Farmweld

The local gas supplier here said to remove valve, flush with nitrogen, then cut. I had a couple that had the valves out for months before I got around to cutting them up and had no problems, though there was still a faint smell from the aromatic they use in the gas here. Filling with water should work OK. The tank walls in Australia are around 4 - 5mm thick and chewed up a few cutting blades in a 5" angle grinder getting around them. Watch out for the double layer where the ends of the tank are welded in or you may end up cutting double. I used one to make a wood heater, cut the bottom off at the weld ring, welded a grate in the tube, cut a door in the side and hinged it, cut a hole in the top for a 5" flange and flue pipe, three scrolled legs out of 50 x 10 and a shelf to sit the bottom on to catch the ash. Works a treat once you get it red hot and burn all the galv off. It got named "Mr Squiggle" after a piece of 1" hex sharpened to a point was welded on the door, a friend said it looked just like his rocket so I had to! Regards Andrew

Thanks for all the replies so far, they have given me some ideas. I should have made the tread height thing clearer, the range is about 20mm but the variance between adjacent steps doesn't seem to be more than about 5mm (eg 175, 180, 185, 180, 185, 190, 185 etc), but when combined with a variable radius curve in the side of the stairs makes for interesting times. I didn't make the stairs so legality of them is not my problem, making the balustrade legal and to fit is. As all the granite has been laid already I can't use any tools inside to cut/shut/bend a template up so I'm snookered using metal. Cutting/screwing and glueing wood may be an option but I'm going to end up with two templates 4.5m tall x 4m long x 3m wide (15' x 12' x 10') with a 90 degree bend about the 3m level and weird curves at each end to transport home. The reason I asked about the Arteferro system was it seems to be a bit like the old Mechano set, lots of short lengths that can be screwed together that have ruler and protractor markings on them. Assemble it on the stairs, note all the dimensions, dissassemble and recreate in the workshop. Just wondered if anyone had used it and what the availability is in the US. I'm probably going to have to hang the balustrade off some hefty posts each end and pick up on every fourth step or so to stop it sagging. The client is still trying to decide between wooden and steel handrail and what sort of posts he wants (trying to talk him out of turned ones as they will make fitting difficult). Fitting the whole lot, about 20m total, is going to be a pain as it will be a one shot fit. I've got to make sure everything is as perfect as I can get it because once we've got it in position its staying there, no chance to remove - modify - refit and any mods will have to be done by the chippy who will be fitting the posts. I'm thinking I may have to do this one on a time basis instead of a quote for the job as there are so many variables involved. Other interesting bits - he's a concreting contractor who is prepared to pay cash if I "look after him", I think I will go the contract route and cover my bum anyway though the thought of cash is tempting. I get to meet the chippy on Monday so I may have some more ideas then. Regards Andrew

Thanks for any answers in advance. I've been asked to do a job that involves building a handrail for a set of stairs. Simple enough, but where it gets tricky is there are multiple different radius curves in the staircase, so its not exactly a spiral, and the builders/granite layers have cocked up the treads by making them the same depth, but the heights vary over a 20mm range. Of course the granite has already been laid, and its imported so it can't be damaged, so I can't fab up something onsite and bring it home, and the owner wants it done ASAP so he can move into his house, so I need some way of measuring the different angles and heights such that I can recreate a template in the workshop to work to. I've looked at the Arteferro stair measuring system in their books and it seems to be what I need but I don't know of anyone who has it or has used it. Can anyone offer any opinions? Also does anyone know how much this system costs in the USA as I can't seem to get a price in Australia. Regards Andrew

Who's going to be the "long haired friends of Jesus in a (mumble mumble) microvan"? Milat used to have a happy hunting ground in Bellanglo (sp) State Forest. Isn't it funny how our serial killers are well known but the people who do good for untold numbers of others are incredibly less celebrated, unless they have been dead for a long time and the Catholic church decides to recognise them. Typed from an Australian State that has both, bodies in barrels and Saint Mary MacKillop. Andrew

Hi Hans, If you're looking for a bigger hammer I've got a 160# Hercules that was recently rebuilt and is looking for a new home. I'm storing it for a bloke and he wants to sell it so if you are interested let me know. andrew at farmweld dot com dot au Don't know what freight from SA to FNQ would be like though. Andrew

