Dan P.

a photo from beneath of the three cradles for the two springs and helve. The helve moves independently from the springs, the springs do not move independently of each other.

another exciting photo, showing basically the same thing;

The thin round bar on the right of the photo above is what connects the action of the fork to the pedal/bar, the ligature of which is seen in the wildly interesting photo below;

Another view;

The twiddler for adjusting the space between dies which is part of the pole which makes the hammer go up and down. You can also see the the bar that makes the fork go back and forth, with square bronze (brass?) bushings (?).

From the back

The bar, the spring that keeps it in idle position, the little pivot doo-dah can be seen just below the motor pulley.The belt is on the idle wheel, the funny little metal fork pulls the belt over onto the drive wheel.

The mechanism works basically like this; the belt goes from the motor to an idler wheel, the same dimensions as the drive wheel. When you push the pedal (or whatever you call it) down with your foot, it is attached to a long bar, which pivots upward at the other end. This in turn... actually, I will post some pictures of the goings-on instead, as I don't know the names of half the little doo-dahs involved; Ready and waiting for sparky to wire her up;

Excellent idea!

I think most power hammer anvils are made from cast iron, which is pretty "dead". I imagine concrete would do just as well, If you are going to fill a barrel with it. If you look at Japanese power hammers, they often seem to have a sow block set in concrete. -Dan

This hammer didn't come with metal links, and the ram has no capacity to be attached to metal links. However, your question about tensioning the spring is a good one, and one I don't have the answer to.

This morning I have a question. I have attached some photos of the coil springs. They were originally tightened so that the horizontal bars held the helve tight. In the pictures the helve is loose. The springs, one above and one below, are each about 67mm in length. The gap that needs to be closed is abut 28 mm. That means that the springs need to be compressed by about 14 mm each, which is about 20%. That seems like a lot, given that that is their non-working percentage of compression. I understand that a balance needs to be struck between the give of the coil springs (generous) and the give of the leaf springs (very stiff). But the main motivation for my question is that, while I don't know very much about springs, I know that they break, and that these ones are aimed directly at my guts and attached dangly bits. Is 20% overtight for a spring? Will an undertight spring be more or less likely to break? I plan to wrap them in leather, but their vertical orientation might prove problematic as the leather wears, sags, etc. Can anyone think of a more suitable sheathing? Rubber?

God Bless you Bentiron, but my hair isn't even particularly wavy, I just happened to have married a woman whose hair-cutting technique has yet to realize its full potential (and I consider men paying for haircuts a true sign of a degenerate society, but I digress). Owen, I thought the same thing about the rings and upsetting on the lower die, but you are looking at some pretty small rings and pretty short bars. It think it is a nod to those functions, in a "selling point" sort of way, while not actually being convincing in either. The dies do indeed go together. This hammer, which was, I believe, manufactured in the 80s, came with a selection of dies, none of which really "match". I will take photos and post them later, along with photos of the mechanism. There is another lower die which, to my eyes, would appear to be the worst possible design in the world, it's a sort of table top. Anyway, you will see it in the photos. -Dan

I took this picture for scale, though it makes the hammer look smaller than it looks in the flesh. The dashing blade in the photo is me. Please do not ask me about my haircut;

The upper and lower dies. I have failed to make sense of the lower "die", save to suppose that it was designed by someone without very much common sense.The hammer head (ram) is made from a cast material, I hope ductile rather than straight cast iron. The lower die I believe is ductile, the upper die is steel. The anvil is cast iron.

Some pics of my helve hammer. It is a "Durabo", made by Perrin & Fils somewhere in France, I forget where exactly. Weight of the actual head is about 20kg. I presume the name Durabo is a (dreadful) pun on "dur et beau" meaning "hard and handsome". Ahem, moving swiftly on;

Thanks for the replies, gents. Owen, I don't plan to be in London anytime soon, but just in case, what size/s are you getting in? Sam, this is power hammer project B. It will be some time before this hammer sees any action. I will be starting a thread about power hammer project A shortly. The helve hammer you spied earlier in this thread. Peacock, I spent a good deal of time scratching my head over a means to tighten the strapping without redoing it entirely, your solution is an excellent one, thank you. -Dan

Strange goings on in the lower die, which was held in place by an oblong pin;

I put a new strap on. It seemed tight enough, but the weight of the ram still makes it sag. I feel that this will be bad for the spring. Your thoughts?

Those hammers are still available (not usually in such graceful form) from farriers' supply companies, listed as clipping hammers. Lately there has been a trend to make a clipping hammer with a small pointy pein, but I, personally, cannot see how that aids drawing a clip, but think that it would rather make it more difficult. They are similar to the Hofi hammer in that the do not have a lot of weight on either side of the eye. They are usually supplied with a very long handle that farriers seem to favour. I personally do not like a hammer with that short a distance between eye and working face.

That clutch system is/was quite common on continental European belt driven machines.

I'd take that with a stone-age sized pinch of salt.

Chain makers used olivers, presumably from quite a long time ago.

Very cool, thanks for sharing. I hope the welds on the rebar ligatures are kosher, that is the one thing I would re-do, an easy forging.

I third the above posts. Owen, have you ever bought or had made dies in the UK? I've been fishing around for something that might fit. I've been speaking to the people at Little Giant, and am hoping that an LG die might do the trick. Obviously the shipping will be murder, and the import duties, but even then it will probably work out cheaper than Vaughns or Angele.