Torin

Of course you can always use 2 or more different high carbon steels and no low carbon steels---some makers call that a "super damascus"...

Well, I don't know about "super", but I like 15n20 and 1095 for that reason. Both high-carbon steels, so the heat treating is a bit easier.

Latest batch of seam rippers turned out pretty nice.

I had no problems forge welding with my Mifco/McEnglvan crucible forge.

Ran on normal low pressure line natural gas. Orifices were about 3/8" and it had a blower.

Interestin' vid,but....to me it seems there isn't much power in it.
But I am bit spoiled by real stuff,which can destroy your piece in nanoseconds;MA,AJAX,Massey,Kuhn,etc.
To be honest,I have never seen compressor powered hammer fast enough and strong enough-there must be at least 225hits per min of considerable power,so staff can finish their piece in one heat.
And technique is must,during that speed fella must be able to turn material between hits to save time and cash.

I'm back after being off for a bit. Jan, I wouldn't go too much from that video. I was trying to get back into learning how to use a power hammer. It still needs tuning and a better set of dies. Plus I'm not really working the hammer that hard. It hits harder that what I was doing. Once I get back into production the season and have more than 10 hours in on it, I'll post another video.

redanvil,

quote: (# of heats BS)

To make MONEY at Blacksmithing for one, and to prevent excessive scaling marring work for another and in fact many other GOOD reasons (check out the effects of overheating and overworking on tool steels for instance) the number of heats needed to do the job should be kept to a minimum. It is FAR from BS. The less heats you take to do the job the better, so you should be aiming to improve on how much work you do per heat. I accept fully that it took me about four or five FULL heats to do a leaf say, when I first started, now I can do them comfortably in two. That means less fuel burned, more made per hour = higher returns.

Please don't take this as a personal attack, is isn't, but rather putting a wrong idea right.

Ian, you are definately making a good point. And yeah, as menioned above, I'm more trying to make sure I have a good feel on how to use my hammer before cranking up the power on it.

I do plan on eventually getting a self contained hammer. That way I will be running without the 15 hp compressor and directly running a 5 hp motor. But I need to have enough production to justify the expense. I'm hoping to get there in the next 2 or 3 years. In the meantime, this will get me going, and building up my skills.

But yes, doing more work in less heats will make this a more profitable (as in less likely to fail) enterprise.

"Mythbusters" says these breaks can't happen, but they haven't spent years in a shop. It is a serious issue and safety gear should always be worn while working.

Well, they changed a bit. The first run through, they were working on 'chip/break/explode'.

The second time through, they got a clue, but they changed the 'myth' from 'chip/break/explode' to 'explode'. So they could still say 'busted' but then they warned that pieces really could fly off.

Don't mind me, I had a nice video rebuttal to their first run through, and then they changed the parameters on it right after I'd gotten it done. Making my work mostly moot.

I finally got the treadle installed and everything working right. So I spent a few hours drawing out billets I'd made up last year. Even repaired a few delaminations that happened on reheating. Nice to see I can forge weld under the hammer.

Anyway, here is a short video of the hammer and it running.

YouTube - Kinyon style air hammer

Here she is. I got her to cycle for about a minute before calling it a night. It still need some tweaking, the treadle built, and some more reinforcement.

I have to ask...

what's with the parking lot in the background?

Where I live, the back yard (and garage) runs up against a church parking lot. On the plus side, any day but Sunday and we have absolutely no parking problems. :D

And here is welding on the ram guide, and pretty much finished execpt for the plumbing.

I didn't get it finshed this weekend like I'd hope, mainly because my wife said I was looking too tired to be safe and told me to stop. It is just a matter of hooking up the plumbing and making the treadle for it. I should still be able to get it finished by today, which is my (self imposed) deadline.

Here are the pictures of assembling and welding the hammer.

Well, it turns out that I now have 2 5-way valves due to some miscommunications.

Oh well. Here is what they look like.



Mounting bracket I made for it is pretty plain, but it works (I did switch out for longer bolts).



And here is the air filter / regulator / oiler.



However I managed to damage it a bit when installing it in the air line. There are little tabs that it uses to lock in the o-ring based conectors and some of the cracked off when I installed the unit. Good news is I can replace them with short sections of threaded pipe. Annoying but a $3 fix.

Well, the local Parker rep hasn't been able to get the 5-way 2-position valve in yet, they are still trying to get it expedited. However Blacksmith's Depot does have it in stock now (probably got the only one in the warehouse) and reopened my order and will have it to me by Friday. This means I'm still on track. (Even though I didn't get any work done last night...watched a movie with my wife.)

Then I wound up spendng most of the day today working on the compressor. The problem with the compressor is that I need it to run continuously, and it didn't have everything it needed to run unloaded. I ordered the parts in , and after some juggling, I got them all. Well, the drawing of how to hook them up included some pieces on my compressor that were from later models. So I wound up making a mounting bracket for it. In the picture, everything that is shiney or unpainted grey is what I added on. So far it seems to be working ok, and I don't seem to have any leaks. This was the part I was worried about most. But it is now done.

Oh, I finally took a look at the power meter while it was running...pretty scary...

Sorry it has been so long since the last update. I've gotten the pass-through hole cut for the ram, but it took forever using cut-off disks on a die grinder. Then after it was cut, I had to grind down the ridge on the u-channel. But it is good now.



