Ellen

Howdy Mills, Well, I bought the DeVilbiss from Harbor Freight (not to worry, it's still made in Alabama) and it was $800 delivered (with lift gate truck), HF had a special no freight on anything over $500. I don't think they carry it now, and I don't think the free freight is in effect now either. I do see some nice two stage compressors for about that price range (cast iron cylinders and not the plast oil-less junk) at Home Depot and maybe one or two other places. Seems like you can can get a new compressor, American made, for around $800 or so; if you want a Cadillac of compressors check out Ingersoll Rand, seems like they have them on line, maybe The Tractor Store or some such. Rich W, I think, bought one that way, and when he is through with his off line sabbatical perhaps he may chime in.....I'm sure others will.

I spent an afternoon last week with my friend Dief who has a 110# Big Blue; he has 3 die sets, flat, combo, and crown. He seems to use the combo dies the most, followed by the crown. It was a real education, and I think a class on a power hammer would be a good idea. And I intend to do so in the near future. My hammer will be delivered (115# Iron Kiss) in July, and I have contracted with a local rigging company to install it. I don't know much about moving heavy machines, and so it is worth a few dollars to me to have it done properly....and safely...by pros. After all, by the time I pay for the hammer and the shipping to AZ from the east coast, the rigging become a very small part of the cost. I watched Hofi's video on free form forging (about 3 times so far), and it was a real eye opener. I've tried to watch Clifton Ralph's video but I rented it from ABANA and the quality was so poor, I ended up watching only bits and pieces. If he'd put it on DVD I would buy it. As it is, Hofi is my first choice to take a class from, followed by Big Blue........but I think a class is necessary to get the most out of the tool and also to be sure you've learned the safety procedures. There are lots of power hammers out there, and to be quite honest, the Little Giants and similar mechanical designs are intimidating to me. I do not like all those moving parts near my head. They seem distracting and dangerous. This is not to run down those who have and love and use their LG's dailing with no injury; it's just me. Another deciding factor was air....I have lots of it. A two stage DeVilbiss 80 gal tank with 6.5 HP, rated at almost 20 SCFM at 150 PSI. So not additional expense there. Noisy you say? I'm fairly deaf as it is. I'll wear ear protection to save what hearing I have left, but I spent way too many years shooting before the days of ear muffs and ear plugs. Great discussion here guys and gals, I've learned a lot. Let's keep in info coming and lets all share, and we'll all learn something.

"and heres to you fuzzy wuzzy with your hayrick head of hair, and here's to you fuzzy wuzzy at your home in the Sudan, and here's to you fuzzy wuzzy for you broke a British square" or something like that. It's been a while. Churchill made some fine points in "The River War" if you ever get to read the uncensored version.....he describes what might happen if technology should come the way of the inhabitants of the middle east...... Anyway, I'm not about to clean or help clean anybody else's shop unless invited and supervised. Life is too short, and my own shop could use a good cleaning.....but not the Thomas style of cleaning; he's already been kind enough to offer.....grin!

I was just saying the welcome mat was out and the shop is there; the timing, if possible at all, is up to Jim. Same for you, you old horse thief you......grin! Sandpile said I should use terms of endearment like that to get on your "good" side, and I can trust him, right? He's been kinda quiet since I said maybe you could clean out his shop while I was in class and he was at the kinife show.....I told him you wouldn't charge over $50 for the job.

Jim, I have a dumb question and I hope this is a good day for dumb questions.....on wrapping a knife handle with twisted wire, do you have an online source for that twistedwire, be it brass or bronze on plain steel? I promise not to bug you again with any dumb questions for at least two weeks......grin! Thank you very much. Today will be the first billet welding, 8 pieces of 1018 8" long using your supersaturated liquid borax flux and powdered borax too. The nickle allows are still "in the mail". Thank you!

Chuck, he, uh, starts his cleaning with the anvil, then the blade and tool steel stock, hand tools, belt grinders, post vises, you know that sort of pesky dust collecting junk. He's so charming about it all the MRs. usually fixes him a nice lunch of chicken fried steak, pie, all the trimmings. He does a good job. Fast too. It's good to have solid friends like that.

Bruce, looked like a great project, impressive to be sure. Rare bird? I thought those were cooked till pink in the oven. Man has his priorities totally messed up! Thanks for sharing!