Hi Al, I've just been through the interesting exercise of installing a 2CWT clearspace Massey so I'll try and answer as many of your questions as I can. 1. I lifted mine 100mm (4") by pouring the footing that much higher than floor level. I wouldn't recommend spacing the hammer up with wood as this will throw all your footing calculations out by the same amount and if the wood compacts at all you will have to keep tightening up the hold down nuts. If you ever remove the spacers then you immediately loose the same amount of stroke and the hammer will probably bind on the anvil before it is fully down. 2. You're going to need something under the anvil to protect the concrete. The old manual recommends hardwood boards but they will compact/disintegrate over time needing replacement. Mining conveyor belt is a fairly good substitute if you can get some about 1" thick. The hammer can be bolted down onto 1" thick boards (as per install instructions) as it is not subject to the same loads as the anvil is. Mine's on 19mm Formply which seems to be hanging in there with no problems so far. 3. See above. 4. Yes there is a standard target height for the anvil, unfortunately I don't have any specs for the 3CWT so you will have to get them from John N. There are witness marks on the shaft to indicate the lowest the ram can go and going lower will probably start getting very expensive. The target height for the anvil lets you swap tooling around without getting too close to the witness marks. 5. I went with 42 MPA. Don't know what this equates too in the UK but our base grade is 25 MPA and the 42 is a fair bit harder than that. The concreters enjoyed working with it a lot more than the base stuff as well. It gets bloody hot when it is going off as well. 6. It doesn't hurt having more mass under the hammer. I went 20-25% bigger purely because the blokes diging the hole got a bit too enthusiastic and it worked out well with very little vibration transmitting through the floor to even a metre or so away. There's about 50-60m of various different size rebar rod in there as well. The main thing is to have your hold down bolt setup sorted out really well before you even think about pouring concrete. The install manual shows "T" headed bolts that you can remove if needed. I welded mine solid onto the reo with multiple passes and I hope I never have one break. 7. Rotating the ram is easy as long as the hammer isn't mounted yet. Undo the nuts on the stuffing box (taking care to support everything so it doesn't all drop out on the ground), drop the stuffing box down and rotate away. There are witness marks to show you which way to turn things so you don't line one of the ring gaps up with an air port. If the hammer is mounted you have to lift it off, pull the anvil and turn it, turn the ram, and then re-mount the hammer (finding you've gone 45 degrees either way and the dies are now at 90 degrees to each other, redo until correct alignment is achieved). 8. There is a set size for the anvil former which you will need to get from John N. It's roughly an inch bigger all the way around. Two other things: a) A quick hint, when the anvil is in position in the footing wedge the bugger in TIGHT. Once the hammer is mounted align the dies, tighten the bolts, and then wedge the anvil in the hammer as well. I had the anvil move just a mm or so with each stroke and it was an almighty pain trying to do fine work, re-wedged it all tight and now it is easy to work with B) A word of warning: when pouring the footing make sure the anvil former is really anchored securely as it is amazing the amount of "lift" concrete has got. Mine had three acroprops up to the rafters and it still lifted 10-12mm. Get professional concreters to do the footing because if it stuffs up, they have to dig it out and redo it. If you stuff it up you have to pay for professionals to dig about four cubic metres of concrete out and then start again from scratch. I know which I'd prefer. 9. I just used two slings, one between the ram and main column, the other ran down the back and around the main drive shaft and back up. With a bit of adjustment the hammer lifted quite level. The other way I have seen was with a forklift, big block of wood between the ram and column and a bar across the forks with a tagalong down to the drive shaft. I took about a day to make up the reo "cage" to go in the footing, mainly because I welded the hold down bolts in and I rechecked everything after each pass to make sure nothing had wandered from where it was meant to be. I then had to make a frame to hold the cage and anvil former in alignment when the concrete was being poured. The concrete guy was paranoid about the former lifting, hence the three acroprops, and he was right to be paranoid as it did still lift a bit. He also used a vibrator on the concrete and it was amazing the amount of air that came out (another hint, drill three or four 1/4" air holes in the bottom of the anvil former as it will collect bubbles. I had to fill them with bog to get a flat surface for the anvil mat to sit on.) After all this it then took me about three goes mounting and remounting the hammer to get everything set up and wedged in properly. Definitely worth taking your time and doing it all properly though as the end result is fun to play with. Hope some of this helps Andrew

I've used chem-set anchors for a few things and they seem to work fairly well. Andrew

