eseemann

Good morning folks, Last night I cut up my chunk of forklift fork and now I am working on pattern ideas. The first question is if the bottom bend of the fork should be down as a foot or up as a work surface. From what I have seen my first guess is down since having the foot up will only give me 1 1/2" of mass under the hammer. If I go foot down I will have two 1 1/2" by 4 3/4" rectangles to work with. Any thoughts?

Wroughtnharv, You might check for forklift forks. I took one of Thomas Powers' suggestions and went to a few local forklift rental places and was able to score 2 1/2 forks for a total of around 350#. People that fix forklifts need to know that you are not going to re-install a scrap fork on a forklift. Visit the places and make sure you let them know any old steel will be cut up and you are not going to put them up for sale.

Smoggy, I may very well be mixing things up. The lines show where the hook was welded on to the fork. I will need to take a better look at it tonight. Thanks for the feedback.

Good Morning all, I found this to be interesting so I thought I would share. I am working on turning a chunk of 4 1/2" by 1 1/2" class II "hook type" forklift tine in to a post anvil. The weld that was used to hold the top mounting hook on the tine looks to be about 1/5" to 5/16" penetration on all sides except the part for the pin that held the fork in place. I can tell you that this weld did not give up without a fight!

That reminded me of this video I saw with 4 guys in Mexico, 1 guy holding and the other 3 with 6-8 lbs sledge hammers going to town on some kind metal like a well oiled machine. It was like watching 1 guy w/ 6 arms the way the 3 guys knew when each man would strike. I don't know what they were working but at the end of the day it knew it had been worked!

Anvilfire is Jock's stuff and no one likes people to mess with their stuff.

That is what happens to your wife's hardwood chair from the breakfast nook when you forget to take in from the back porch and it rains. The oak slats start to separate. This caused de-lamination of you and your wife's good graces. The two start to separate in her mind and you need to act VERY fast to re-glue your self in to her good graces. You see it mostly on plywood outside.

Pulse, Now I will start by saying my 13 year old is already better with Physics than I am so I will be pulling her in on this (my girl is SMART!!!). I have seen Thomas Powers tell people they are better off arranging plates for a stake or striker anvil in a vertical orientation over a horizontal orientation and because he is Thomas Powers I am inclined to see him as a subject matter expert. I have wondered why this is and my best guess would be that if you are welding 4 inch wide plate it is likely you will end up with less than 2 inches of weld penetration on each side leaving an air gap between the horizontal plates. I know (at least I think I know) that air is used to insulate sound and sound is (at least I think it is) kinetic energy just like a hammer blow it stands to reason that some of the force would be lost going from plate to air gap to plate. Please let me know if I am on track or not. I liked this post, very well thought out. Link to anvilfire image removed at the request of Jock Dempsey

Wroughtnharv, was someone selling a used hammer or making them to order. Can you tell me what your motor's RPM is, the ram weight is and your large/small pulley sizes are. The photo with the hammer with the farm in the background looks like something in a magazine. Look forward to seeing it work.

Will do/ Cool!

Frosty. As always I am happy to get information from you. The thickest part of the forks are 2" on the shorter end and 1 3/4 down to a bit less than 1/4" at the end of the taper. My saw has a speed control and I will take your advice. thanks

Brianc, Thanks for the information, I will give it a try. The band saw is a good nicer to work with than the angle grinder.

JM, Thank you for the information, I have seen metabo products on different websites and they seem to work and not be cheap but they work. my planned PPE is would be auto darkening welding set to grind, ear plugs, n95 mask jeans, long sleeve welding shirt (fire resistant but i have not tested that) and leather shoes. Do you think that will work? And a large fan so I don't pass out from having long sleeves and jeans on in Alabama in July! This is my find

One quick follow up, can a carbide reciprocation saw blade (like for cast iron) be used on forklift forks?

Frosty, I think I understand what you are saying. I am about 95% set on using a "krusty" style spring until I can get a larger work space but here is the plan for "the next one". Get small (24" ish eye to eye) 3 leaf trailer spring. Reverse the leaves and (maybe) use a come along tool to get it to the right shape. The funny thing is I work in Huntsville where a good chunk of what happens is rocket science so I should know better. On another topic, I have used the sage advice of Thomas Powers (on account of he knows many things) and have been gifted some forklift forks that I plan to cut up in to manageable chunks using a portaband saw (lenox bandsaw blades 24 tpi) and the angle grinder with cut off wheels. This will give me what I needed to upgrade to either a cut-off saw or larger grinder namely a good excuse. My portaband saw goes up to 420 fpm, am I correct that on something like forklift forks I want to go no faster than about 200 fpm? I hope to get some of these chunks over to the local forge group for iron in the hat so the new folks don't have to resort to an ASO. Thanks for all your help, Ernest

Looks very nice and I think you are on to something using the RR spikes.

How did you manage to cut out the hardy hole, looks very nice!

Yup, Just like Galileo in his bath tub http://galileo.rice.edu/sci/instruments/balance.html 7.48 gallons in cubic foot or 62.43 pounds of water per cubic foot. This gets much easier if you use the Metric system. tonne per cubic meter (t/m³) 1 kilogram per cubic meter (kg/m³) 1,000 gram per cubic meter (g/m³) 1,000,000 milligram per cubic meter (mg/m³) 1,000,000,000 gram per litre (g/L) 1,000 You can ball park steel at around 490# per cubic foot.

DuckCreekForge makes a VERY good comment about 1750 RPM. I picked up a 1 HP motor that turned out to be 3600 RPM and I will need to make sure i have the spindle to tire ratio correct so the hammer does not sound like an MG42 and/or spastic woodpecker.

How large a ram are you thinking about using?

Would a small trailer springs (26" eye to eye) taken apart and put back together in the "right" way work? I think I could get that pre-stressed but it would not be the same shape as proper "Champion" spring. Is that worth messing with? I showed my wife how the tire hammer linkage worked and she commented it made her dizzy.

Charles, So where would someone get a "Champion" style spring if he wanted to order one? I figured (not knowing any better) that you could have a spring shop that started with flat spring stock arch the flat spring stock to the right shape. I am thinking this may be one of the items to add to my list of thing I don't really understand.

Charles, i have a new spring to work with for the "Rusty" option. I figured out a good while ago that it is not worth it messing with a scrap spring for this type thing. You can't buy a rebuilt face for the $100.00 you would save.

That is one of the things I had in mind when I told my wife that I would want someone else to show me how to build the LG type linkage since it would be right next to my face. That is why I am either going to get a spring shop to make a "champion" style spring or go with a "Rusty" style spring. Alan, I will do just that. Have you ever used the temp sticks?

JM, Thanks for the information, it seemed like it might not work that well but I thought I would ask. Ernest