It is starting to look like a real hammer now. However, I had to widen some holes I'd drilled because they didn't quite line up right. I probably should have done them on the mill at work with the DRO, but I didn't want to spend that much time at work.



Then I found out that the top of the H-beam spacer wasn't as much of a perpendicular cut as I thought it was. Looks like the rod tapers 1/8" towards the spacer. But the nice thing is a 1/8" spacer under the U-channel makes it parallel again. I'll just weld it in place.

Black hot is still hot.

And here they are with the cylinder, and a picture of the ram being drilled.



Oh, and the parts for the compressor arrived, and the vital part was the wrong one... :(

Well, here are the die plates



And the mounting plate for the air cylinder.

1.5" holes with a HF drill??? Wow there's hope for mine yet LOL. Or, are we talking about a 1.5" hole SAW? Otherwise, where did you find and inch and a half bit to fit in a chuck?? BTW, Really enjoying the chronology, Todd.

Hole saw. And I got it most of the way with the HF press, and then moved on to a regular electric hand drill to finish with the saw so it wouldn't mark up the table. I should be getting a few picture tonight to update with.

Well, the drilling is going well. However, the belt on my cheap HF drill press was wearing out. It was literally about half gone. And my experiences with ordering spare parts from HF meant it was probably going to be at least six weeks for a replacement. But I was able to find a replacement belt at a nearby auto parts store. Even though the staff was sure they didn't have anything that would work. Drill isn't really slipping anymore. However, I'm working my way down on hole sizes. The 1 1/2" hole is done and I'm just about through with the 9/16" holes. Then I've got 27/64 for the 1/2"-13 tapped holes. Plus whatever I need to do to drill out the corners for the ram pass-through hole. I'll be cutting it with 3" cut-off disks using a die grinder.

Amusing fact of the day. Home Despot will sell you the disks, but they don't have an arbor for it.

Also, just called and the local air tools place has 3 of the 4 parts I ordered in. They are still waiting on the 5-way valve.

Well, this weekend has been one stumbling block after another. Mainly dealing with trying to borrow a tap wrench from work big enough to tap the 1"-8 hole for the cylinder rod. Well, that is done now, and in a few minutes I'll head back out. Boy it takes a bit of effort to hand-tap a 1" hole.

I think I'm going to use the big cut-off wheels used with a die grinder to cut the pass-through for the 4" ram. The pass-through is so I can take the ram off once it is all assembled. Without it, I'd have to weld things so they wouldn't be removable. But I'll drill the corner and then use the cut-off wheels to connect them. Also, for the cylinder rod, I'm going to go with a 1 1/2" hole saw. I've been using a lot of cutting oil already on this.

The ram guide is drilled and tapped an ready to weld in place, though I'm going to wait until I can mock it up in place to make sure of the alignment.

Well, I'd better get back out and drill some more.

Thanks for the interest everbody.

I was thinking about doing the drilling and then the slabbing off, but 2 things worked against that. 1, the time to be able to use the saw came up faster than I was going to have time to do the drilling. 2, I'm going to want more than 1, or even 3 sets of dies, so I figured I would go ahead and just try and do a good job of drilling from a template. Plus the drill press I have only has about 3" of travel, which makes drilling deep holes really hard if I also want to get any precision as well.

I also appreciate the heads up about only needing 2 bolts. That will let me make sets of 45

Well, I'm still hoping to have it done by the end of this month. That was the deadline I've set myself. The pumbing has starting coming in and I hope to have it all by the end of next week. At least that was what I was quoted.

Also, for those that wanted the part number for the 5-way valve. It is a Parker brand, and the number is: B844000XXA

I really haven't gotten anything done in the last 3 days due to the heat and recovering from not being able to sleep well durring it. We have no A/C in our house.

Ok, I was able to get the 27" long chunk of H-beam cut down to 18" using the big 20" saw at work. Also cut off some from the 4" square ram. 2" of it for the air cylinder adapter and two 1/2" plate for the dies to be welded to. And the ram guide got 2" cut off of it.

However when I was welding nut onto the ram guide it finally hit me that I've been spending too much time with the welder. I didn't need to weld them on, I should have just drilled at tapped the holes. Given the size they are now, I can probably go with 9/16"-18 bolts, but given that they are $3 each from McMaster and I can get 3/8"-16 bolts for nearly free, I figured I'd order another 10" chunk of tubing for a new ram guide and do it right.

I got the H-beam spacer drilled for the 4 bolts that the ram guide will have on that face. They are 7/8" so I should have plenty of room to adjust for ram placement.

I then welded a small chunk of rod onto the H-beam and lifted into place with the engine hoist. Once in place I clamped it, but left the hoist hooked up, just in case. Then I stitch welded it in place. However I still need to work on my vertical welding, as I kept having the weld bead drop to the floor.

So I still need to get more welding done on the spacer to build up the initial weld. Also, I need to get the square cut out on the U-channel for the air cylinder mount. And I need to start working on the anvil sleeve for the anvil die plates.

More detailed information tomorrow, but I did get a fair amount of work done this weekend. All the cuts that were needed to be made were except for a square cutout on the u-channel.

When all you have is a screwdriver, all your problems look like screws. Figured out an error in my thinking.

And here are some photos.

They are called oil skimmers. There are belt styles and wheel styles. You can go to MSC Industrial Supply and type in "oil skimmer" in the keyword search box and have a bunch pop up...