HWooldridge

Here are some numbers: Radius across the face (both directions) - 24". Radii on the corners - 1/2". Radius across the peen - 12". Don't laugh at these figures - get a big compass and draw them on your work table, then lay the hammer down for reference. You will have to change your style enough so that the hammer can be used on its corners. Once you get loose with the hammer and swing from the shoulder, you'll be amazed how fast you can draw a piece of material - especially if you combine it with a similar radius on the edge of the anvil. The face of the hammer is primarily for smoothing - most of the work is done with the edges and the peen.

Most vices are closer to a square thread than an Acme (which was/is a patented form). Sometimes, they look like Acmes after many decades of use but they most likely started life as a square thread. If you have a lathe and the skill to do it, you can make a box insert to fit the screw - or make both pieces from scratch. However, you can also babbitt the box with the screw in place. A full length thread which is secured into the box so it will not pull forward under load will work just fine if kept well oiled. This is a cheap and reasonably easy fix if the thread on the screw is in good shape. I did this on a cast iron box that had completely failed. All of the interior threads had broken out over time so the screw (which was in pretty good shape) just pushed right through the box. I drilled four holes and put four machine screws into the box where they would not interfere with the vise screw but still allow the lead to form around them as anchors. I oiled and set the screw vertically in the box, dammed up the bottom with oakum, heated the box to smoking and poured in the babbitt. After cooling, it took some work to break the screw loose as the middle was more worn than the ends but patience won out in the end and the vise was eventually restored to working condition - without having to resort to any machining. A friend of mine now owns this vise and uses it regularly - the repair is about 15 years old and still holding.

I posted this on Farwest today in response to the same question: < When I make a set of swages, I clamp the two pieces of stock in a vise and drill the size I want down the middle. I then take a die grinder and generously relieve the sides so it could well be 3/4" wide for a 1/2" hole. I also usually mark a shoulder with a side set and then rough the tenon close to size before putting it in the swage. A piece of 1" square would be shouldered and roughed to 5/8 square or so by eye, then the swage applied to round up the tenon to the proper size. >> Normally, you also want a generous radius at the transition of the tenon to the parent stock. 1/4" radius is not too much - the matching mortise is also radiused with a bob punch so the shoulder of the tenon seats properly. Too square a corner will create a stress riser and potentially cause a tenon to break off. Voice of experience - I did this twice on a set of andirons before I figured out what was happening.

H13 makes an excellent hot cut. I have one forged from 3/4 round that is spread to 2" wide by 2" tall and about 3/16 thick at the shaft, tapering down to 1/32" or so. It will cut through a piece of hot 3/4 square in 3 good licks. The edge will not curl or deform if I use a soft piece of scrap aluminum or copper underneath the stock. You can also water cool H13 to keep the edge from overheating.

It's a cold spot but how to fix it could come from several solutions. Choke the inlet, increase fuel consumption, lengthen the burner tubes, etc., are all possibilities.

That almost looks like cast iron. I find it hard to believe the maker would have used that material in this application but maybe it was done to get a net shape part within a shorter cycle time. They overbuilt on the assumption it wouldn't break within reasonable limits. Somehow, your hammer developed a stress riser that propagated with time. If it is steel, it can be successfully welded as Jr described. I have welded large driveshafts that twisted in half using similar techniques and they held up.

LG style and similar hammers 25-50 lb - 1 to 2 hp 100 lb - 3 hp 250 lb - 5 to 7-1/2 hp My 100lb Beaudry has a Century 3 hp cap start and doesn't bog down at all under full load.

I built mine to the original ABANA plans that were put out 20 years ago or thereabouts. Not much adjustment, swing type 60lb head and about 24 inches clearance at rest. It hits very hard and I never make adjustments to it but instead, try to tailor the work and the tools to fit inside the sweet spot of contact. This area starts about 8 or 9 inches above its anvil. Higher than that and I have to assist with one hand to get a really hard hit but I don't have many combinations of tooling that are that tall. I'm not knocking any of the newer designs but the old ABANA plans will make a good hammer. To answer your question, steel works best in tension - not compression, so in most applications, it's always better to pull than push.

Can you vee it out and reweld it? Might save you some work until you can make a new one.

The first Conan movie with Schwarzenegger had a big wooden one with iron bands, which was used by one of the bad guys.

This anvil weighs 250 and the block of concrete weighs just a touch more - around 260. The whole mass is enough to keep from bouncing around under sledge blows.

You will want at least 12" round all the way out - 12" square is better. I have tried smaller sizes and size matters with regard to good smoke exhaust. An 8" reducer will act as a choke. HVAC contractors make flashings all the time - I'd contact someone and have them build it. You may not want them out to the shop if it's a potential permitting issue, but you should be able to give them a short section of pipe and maybe even a piece of roof. They will hand back a piece that your chimney should easily slip thru - maybe 12-1/2" ID. Of course, this will let rain inside so after your chimney is installed in the right location, go to Home Depot and get a roll of 6" flashing. Roll this around the chimney just above the manufactured flashing and fasten with pop rivets, then finish with roof tar. I did this on my corrugated tin roof and it does not leak.

