gote

Another reason for bad advice/info is when not only the steak but also the original message has been corrupted (or lost in translation). To give an example that the viscosity of air must be taken into consideration in aerodynamic calculation the professor says that "if we disregard the viscosity, the bumblebee cannot fly". Whereupon a joker cuts off the first half of the statement and says that " the bumblebee cannot fly - but it does not know so it flies anyway" and a bladesmith on the net who has not studied aerodynamics tells the world that enigeers are idiots based on the corrupt statement. Another example: The guru says that "It is alien to human nature to sit in front of a typewriter all day" After being translated by ignorance or ill will we get the statement: "The guru believes that typists are taken over by extraterrestials". It is human nature to want to "improve" statements by others so they fit another purpouse.

OK so by balance you mean that the axis of the handle should go through the center of gravity of the head. I am afraid that I still do not see how that will influence. If I hit squarely with the face without creting divots, it means that the the head is coming down squarely without any rotation/wriggle. If I turn the hammer and use the pein, also the pein will come down squarely unless I change the way I move my arm and unless the head is asymetrical around the handle. However, the mark made by the pein does not show if the hit was not square. A very squat hammer like the Hofi hammer will have less resistance against turning around the handle axis than a longer head of the same weight but this is a question of moment of inertia rather than of balance.

I am at a loss to understand the term 'balanced' hammer. Most hammers with a pein that I have seen (including Hofi) have more weight on the flat side of the handle than on the pein side. Balanced around what axis and what is good about it.

I concur with Smooth Bore, however I got an advice sixty years ago. I do not remember how it was said but the meaning was Hit as quickly you can. It is also a well known statement that the Hell is full of smiths hitting cold iron. "Helvetet är fullt med kallsmeder"

Not only anvils. Gardening and rare plants are one of my hobbies. I can roam through a whole province and see nothing of interest. Then I stumble over (not literally) a terrestical orchid and then suddenly hundreds pop up in the immediate vicinity.

I had mine like that and I very quickly got a back problem. I had to stand with my feet nearly three feet apart to save my back. I then did as Glenn recommends. I did it before reading about it. I figured it out myself. When your back hurts you get inspiration. Now if you are a young man you may get away with a too low anvil - for now. Question is what it does to your back in the long run.

This is what Japanese swordsmiths do. Or rather: they make the billet on a handle.

Nice looking stuff but does not your back hurt when the anvil is so low. If you make it possible to change the dies or whatever they are called in the power hammer you can get it to make different tricks.

I like your designs. You know how to do that

Is that a Japanese kanna in the pic or have you made it yourself? If your first head looks so good I want to see your tenth.

It seems that many forget that blowing and sucking are two very different things. If you blow through a pipe you get a stream of air that can be directed. If you suck through the same pipe you get air or whatever coming from all directions. If you have a biggish hood above the fire it will suck air from everywhere in the room. Thus the hot gases from the fire are very diluted and thus not very hot and thus not creating much of a draft. The side sucker works so well because the opening is very close to the fire so what goes through it is hotter creating more of a draft. Compared to the typical hood the opening is also smallish so there is not so much room air sucked in as in an old fashioned hood. I am not using sidesucker because I want the forge away from the (wooden) wall, because I want the forge free in all direction and because I use forced draft anyway. BUT I have the hood as low as is practical and relatively small and with more than 45° slope so I catch the smoke as undiluted as possible. You want your exhaust to take out the smoke not the air in the room. A big hood works like a funnel on a vacuum cleaner would. That it works at all is of course because the smoke is hot and goes upward. I would be very worried about the hood in the picture since it is so flattish especially in the left part. There is no slope to take the smoke to the opening of the flue. Steve makes a very good point. This can be risky business. A forge can easily create a lot of CO which is a deadly gas. Since this is the result of incomplete combustion of the carbon in the fuel, the temperature is lower and it is more likely to escape from the hood. Please get yourself a CO-monitoring device before attempting to forge with this setup.

Sorry Alan. I am a fast reader which is just a kind of excuse for being prone to accidentally skip parts of what is written.

"I love work! I can look at it for hours!" Used to be a work.

Dwarves???

Just a note to Alan's drawing. Good tape measures have the hook loose with longitudinal play equal to hook thickness. This way push and pull measures are both correct. Could perhaps be adapted also to measuring rods.

That is a really ingenious use for old pushrods. Very nice frame indeed

Whem the head strikes there is a slight reaction moment in the handle that wants to bend the end upwards. An offset pein gives a rotating moment to the head when it strikes. If the pein is on the nearside this moment is directed the other way so the maximum moment in the handle is decreased, Both moments would I think be negligible except perhaps as to the fixing of the head to the handle. I doubt thatt his is the reason. The claw is a very different animal. Normally you do not strike with it.

Thank you all for the tips

Well you do loose the original heat treatment/temper/whatnot that the steel works put in hopefully with well controlled ovens and timing. If you know what you do you can of course get most of the properties back but I assume the man thought you were a nitwit who did not understand that. How many customer do YOU meet who know about hardening and tempering? I think you were on the receiving side this time

You can avoid the curve if you want. It is possible to hit on the side that is going to become the edge to straighten it. Do this as soon as you see it bend. It will not become very much blunter in the process and the little that you get disappears in the next heat. This of course means that you must have an anvil with some length. A sledghammer head is too small.

Very nice work Jennifer. And I like the idea of strenghtening the tines. Frosty. In my part of the world Jack Frost is a lovable (except by his superior) chief detective in the Denton police who occasionally appears in the telly. The series is called 'a touch of frost'

An alternative is not to square the heads but to use machine thread bolts and bang them on the top so they are rivet head shaped or very low six sided "pyramides" . Then of course you countersink at the bottom and use a nut. An added boon is that they are stronger than screws are. Very nice looking handles. Will try something similar one day.

OK I misunderstood. Perhaps because I have seen too many (posed?) pictures of smiths standing with bent back. I totally agree that the stance should be comfortable/natural - including the arm. I think that it is helpful to tell people not to think about the hammer but to concentrate the mind on the place to hit - or perhaps as someone (I think Frosty) just below.

What is wrong with an upright stance? My back does not allow me to bend for more than a few minutes and I am under the impression that it is better for the back to work in anupright position. All medical advice I have seen stress that.