patrick

The MOB is based in the Columbus area. Years ago they met regularly at a shop just south of Columbus. I'm not sure if they still meet there or not. If you can make it over to the SOFA shop in Troy for their monthly meeting you can usually find some of the MOB guys there. Patrick

Beaudry made a power hammer that was very similar to that one in that the ram was suspended on a strap and round in guides. That part of the hammer is basically identical to what Beuadry did. The drive mechanism is different as I think they used a slack belt clutch. I was impressed with how quickly the hammer stopped when your foot came off the treadle. Patrick

Has anyone ever seen a post vise with the leg offset so that it is in line with the pivoting jaw? I bought one like this a few days ago and have never seen one like it.

Heat for 3 hours. I wouldn't work about the scaling. Let it happen and grind it off. You won't be able to get the stainless foil off before you quench and it will act as an insulator counteracting the effect of the quench. Plus it is expensive. For a 19# piece you really need much more quench fluid. I'd suggest at a minimum 20 gallons. For 4140 I'd quench in a light weight oil. Something on par with vegetable or peanut oil. If you have a lot of work already in this die, just go pay a commercial heat treater to do the job. They typically have a minimum fee then charge by the pound. For your job you'll probably end up paying just the minimum and that should be in the neighborhood of $50. That's a small investment to know the job was done properly. Patrick

This grade has selenium as an intentional alloying addition which is very different from 4140. I'm not sure what the selenium does as I've never seen this element used as an intentional addition. I wouldn't go out of your way to get this material unless you can get it for free. If you do get some I'd expect that it will heat treat like a standard 4140. Patrick

Guided helves have a wood beam. What is described above is a strap hammer.

For the strap you can use the same type of belting that would be used to drive the hammer. The idler pulley diameter is not critical since all it is doing is taking up slack. The drive pulley and motor or jack shaft pulleys are the ones you need to get right. That being said, I think the idler pulley on my 300 lb hammer is around 6". Patrick

Wrought iron is not defined by its carbon content but by its method production and the fact that it contained iron silicates as a by-product of its production techniques. Wrought iron was routinely carburized to product higher carbon contents for applications that needed that. This was typically called blister steel, and though the carbon content was high, the iron silicates remained in the material. For certain applications, these iron silicates would cause rapid part failures (spring and razors being two examples). For applications such as this, the blister steel was melted to allow the iron silicates to float to the top of the bath of molten metal. This liquid steel was cast into small ingot mold and re-forged. Steel produced by this method was referred to as "cast" steel even though the end products produced were still forged to shape. This designation allowed users to distinguish high quality tools and objects from those made strictly of high carbon wrought iron. The microstructure of the "untouched" piece shown at the beginning of this thread is ferrite/pearlite combination that is typical of all carbon steels will less than 0.77% carbon that are slow cooled from hot working temperatures, as is the case for bars of A36 and similar supplied in the hot rolled condition. The relative amounts of pearlite/ferrite will vary depending upon the carbon content. More carbon=more pearlite. Baintie/martensite are formed when steel is cooled more rapidly from hot working temperatures. Patrick

One of the things that I find as a difference between old decorative iron work and new work is the change of cross section. In today's work it is common to see long tapers, heavily upset end and other forms that really illustrate the plasticity of hot steel. In old iron work you see a lot of uniform cross sections that are punched, split or welded, but the work and designs are limited to the ability to work fairly small pre-rolled stock. Today's artistic smiths are not limited in that way if they choose to uses power hammers so not only are their gains in efficiency, but also a much wider outlet for creative expression.

Javan-The phase converters you noted are cheaper than running a line from the pole. When asked about that last year they said they'd do it for $2700, but single phase was only $700 and at the time I just didn't have the extra cash for the 3 phase. I'll look into the converters you mentioned. Patrick

No I don't have three phase in this shop so this will be an opportunity to either get a converter or switch to a single phase motor. Most likely I'll go with a converter, though depending on the cost, it may be more economical to just have 3 phase run to the shop. I looked into that when I ran the electric service, and though it wasn't terribly expensive it was more than I could afford at the time. Patrick

This one has a 15 HP Westinghouse that runs at 880 rpm. I'll probably increase the pull size a little bit as I like my hammers to run at a about 200 or so blows per minute. patrick

I found my copy of POP. Bradley merged with Edlund Machine in 1952. Sometime later in the 1950s the hammer building business was acquired by Precision Castings Co. Apparently, by 1955, the Bradley name was no longer in use, even though hammers continued to be built. This machine doesn't have the Bradley name cast into it as my other one does and the manual that came with it (though it has the Bradley Logo) states it is a division of the Precision Castings Co. Based on that I'm pretty sure the hammer was made after 1955.