Glenn, Thank you for undertaking this project and seeing it through to completion. Mighty nice of you to do so. Had I been spending more time here and wasting less time elsewhere I would have been "up" on this project and contributed a leaf. Sorry I missed out on it!

I tried to reload my flypress and tooling pictures but didn't have any luck; I'll try again later and seen what the problem is. I mean, they loaded fine just a few weeks ago, seems they should load fine now......must be operator error!

Question, a friend wants to make some old style knifes out of 1095 like would have been used by Mountain Men and Voyageurs; she wants them to look a bit aged (NOT to sell as antiques) and was wondering what type of acid etch would be good for this? Thanks!

Well, a friend of mine, Gordon Williams makes his living smithing and just outside his shop he has made a tumbler from an old style water tank. He puts in his forged pieces, and drops in pieces of scrap steel; old nails, round drops, pieces of cut offs, etc, and spins it with a v belt, it sits on two rollers , and a small electric motor...maybe 1/3 hp. It makes a racket. He says it takes 1 to 4 hours to clean a load of forgings. It leaves a matte texture on the finished work. He runs it in the day when hopefully his neighbors are at work......I've heard it and it is a horrible sound indeed. But it works.

If I was scrounging from scratch I'd go with 1/2" plate as well; you know it is stronger and.....and......and.....

Not to worry Chuck, what are friends for? I will be at the workshop, taking notes and nice pictures to post, Thomas will be at your house, paying his respects to Mrs. Chuck (Helen), and cleaning out your workshop for you so when you get home it will be nice and empty, and clean and ship-shape, Bristol fashion. You're lucky to have friends like us! Thomas never charges more than $50 for this service.

I've used 3/8" plate for bolsters and it works fine, I just back it up, for example, around the square for the hardy hole. Use what you've got on hand.

Well, I have ordered 3 die sets for my Iron Kiss; flat dies, combo dies, and crown dies. I just watched Hofi's free form forging DVD, twice, need to order a copy of my own. I hope to take classes from both Hofi and Steve in the near future. Yep, short handles are good. Big Blue sells a set of short tools, I think 12 in the set, and a set of locking tongs to use them with, all for $250. Might be a good investment. Safety, well, safety glasses are obvious, but there is also the extra power you are dealing with. That is where I think some air hammers have an advantage, the power is more controllable, and the ram comes down absolutely straight, not off a flywheel. Based on the short time I had with the Big Blue 110# hammer yesterday, I felt very comfortable using it; it had combo dies and they were real nice. Drew out a knife tang from O-1 in one heat from a short stubby thing to about 5" long, tapered and ready to use. Also drew out cross piens on two hammer blanks I had ready to go out of 1 3/4" sq. 4140, now they go to the belt grinder. The hammer made short work out of these jobs, which I could not have done by hand. I know a lot of you guys could do that kind of work by hand but I am female and 60 years old, so realism has to be added to the mix of information here. Anything over 3/4" with a hand hammer is work for me.

Well, I understand and respect your decision to stay with your troops. You have just shown yourself to be a top quality professsional, in my book, but I wanted to make the offer. Nothing wrong with the round shafting for bottom tooling, heck it may even be better. I look forward to seeing how it all turns out. Let me know if there are any "missing" flypress and tooling photos from the gallery that you would like to see, and I will have them either up or emailed to you ASAP.

Jim, if you look at the knife thread on your PW class, where you talk about possible deployment to border, it was pointed out that Thomas and I both live in states "on the border" and should it be AZ I am 150 miles from the border, with shop, guest room, shower, and the welcome sign would be out for you so you wouldn't have shop withdrawals. Your bride could come down and spend time with you as well, so it would be a home away from home. Fancy we're not, but hospitable we are.......

Thomas, there are all sorts of possibilities. The guest bed is a king, so it would hold two or three if Jim were here at the same time. Otherwise, a cot can be set up in one of the other rooms, the barn is o.k. but warm this time of year, even in the evening, likewise the shop, since it is steel......so not a problem. When I was into bike racing I would sometimes have ten overnight guests, bags and air mats rolled out everywhere, gets the job done. We are not fancy here, but we're hospitable, just don't look for fancy cause it's not here.....grin!

