump" like it seems to in the video. Just a thought, I could be entirely wrong.

I don't understand how this is an "old-style" forging operation? How do you envision that drop forging plants do work? The large hammers in use today are typically 40+ years old in operations that are still going strong.

That makes sense. I'm so used to seeing the nazel/beche with the geared drive wheel that it didn't even occur to me that it would be a split pulley with just the rear side for idling.

Mac, is the odd post/handwheel thing that rises behind the rear flywheel of the hammer part of the original photo? What is that? (ps, I got a chuckle from the pic)

I just noticed in the video that the treadle reciprocates pretty violently on the "continuous" mode. Has Ken found a way to mitigate that? Seems like it would be distracting/disconcerting at best. Ps, congrats on the new hammer!

That's pretty slick Patrick. I always pictured you as an old codger, you're a young guy! How long does it take you to switch out the die sets on the Bradley?

How would running a 7hp motor (?) for an hour, ie 5kwh, cost you $125? Average kwh is about 12-15 cents.

I don't mean to shoot you down but.......not going to happen. Johns offer was exceptionally kind. How much money do you have to build this? My guess would be that Johns guess of 100k to build a new 4N would be short by about 250k if a big machine shop in the US undertook the project. Yes, the Bike Building Bloke, aka Jessie James, aka Franky Luckman, aka Popeofwelding, uses a 4N, and that is probably the genesis of all this.

Chinobi, look up "Emon Demon", it's what most industrial landlords in the Northeast use to monitor the electric use of their tenants for billing purposes. That way you don't have to pull an individual service to a new meter, etc. Just hook up the ammeter doughnut from the Emon-Demon to whatever you want to monitor, and it tracks it for you.

Jim, did you machine the knurled punch holder? Or get it from someone/etc? What's the advantage vs using the tooling hole in the ram?

In your second post you cursed, that's frowned upon by the mods, that's why you got put on the list. Ps the piece in your pic looks nice.

What's the weight on that Larry? Hammer body vs anvil?

FWIW, I just Installed a 165 Anyang from James Johnson down in TX. It's just a beautiful, beautiful hammer. Give him a ring, he couldn't be any friendlier or helpful. I plan to take some gopro vids of it forging this week.

Good for you Ric! I know that you've been looking for a candidate in that weight class for quite a while. Looks like a gorgeous hammer.

Get someone to roll it. Any metal shop worth it's salt will have a three roll or plate roller.. My Ercolina will roll 4x.75 on the flat. If all else fails I might me able to roll one for you.

Your last post uploaded as I was writing all sorts of questions. There is no one who stocks bronze sheet close to you? Most cymbals are spin formed on a lathe out of sheet. Totally different process, I doubt you can get the correct sound out of a forged cymbal vs modern spun cymbals.

Since youngs modulus doesn't change significantly between a36 and a514, do you think using the a514 helped, steve? That's a genuine question, I know you do a bunch of NDT/inspection.

A few things, what is the life preserver thingy on the crane? Two: notice the sword on the controls and how it looks like it rides on a cylindrical boss on the tup? Looks like the boss can be rotated on the round plate with he handle for more or less engagement with the sword. Thoughts?

Where is this place? One of the photos is a back-geared punch press prob 200 ton, and another looks to be a 36-48" Bullard style VBM

Andrew, do you have a lathe and a mill? There is definitely some machining work there to rebush the worn out pieces with bronze. You will save a ton of money doing it yourself, or having a friend do it. And remember Kroil is your friend when you do the initial breakdown!

Just saw this pic. Thought I would "pay it forward" to you gents. It's from the Krupp Ironworks in Essen, Germany, obviously long since dismantled/destroyed.

Iron, I don't want to hijack the thread (b/c it is a nice die), could you speak a little about your experience with the 88 so far? I know James Johnson is a great guy, and I have nothing but positive things to say about him and what he is doing for the anyang line. Specifically I was wondering what "little" hiccups you might have had with the hammer, i.e. running hot/oiler problems/etc that had to be worked out b/f you were compeletely satisified. I assume you love it now?