I seem to have misplaced my copy of Pounding Out the Profits. Can anyone tell me what year they finally we sold? I'm thinking it was in the mid-1950s but I don't remember for sure. Thanks. Patrick

The former owner is a farrier and used the hammer to make horse shoes. He got it from another farrier some years back. They think it came out of a forge shop called Broderick in Muncie. I heard about from one of the members my local blacksmith group (UMBA) who is a farrier and knew the owner. He knew I had a big Bradley and mentioned this to me in February at our winter meeting. The hammer is on its own foundation, not the slab floor. The building was set up as the forge shop for the farrier, but he is down sizing now that he's only working part time so he has cleaned out everything from the building already. He rents the building and it sounds like it will be torn down as soon as the hammer is out. The building is in pretty rough shape, but there is nothing wrong with the hammer.

So I bought a 500 lb Bradley today and have been comparing it to the pictures of the one Michael Dillon has. This one is different in that all the bearing surfaces have grease zerks rather than oil cups. The castings don't have the oil cups built in as they are one my 300 and on Michael's 500. Additionally, the anvil is a different style and the sow block is steel. The serial # is 222407. The number on my 300 is 222301 and it was made in 1944. Bradley only made 28 hammers that entire year and since production declined after WWII I suspect this machine is from the late 1940s or early 1950s. I'm trying to confirm that now. Michael- Do you have the serial number/date for your hammer? Also, do you know how much the anvil on you machine weighs? How about the entire machine weight? Based on the way this one looks I think it is heavier than yours. I ran the hammer for a bit just to make sure everything is in good order and it is. Some adjustments are needed to improve the performance but that is simple. Now the bit challenge is to get out of the old run down building it is in and move it to Wisconsin. Currently its near Muncie, IN. Pictures attached Patrick

The SOFA anvils were repaired using a method provided by Hobart. You can contact them directly for the procedure, but rod used is Hardalloy 58. That is what I used when I made my big anvil a few use ago. There is a thread on that here somewhere. They advise using Hardalloy 32 as an unlayment, but if you already have a fairly hard surface, I don't think that's necessary. You MUST preheat and slow cool. If you a running a very large area, you need watch your interpass temp and make sure it doesn't get too hot. I'd advise shooting for 600f preheat. My anvil was probably hotter than that and I welded on it straight for 7 hours so it is a little softer than I would like but that is my fault, not a problem with the rod. NOTE that you cannont weld more that two layers (according to Hobart) without Hardalloy 58 cracking. Hardalloy 58 has low to mid-50s HRc hardness as welded (assuming you don't get it too hot). It is not a high wear resistance rod so it grinds pretty easy. If you use a work hardening rod like those designed for rock crushers etc. you will likely have to heavily deform the weld deposit to attain the hardness you want. That means you will need to weld and beat the tar out of the face, then grind smooth. Patrick

Contact Doug Fruend, author of Pounding Out the Profits. He has some company info and can give you at least a general idea. He may be able to give you the specific year depending on the detail of his records. Patrick

It is not clear if you are wanting to change the microstructure of the metal or just the surface condition. Lathe turning as you described will only clean up the surface but will not alter the as cast microstructure. That will take mechanical deformation and heat. Extrusion could probably be used but would require surface conditioning as you are already doing. I suggest that you grind your ingot then experiment with thermal cycles (no deformation). See what properties and microstructure you get, then see what can be done from a hot work standpoint. Depending on the resources at the university, you may have access to a rolling mill. I would use that before a forging hammer since you can control the strain on the metal much more precisely with that tool. Patrick

That looks a bit like an anvil that Lee Liles had cast quite a number of years ago. I saw it at Quad State probably 12 years back. If I recall correctly it weighed in at something over 2000 lbs.

Jaz, Get yourself a copy of "Heat Treatment of Steels " by M. A. Grossman. This book has a whole chapter on the development of microstructures based on carbon content, hold times and cooling rates in plain carbon steels. The book was first published in 1935 and the 5th edition came out in 1965. That one is coauthored by Edgar Bain (of Bainite fame). Of all the metallurgy texts I have seen and used, this is the absolute best one for a basic intruduciton to steel metallurgy. It is now out of print but used copies are available online for not much money. I have 3 copies which I loan to my interns and collegues at work. I have found this to be an invaluable resource, especially when dealing with folks who are are not classically trained in metallurgy. I think this will answer the bulk of your questions without the need to repeat experitments which were done almost a century ago (though I'm not suggesting experimentation is not worth doing). Patrick (professional metallurgist and avid blacksmith)