$8 each? Solid gold? I don't know what the price of 1 3/4" CR 1018 is since I buy it in 20' lengths, but suspect maybe 50 cents......the 1" ID motor shafts are a couple dollars each, from Fastenall, Grainger carries 'em but charge a mite more. Haven't checked MSC or McMaster Carr lately. Just degrease 'em in acetone or some such before welding. The hardy bolster plate has worked well for me, and is less fuss than working with round stock and shaft collars....1" sq. stock in 20' lengths is rather cheap as well. And it comes out shorter than if I were using a "top" tool in the bottom bolster, sometimes this is important. Bottom line, whatever works......

Jim, sometimes our Thomas has good ideas, I live about 150 miles from the border, have a guest bedroom, and a messy shop but lots of nice tools in it. Feel free to make this your home away from home if you get sent this way. My power hammer won't be here till July, but lots of other goodies here.

Well I made a bolster plate with a hardy hole set on the diagonal, that way I can run longer work past the press's back casting. Works good for me, and then all of my anvil hardy tools fit. For top tool, I use 1" CR1018 (A36 is too big, won't fit), and I weld a 1" ID motor shaft collar to the 1018 to take the impact and not mushroom the 1" shaft, I also cut it so there is 1/4" of gap between the bottom of the ram hole and the end of the 1018, to be safe. I belt grind a flat on the 1018 shafting so the set screw locks it in place and also helps with the indexing. John Crouchet goes into this in detail on his excellent DVD, and we also spent a lot of time building tools in his 3 day class at Amy's. I came home with over 20 finished tools. I use S-7 for almost everything that will take impact in the flypress tooling; it is cheaper, works good in the forge, and I can heat treat it consistently with my simple shop tools. I like to have a half dozen 1" 1018 shafts welded up with motor shaft collars, ground flat on top....all welding is on the opposite site from where the tool will contact the ram.....and then I can just pick one up and make the tooling for it, weld in place, and I have a tool ready to go. I just bought a piece of scrap strap iron grating with 1" x 2" openings in it and my tooling will set in the grating so it's all in one place, I'll pick up a shop cart to put it on so I can roll it out of the way.

Howdy Jim, Well I have a new Fly Press page going under Blacksmithing, and have referenced Augustus Squeezer there, so let's let 'er rip!

We had a nice fly press page going, and it may be lost, so we have an opportunity to get it going again. I have a number 5 Flypress, made in India, purchased from Amy Pieh at Pieh Tool Co, a wonderful supplier and a friend to all smiths, and have made a lot of tooling for it. If these photos aren't recovered and reposted in the gallery in the next few days, I will simply repost them; life goes on! Dr. Jim Hrisoulas just bought a #6 Flypress from Pieh Tool Co, appropriately named Augustus Squeezer, and like myself, he also purchased the excellent steel stand for the press that Amy carries. For those who do not know, a flypress has a 3 or 4 lead screw with a fast twist, such that one turn of the flywheel moves the ram an inch or more, and if the flywheel weighs 100# (which is what a #5 does), then the ram will be coming down with several tons of pressure. You can put patterns in cold steel, bend circles, do veining, wonderful decorative edges, and you can also work with hot steel. It's great for punching holes, fullering (like fullering a knife or a sword), and is a valuable addition to any shop. All questions and comments are welcome!

This thread was just started the day before the crash, so let's just get it going again. I have ordered a 115# Octagon Iron Kiss pneumatic hammer from John Larson; it will be here mid July, and I have already selected a rigger for moving the 3,000# of hammer into my shop. It is coming with a set of flat dies, and a set of combo dies. I spent a couple of hours on a Big Blue 110# air hammer yesterday, and learned a lot, mostly how many new windows a power hammer opens. So, let's share info, tips, techniques, pictures and have fun on this wonder family site!

Well, I was number 3 on the list, so I just wanted to get back in here; anytime Dr. Jim wants to have the class fits my schedule. Heck, I'll make it fit. I am still rereading and re-viewing all 3 of the bladesmith books and the VHS tapes. I have my 15n20 and 1095 in transit, just bought 40' of 1 X 1/8 flat steel to start practicing my billets, and John Larson is building a 115# air hammer for me. Needless to say I'm excited! Hope the flypress page and the Augustus page are not both gone; the power hammer page I just started only had a couple of posts so that is an easy one to restart; my flypress tooling, the pictures are still on my computer so I can repost them to the gallery. Sorry this had to happen; mighty fine site here and I look forward to it getting back up and running. I sure missed it when it was down!