Thanks again for the replies. I've had a fair bit of experience with getting the pipe and RHS gates we make powdercoated. Found a good one eventually who will sandblast, then prime, then colour coat. Plenty around who will just slop the colour straight onto the gal pipe and pray that it sticks (it doesn't). We've only had two jobs hot dipped by one place so not as much experience there (not the greatest job either, drips, buildup, and a couple of dings) and I want to try some of the other places which have been recommended by my poowdercoater. He uses the Interpon powders as well. I've also had trouble with some cast jointed gates that we make cracking joints in the oven, could have been a bad batch of castings as it's only happened three times now (could have been some dodgy welding as well). All I know is it stinks and makes a hell of a mess fixing them up so they can go back for re-coating. Thanks also for the tip about the gilders paste, might have to try that on some highlights next time I get a fancy job. Andrew

Thanks for all of the replies. There are two main hot-dip places locally and I am going to have to do some research as to their "performance". I've heard there was also a metal spraying place set up for a lot of the stuff that goes up to the mines so even more research. Still waiting to hear back from the customer but it's always good to learn something new from others. Thankyou very much. Andrew

@mudbugone what you have done is a gross breach of copyright. I have copyright on a gate design in Australia and it has been copied by several other companies in Australia, which I am not particularly pleased about becasue them marketing my design costs me money! Just check out some of the legislation the American movie and music industry is forcing through your legislature to see how seriously they treat this. Andrew

OzMatt, this one is through a builder and its a bit of a pain because they haven't come up with a design/drawings of what they want, but they want an "estimate" of what it could cost and how long it will take! It's become a take a rough look at the list of things they want, pluck a number out of the air, add my mobile phone number, times it by the date, deduct grandmothers birthday, and add the dogs age as a percentage of the total exercise. Double pain because of the size/cost of the job, it will have to be made up in sections and either welded together onsite (which I don't want to do as the whole lot is being epoxied into the marble) or I have to make concealed latching that will lock up once it is epoxied in. Astro_Al, thanks for the heads up about the metal spraying. I haven't had a chance to chase it up but I've heard there is someone local who does it, just need to find out the cost. John B, thanks for your words. Yes it is one of those make or break jobs and it is rapidly turning into a headache. We would love to have a go because of the size and potential profit, but it is going to tie the workshop up for at least six months and possibly a lot more, and we may have to employ another person to keep the regular work going during that time. We just have to sit down and do the sums and decide whether we want to go for it or not, and then the customer has to decide if he wants to pay that much, and then we have to hammer out a contract re supply and payments. Just to top it all off we had another builder ring us yeaterday with a similar, but considerably smaller, job yeaterday. Andrew

I was just wondering if it would be worth starting a new forum topic along the line of "Finishes" for both small and large items. The reason I asked was because I have just been asked to quote on a pretty big job involving a spiral staircase, 2 x curved staircases, about 50m of balustrade and handrails, about 30m of front fence, a couple of balconies, and lots of gates 2.4m tall or taller and varying in length from 1.2 to 6m. Some are internal and will have to be carried into the building for installation in pieces, others external and will need protection from the weather. I was wondering what others on this forum would use in these situations and a search only throws up mainly knife smithing or small item finishes. I need some advice on big stuff. The outside stuff we are looking at either hot dip galv. (which will bugger up any fine detail work) or zinc plating, any advice on either? The inside stuff which will have to be carried in will need some finishing and/or touching up once it is installed, any advice on which types of paint/powdercoat/crayon/mud to use would be greatly appreciated. I don't like having to sit down and quote out these big jobs because there are so many variables involved and the finish that I need to steer the customer towards to make my life easier is just one of them. Andrew

Hi all, Had my first chance to fire up the forge in a while and needed to get some table leg ends scrolled in some 1" round stock. Four hours from carry in the material to shut the forge off, started at 0630 and it was starting to get pretty warm by 1100 when I vacated the workshop. Now all I have to do is put the rest of the bends and curves in them and then weld everything together so the carpenter can screw the redgum tops on them. Andrew Farmweld

Hi Trevor, Just a quick correction, they were named after James Stobie and are quite interesting if you look at the Wiki article. The posts themselves are made of "H" iron bolted together with the gap between filled with concrete. They're renown for their ability to cut a car in two whilst still keeping all the wires up in the air. The original Adelaide to Alice Springs telegraph wires were strung from RR track and I think the original line across the Nullabor was as well. Termites used to build tunnels 20' up the side of the pole to get to the Jarrah timber at the top. Andrew

Thats interesting, at the last ABASA meeting we were trying to work out a way of ordering and transporting 10 tons of coke from one state to another in a truck, and getting it dumped in my front paddock for bagging off into 600kg bulka bags and 30kg bags for the hobbysmiths. Are we talking about the same stuff?