Keep in mind that only the face of an anvil really needs to be hard. Therefore an inexpensive shallow hardening grade can be used provided the proper heat treatment is employed. It's been awhile since I looked at the chemistry of the material being used by Old World Anvils, but when last I check this was a plain carbon steel with bit of extra manganese. When I say a bit I'm talking well under 2% and the carbon content wasn't that high either, around 0.3% if I recall correctly. This grade should be about as cheap as you can get since it has virtually none of the more costly alloys like nickel, chrome, and molybdenum. To heat treat, heat the face only and quench. All those other elements besides carbon and manganese do increase hardenabilty which means you can get high hardness to a deeper depth, but that is not necessary for an anvil. Certainly a grade like H13 is air hardening and that makes heat treat easy, but that is a pretty expensive grade and you really don't get much of a performance boost by using it. In my opinion, using those other grades primarily provides a marketing advantage since the are recognized in the blacksmithing communty as being good steels. They all still have to be heat treated correctly to deliver the expected performance. Patrick

I neglected to answer Grant's question directly in my post above. The differnce between heatign and cooling with and without deformation is as follows: When you deform a piece of metal, the crystal structure breaks up and may or may not recrysalize depending on the grade, temperature and time. Without deformation, you do not have that same change in crystal structure (and stress) hence heating and and cooling down without deformation in distinctly different that heating and deforming before cool down is complete. In addition, the temperatures generally used for forging are much higher than those used for intentional heat treat applications. If I load more pieces in the fire than I can forge in a day, those pieces which were heated and not deformed would not, in my opinion, be heat treated. The reason is two fold. First, the temperature is so much higher for forging than for heat treating that I would have to re-heat and control cool to get the properties of interest. The second is that the intention behind that heating cycle was NOT to develop final properties, or even intermediate properties, but only to aid the forming process. Patrick

I cannont, in good conscience as a metallurgist, agree with the idea that hot forging is a form of heat treatment. Forging and heat treating are two distinctly different operations with different microstructural and mechanical property outcomes. While a object may be usable in the "as-forged" condition it has not been heat treated with the intention of controling properties. The properties attained during forging may or may not be suitable for the intended service. The term "heat treated" is broad and applies to a variety of operations but those operations are recognized in industry as being distinctly seperate from the forming operation. Heat treatments are performed for the following reasons: Make a part harder or softer, to reduce residual stress, to dissolve undesirable precipitates, to refine or control grain size. Parts can be made harder through normalizing, quenching, nitriding, and carburizing followed by quenching. Forging is done for the following reasons: to get rid of shrinkage cavities inherant to the casting process, to develop anisotropic propties (that is align material grain flow in a way most favorable to the intended application), and to create a part that is near net shape requiring minimal machining. Let's do a thought experiement. If I have 4320 steel which I purchase annealed to a hardness of less than 20 HRc and I then put that bar in a cold heading tool and form a gear blank which gets hot during the forming process purely from the metal deformation and I then take that gear with no further heating operations and machine and use it, has it been heat treated? NO. Did it get hot? Yes. Is it fit for my application? Yes. But it it was not heat treated, only formed. If I take the same gear blank and after machining I carburize the surface then quench and temper it to a hardness of 58 HRc has it been heat treated? Yes. The part did get hot in both the forming and the subsequent manufacturing operatioins. After both forming and subsequent case hardening the part was fit for some (but different) applications. But the steps associated with case hardening are the heat treatment. The same is true with hot forging. The heat is added soley for the purpose of aiding the forming process and not with any expectations regarding the microstructure or properties. To suggest otherwise is not in keeping with good metallurgical terminology and in my opinion is likely to confuse people who are interested in better understanding the concepts of controlled heat treatment. If hot forging is considered a form of heat treatment then so is casting. If the casting is usable as it comes out of the mold, then by the logic applied earlier in this discussion that casting has also been heat treated. Patrick

Hot forging is NOT a heat treatment because the microstructure and properties developed during hot forging are typically not controlled. This is especially true of open die or hand (hammer and anvil) forgings. While some forgings are used in the 'as-forged" condition (especially in the ornamental field) most idustrial type forgings undergo a seperate heat treating step. The forging process is done over range of temperatures so that when the forging is completed, there typically will be a variety of microstructures AND stresses present. Re-heating to a temeperature above the transformation temperature and controling the cooling rate from this point will result in controlled and predictable transformations of the microstructure which is how we get the properties we want out of a finished piece. Grant is correct that many forgings are shipped with a designation of "as-forged" but this is to distiguish them from those forgings which have been subjected to controlled thermal processing and in my experiece these pieces will undergo heat treatment at a later stage of processing. A simple way to think about this is that forging allows us to control the shape while heat treatment allows us to control the performace characteristics such as hardness, strength, ductility etc. Forging can have an influence on these properties, but in MOST cases, as long as you have the shape you want after forging is complete, the exact technique you use to get there is not critical since properties are developed during heat treatment. Patrick