peacock

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You would have to harden it before you can temper it. I fit them hot and use them as forged.

I once found a set of pickup tongs forged and given to me by Cliffton Ralph in the bottom of my 55 gallon slack tub. I had a friend here and he was using them, and when he left I could not find the tongs. I thought he took them but could not believe he would do that. It took a year to find them. I sure was glad I had not said anything to him. Also glad to have the tongs back. Lesson learned dump the tub every once in a while.

When we installed Tom Clarks 250 it wound up being easier to pour a base outside the shop door install the hammer there and build a roof over it. These kind of issues are why big hammers sometimes sell for less money than smaller ones. I know of a guy that bought a 300# Chambersbrug and didn't have enough electrial service to run it very disappointing. It's kind of like pipe diameter, double the sze quardruple the cost.

You will better off if you sell your tie plates and any thing else you can do with out for scrap and spend the money on some solid round and sqyare stock as long as the pipe you are useing for the anvil and stuff it in the pipe end wwys then weld it all together as solid as you can. Even rebar stuffed in there and welded will wotk.

How long has the 10 ft. of fill been in place? If it is fairly recent you may want to rethink this. You could make a temp. base out of timber. A 250 is heavy and much taller than the base is wide . If it would settle straight down not so bad but if it starts leaning could be serious.

LG #2236 is back in the owners shop. He will send pics when he has it complete.

Trotter and pacers are ask to make speed at a gait that is not there choice for speed. A gallop would be used in nature. A good blacksmith and trainer could get together and change the way a horse foot traveled by chanding the type of shoe, the angle of the foot front to back or side to side. The blacksmith would put creases, heal calks. toe grabs, toe weights. side weights 1/2 round 1/2 swedges, trailers, square toes, diamond toes, well the list could go on and on. All this is an attempt to either stop a horses feet from hitting themselves or otherwise increase there speed. Different tracks sometimes required different shoes. I am sure Frank, Eric, and others could write volumes about the different things they have seen and/or done. I will be at a blacksmith meeting (BAM) for the next couple of days so I will leave you all to kick this to the curb. PS I know I have left some of you horsey type blacksmiths off the list but I'm not sure it is OK to give up your names. I don't want to step on your toes as you get enough of that allready.

Those strange curly things are believe it or not horse hoof walls. Think finger nails on a human. It's where the nails are driven thru to hold the shoe on. Most likely a horse died and as it decomposed the walls come off the bone. Just a conversation piece. As they dry out they curl up like that

Well my grandfather was not a Blacksmith, But my my wife'sBlacksmith is a Grandfather. I have shod horses, I do make shoes for farriers to put on horses, I have even made RR spikes. What I like best is forging Little Giant power hammer parts. I doubt if many people would call that blacksmithing but I do. The question I like best at demos is "have you ever got burned", My responce is "yes but I'm over her now"

I did notice 1 huge problem with the 200. It's not setting in my shop. You need to work on that John. I could be persuaded to be your midwest demo site. You know they could compare with Lillle giants, Bradleys, SayHa, and Iron Kiss at one location.

When I build a new spring tool the first thing I do is forge what I call a master I forge a piece of stock without turning it. take it out trim the flash reheat and reforge again with out turning. These are stored so when the spring breaks or gets out of aliginment I can put the master between the dies clamp in a vise while I weld it this give perfect line up very quickly amd easily. You can also use the master to produce another die set without haveing to grind relief as the master has coiped that from the first one. If the spring breaks striaght across I line the ends up but I weld down the center of the spring lengthways with a bead 3 times the width of the stock then another bead on each side of the first 2 x the width then one more bead on each side of the second this time 1x width this makes a diamond shaped patch without stress lines running across the spring. Also when forging a item that will be round If possible I like to start with square stock on the diamond (corner up and down) turn 90% from diamond to diamond till it rounds up. By hitting the corners the steel only has to moveabout 45% instead of being extruded out the ends. This makes for lots fewer blows which means less stress on the die, quicker forging, and less breakage and wear.

The mainshaft on a 25# Little Giant is 1 5/8 and on a 50# 2 inch. I have made several of each.

Stewarts method is the very best for long runs no question about it. If you can afford the steel and can machine it yourself there is no better way to go, if you only have one hammer and only need a few parts you may spend most of your time changing and setting dies.