Quick question for Australian blacksmiths. I've been offered a 160lb Hercules which after a quick look seems to be in good condition. I haven't seen it running but after a three minute inspection it is definitely in good order and looks to have been overhauled before being put in storage. Everything is very clean, no scale or grease/crud buildup, and all the bolts/nuts/splitpins look brand new. It looks self contained with a three phase motor driving a belt setup to power it. My question is, how much do I offer the vendor considering I don't actually need another big hammer, but I don't want to see it scrapped, and would probably want to move it on fairly shortly? It is local (South Australia) so moving it will only be a matter of loading it on my trailer. Any ideas or offers would be greatly appreciated. Andrew Hood Farmweld PS: I'll try attaching a picture but it hasn't worked the last couple of times I've tried.

Thanks John N and forgemaster, I decided to try a couple of strips of 25mm cotton webbing folded in half so that it looked similar to the original asbestos tape, assembled the whole thing, and it worked! Probably won't last that long but it got me going and able to do some forging, and I got to play pulling my toys to bits and putting them back together again. Somewhere in the middle of doing the above I was running the hammer without the ram in it to see if the oil pump was working properly. There was a bit of a click noise and the air noise in the ram chamber changed. After assembly the high pressure hold up worked fine and has continued to do so, so I think one of the valves must have been a bit sticky and isn't any more. As I said in a post above I checked the shim blocks in the stuffing box against the figures in the book (4 thou) and couldn't get a 2 thou feeler to slide in either side so I figure they must be pretty close to factory spec. This hammer really hasn't done much work at all and the bottom ram piston ring is still only in contact with the cylinder wall for half its width, still not completely bedded in! I got a heap of paperwork with the hammer including manual and leaflets about mounting and maitenance, and some correspondence from Davy-Loewy Ltd. Press Division dated 23rd December, 1981 to the then owner of the hammer, a Mr J. W. Vivian (since deceased) about the same. It was signed by a S. Hampson. Interesting to read through the old manuals and pamphlets and to note the difference in language and grammar to what is used today. Now all I've got to do is get the rest of the shed built and make it into a workshop (I'll see if I can attach a picture of what I looks like at the moment) With it being open like it is it's bloody difficult to work when the temp is over 30C and I can't fire up the forge on total fire ban days, which leaves me with nights and about two days a week.

I've been busy, first I had to get the forklift going again (only bought it three weeks ago, partially because I didn't want to have to hire one to put the hammer in, Hyster 3.5T with a Continental flathead six in it, learning curve there as well) which turned out to be the points having too big a gap, so that runs properly now. Then I lifted the hammer off and re-wedged the anvil so that shouldn't rock any more. Then it was out with the gantry and block and tackle to drop the ram guide off, but it ended up being easier to pull the whole piston, ram and guide in one piece and then split them on the workshop floor. Checked the ram/guide clearances before I split everything and they seem to be good so that is a plus, then dropped the guide off and "what stuffing box seal"?, I think I pulled about one 6" section out that was complete and a couple of other small bits and that was it. No wonder it didn't lift on the low pressure hold up. Forgemaster, or for that matter anyone else, could you please post details of any suitable packing I can try to buy from suppliers here in Adelaide? And you are also right about the piston clearing the bottom ports when fully down as looking up the cylinder from underneath and eyeball measurement it looks like that is the case, possibly some sort of safety measure to stop the piston punching out the guide if there was too much clearance. If you're over this way give me a call and drop in for a look, info is on the website in my profile. Thanks Andrew

Thanks for the replies so far. JNewman - neither low nor high pressure hold up is working. Before it was decommissioned the low pressure hold up didn't work because of the stuffing box packing (or lack thereof) but now the high pressure hold up is not working either. The rotating block on the treadle was quite handy for stopping the hammer tupping on the anvil! I'll look at getting the stuffing box packing done first and then move on to more "complicated" fixes. forgemaster - The hammer was stored under cover with the ram extended as it was only going to be for a short while but (as always) the time got extended, and extended. The amount of oil that was coating the ram shaft was quite sufficient to stop any rust, and I was checking it every week for the same. I wondered if there might be some sort of ring compression problem on the piston rings with them sitting at the very bottom of the stroke for so long but that doesn't seem to be the problem. Interesting observation - with the ram fully extended you can turn the flywheel over with no compression at all, it just wheezes away to itself . move the ram up a bit and all of a sudden the compression kicks in and you haven't got a hope of turning it over. No wonder it needs a 15HP motor to get it going!