Shhhhh...I've said too much already. Hee-hee-hee...:-)

Using a cup of water, cool the side that starts to thin more than the other. Work from both sides and go slowly - e.g., two full hammer licks on the drift, then flip it and do two more with the same force. Take your time - better to take a few more heats than spoil the whole job.

Your lines are getting better with time - that would be a great blade to carry into a dark alley at night.

I handled a real medieval one that was on loan from the armor museum in Vienna. It was basically an oversized framing hammer with a spike on the back instean of a split claw. Head probably weighed only 3 lbs but the handle was about 30 inches. Had two straps that went down the sides of the handle to reinforce the wood. I am 6 foot, 220 lbs but they must have had real men back in the day - I would not want to be swinging that in the summer while wearing a suit of armor. Sign me up to be an archer...

I would weld a stud to the bottom or back of the piece and then epoxy that into a hole pre-drilled in the rock. If possible, two places would be better to eliminate flexing on a single joint.

Twenty years ago, I would resharpen sweeps on occasion but have no call for it anymore. I did have one guy come in and want three lays done for a mule plowing competition. The plow work is gone.

Two 55 gal drums - laid horizontally, one on top of the other. Bottom barrel is the fire box and is piped to the top one. Top barrel has the chimney at the opposite end from the lower pipe. The heat and smoke go into the top barrel, which then radiates heat into the structure, before exiting the chimney and going outside. If you are real industrious, you can run water pipes thru the top barrel and into a radiator with a fan behind it. A copper coil would work - maybe 3/4" (19mm) pipe.

I like bois d'arc or Osage orange - partly because it's native here and partly because it is commonly used in bows and makes a really good hammer handle, it's also pretty. Fruit wood cuttings out of orchards work well also. I also have a couple of handles from Arizona ash and they work great if you don't cross the grain, otherwise they will split or break. Lots of species will work but hickory is simply a very good wood for hammer handles, which is why it is the classic choice.

IIRC, wrought iron is the most ancient and primitive ferric-based raw material and was made from iron ore that was often "black sand" or slightly larger pieces of ore. The melts were done at relatively low temps and the puddle was a mass of material that never quite fully melted like cast iron does to fill a mold. It was still a very hot mass and was worked while hot to refine then forged repeatedly if additional refinement was desired. The native carbon content was quite low and tended to be less than .15% along with some level of silica that initially existed in the melt as slag. To answer your question, I think it would be difficult to convert cast iron into wrought. Just based on carbon content alone, you'd be better off starting with mild steel.

Although I built - not bought it - I use my treadle hammer all the time and it will be one of the last tools to go if I ever decided to downsize and turn this back into a hobby. More specialized but of equal value is the "smithin magician" - it also gets a large amount of use.

Hofi answered about the hammer so I'll talk about neck pain a little. I had a non-malignant lipoma growing on my neck for several years. It got to the point where I looked like Quasimodo and couldn't button my collar to put on a dress tie so I eventually had it removed with outpatient surgery. Before all that happened, I woke up one morning with intense neck pain. It got worse as the day went by and eventually put me in bed. I had to take heavy-duty pain killers for a week before I could even sit up in a chair. The point of the story is this: The doc told me the neck and rest of the spine all develop wear patterns as a person ages. These start about age 20 or so and get progressively deeper. At the same time, your disc sacs also collapse (all this comes from Demon Gravity). This is why most folks get shorter as they age plus the spine develops more curvature. Pushing the joints out of this wear pattern often causes a great deal of pain due to pinched nerves - which is what happened to me. When you go to sleep, the joints usually try to stretch out. If they can't align while you are awake, they often cause pain. This is one reason doctors sometimes use traction for chronic neck or back pain, to pull the joints out so they can return to a natural position. Accidents and injuries (or a chiropractor doing the wrong move) can push them into the wrong place. The muscles then tighten from the pain, the nerves are pinched more, more spasms, etc. and the cycle continues - sometimes for years. If left untreated, your wear patterns become permanent and you get chronic pain. Many people are helped by gravity beds (the "batman" cages where you hang upside down for a while), stretching (highly recommended) and external heat (sauna or hot tub). I am not a pill junkie and prefer holistic methods if possible so a little bit of all of these treatments has completely eliminated my pain. Maybe some combination could work for you without causing other problems.

WD40 - that's what it is made for...

You know, Ed, that Mother's Wax is probably a really good kink to protecting any type of ironwork, even things other than knives. I'd be tempted to use it on food products like BBQ forks and ladles - especially on the handles, then oil the lower contact portions with canola oil.