You will all ways wonder untill you try it. The simplest way that I have found to deal with that issue is the grind or machine a nice radius on top of the top die the upper die, hitting on a round surface will take most of the flexing out of the spring. Normalizing after welding on the handle will help alot. If you must fix this completely then build a die set with a base plate with guide pins, springs and bushed holes in a top plate and mount the dies one to the top one to the bottom exactly like you would make for punch press or close die forming. You will most likely need to remove the bottom die completly and build a male dove tail directly on the base plate to have enough room for all of this. It does work I have done it. It's cheaper and much eaiser to use a spring die. If you will rough out the stock on open dies first so the spring die don't have to move a large volume of material they will last longer.

Yes, use a butcher or something of that type to set the shoulder then draw down. Now remember when you wanted to upset bars? Use the lesson learned on that here. Make a monkey tool for your 6x air riveter and square up the shoulder. Let the mass of the bar become is't own anvil as Bigfoot just stated.

Haveing just retired after 15 years teaching welding in a prison I can tell you the greatest reward does not come from the student that progres easily. The student that struggles but stays with it and finally succceds Is by far some of my best memories. He has learned not only how to weld but how to solve problems, deal with dissapointment and think for himself, sometimes withsome guidence from others. These skills are the ones that will carry him thru the hard times he will face in the future. When I started teaching I tried to teach "think outside the box". Now it's more like don't build the box in the first place. If we can have patience with the serious seekers, share what we want to, incourage them along the way the craft will thrive and never die. My goal is for my students to be much better than I ever was. In 15 years I had over 1,300 students I learned something from every one of them. Who do think learned the most in my class?

You can get BAM coal from Bob Maes millerville mo. Go to bamsite.org click on Jan Feb news letter go to page 26. You may want to think about joining BAM

Depending on the size of stock, I would be more worried about getting my body parts hurt, they are not replaceable. My rule of thumb is this, if I can put it in a vise and bend it easily by hand then it shoudn't hurt me too bad if it kicks as long as I can hang on to it. If it jerks it out of my grip all bets are off. Please be careful.

I guess the part that bothers me most is the lack of commitment. Almost everything I know I have learned from others. I for sure get more from this forum than I give. If I feel I can give a correct answer I'll be glad to post. Most times someone else is faster in posting and that saves me from typing it out. Sometimes I will post and get a phone call wanting more info.that is fine. Often I have invited that call. Now comes the rub. when people are really after me I will often invite them to my shop so we can have some hands on time. I have a well equiped shop with several power hammers to use as well as other equipment. I know travel time is hard to come by, but if you really want to know find someone willing to help and go. When I wanted to learn about power hammers I spent hours and lots of money going across states to get a chance to work with people, some of you are on the list also. Then I spent more money on speeding tickets hurrying home to put what I learned to pratice before I forgot. My point is If you really want to know you must make an investment, a sacrifice of yourself. When people see you are serious they will bend over backwards to help. I am nothing more than a compulation of all the people who have taken the time to help me and I think the payment that is due is to continue passing along that info and give credit to the people who gave it to me. Thousand of typed words and hours of free minutes on the phone will never replace a day or 2 building a relationship with someone who knows what you want to know.

I just regrind a round center punch to pyramid type point.

square center punch marks put in cold then enlarged at low red heat. The square marks show much better than round. On some of my punches I make a small point to feel the center punch mark. Got the idea from iron worker punches.

Hard maple is the wood of choice for helves. My 40# bradley has a 7x6 inch maple helve thats is about 7 feet long. I have tried other wood with no success. Of course it needs to be free of knots and other defects and glued up from 2 or 3 pieces to be the best. The 125# Bradley is about 4x5x 40 and is one piece (not glue up) it is factory part may be 80 years old still great. Oak and osage orange were really bad didn't last long at al. Don't waste your time and money with anything other than hard maple.

Sorry about your misfortune. Seems like things really come out nice when you put you blood and sweat into them. Love to see the whole cooker

Patricks method works great I have done it that is what Clifton show me. Again on an air hammer you must make up the space of the missing bottom die. I think your top die dovetail is different and I don't think this will work easily for that one. I have made dovetails no taller than the sow block then drilled and counter bore from the bottom so the top part of the die could be bolted to the dove tail.