Hi all, attached is a picture (hopefully) of the toy I bought myself six or so months ago. I've finally got it mounted on the foundation on Christmas eve and managed to hotwire some three phase to it this afternoon and got it running. xxxx it was good to hear after just watching online videos for so long. Couple of problems though, after sitting for so long it doesn't seem to want to lift the hammer when hold up is selected. This machine needs the stuffing box packing replaced anyway as it never used to pick the piston up in neutral and leaked like blazes in hold up, but I could only get it to pick the piston up once. Not sure if this is a packing/seal or piston ring problem or whether there may have been some gunge accumulation/disturbance during moving/storage which has clagged up something in the valve train, any suggestions? Second problem is the dies, or the wedges that hold the dies, are that tightly wedged in that I can't move them at all to adjust the dies. Might not be a problem as I have to pull it off the anvil to re-wedge the anvil which moved after the first couple of heavy blows and if I pack it into the right position I can adjust the hammer to sit over it square, but I was thinking I might want to try some different die combinations in the future. Any suggestions gratefully accepted Andrew PS: tried several times to attach picture but it doesn't want to know about it

"Their logic is that having three sets of addresses makes it much less likely that the shipping elves will loose the address and increase the likelihood of the package being delivered. " Interesting name, Shipping Elves, I tend to call them Freight Monkeys, dunno why, but having seen what an oragutan can do to a tyre, and the similarity of that to some of my packages that have been returned the penny may be dropping slowly.

Just wanted to put some pictures up of the foundation for my Massey 2CWT looked like while it was being poured The first is the hole with reo and anvil box in place. Second shows where the shed is going and all the props used to hold the formwork down. Third is starting the pour, an extra prop was added to hold the anvil box down. Fourth is finished pouring ready to screed off. There ended up being four cubic metres of concrete going into the hole, I think the boys got a bit enthusiastic jackhammering out the hole and it got away from them a bit. Fifth is the dog helping clean up the bracing for the formwork. He keeps nicking bits of wood and burying them in the garden. Tomorrow the rest of the retaining wall is being done as well as some plinths for the gantry. Andrew

Hammer control gets different when you do something stupid like I did years ago. Took the middle finger off my right hand with a circular saw attached to the back of a tractor. I also managed to cut all the tendons and halfway through the bone in my index finger. End result after half a dozen operations is that my middle finger is now missing all the way back to my wrist and my index finger tip is locked at a 45 degree angle, the middle joint is locked straight, and it bends at the knuckle (makes shooting interesting too!) The only real grip I have is with ring finger and pinkie, with index supplying some support. I have real trouble with the hammer "twisting" as I strike a blow and I get tendonitis very quickly if I work with too heavy a hammer for too long. Might have to try the thumb on top technique to see if that will work for me

As a hobbyist you are producing what are effectively "one of" art pieces (which usually means you can charge eye watering expensive prices because thats what they are). Try producing the same thing in any sort of number and you run into all of the pricing problems listed above. If you come up with a really good design and don't patent it someone will copy it and kill your market with cheap copy's (and a patent don't mean anything). Welcome to the world of supply and demand, you are happy to sell your product at a low price because to you it doesn't "cost" anything. An art dealer could probably sell it for your price to the power of ten. As someone said above, charge your maximum price, you can always come down, but never ever undersell your work because the complaints come thick and fast if you put your prices up.

Here in South Australia all plastic shopping bags have been banned, they can sell bio-degradeable ones for about ten-fifteen cents each if you don't have a bag on you, and they sell re-usable cloth onbes for a dollar or so. I've got a bloody great collection of bags at home and in the boot of the car because I keep forgetting to take them into the shop with me. I suppose the memory will start working eventually! Andrew PS: We also get ten cents return on all drink containers so every twentieth carton of beer is a free one!