John Larson

I had success with the second address as I mentioned. Don't ask for the article title, but rather the proceedings in which is was p[rinted.

The spring shape is highly arched so that the tup does not hit the spring perch when the inertia carries it upward. This is also true for all "cross-bow" spring hammers.

This document by Mr. Massey is a must read for all truly serious students of power hammers. It places the steam hammer near the top of the heap of all power hammers and discusses merits and flaws of most all basic styles. I have successfully printed the document using Wiil. K.'s second suggested link. Thank you Will. K. for bringing this document into view for this forum.

I hope this thread can be kept up over time. I keep expecting Danger Dillon to be posting some updated material to show the steam hammer's development. I'm sure the man is busy.

A kinyon style requires pneumatic components that are usually ill-sized when scrounged. It is very unlikely you can piece one together with scrounged parts at 200 dollars. The frame yes, the critical parts no. That is why mechanical hammers are so popular IMHO.

DO NOT USE MARVEL MYSTERY OIL. It goofs up the synthetic rubber seal and rings.

Air cylinders and valves will freeze if there is any moisture in the system (and there always is) unless you you use air tool oil with antifreeze. You are already familiar with it based on your comments. Ingersoll-Rand sells it by the gallon. There are other brands. Google on it to find them. One other item, if you do not run your hammer for a while then moisture inside will likely rust your cylinder's steel end caps, ports, and piston unless you run a lot of oil through it before storing it. John larson Iron Kiss Hammers.

Thanks. That others can learn a bit and hopefully be inspired drives me, I guess. Power hammer research takes an enormous amount of time and money, so that I can reduce those for others makes sense to me.

Today I created a storage spot for the self-contained, to hold it until my time frees up. In its spot, by the coaql forge, I put the 150 that I brought up to current standards. That frees up a spot near the front door that is sorely needed for parking a couple of tool boxes. I've been rebuilding the front end of the shop to accomodate my new associate who is launching a steel fab operation. I'm helping him with space and machinery. He has a heckofa telephone bookdeveloped at his previous employer and is starting to get orders.

For what it is worth, being willing to spenf on tools and not on dies is a contradiction.

Thanks, DD. I can see your bottom die moving a small amount so whack in that wedge a bit. :-)

Danger, I hope to see some video material from your super shop. :-)

Of course it was in fun. I like the king cong idea. I've added several pictures of the old 150 pound utility hammer that I just rebuilt. The octagonal hammer head is 9" across the facets and has a 7.5" inside diameter on top with a solid bottom. This hammer was built originally a few months after the self-contained and had a cabinet enclosing the hammerhead. I kept that but modified it to now have V-guides instead of keys-in-keyways. I also added the stroke adjustment lever and other current pneumatic features. This was the last machine to use a 24" tower and for many years I used a 12" tower.The cabinet on this machine is 18" with 12" from the die center to the tower's front. Back to the original bling comment by Danger. I have thought occasionaly about how really cool it would be to use polished stainless steel cladding plates. I've had numerous suggestions to use cast bronze name plates such as the old machine tools used. I used to leave every bolt head in its yellow zinc color to accentuate the illusion of rivets. On most of my hammers I use an aerofoil shaped lifting eye on top in the context of art deco steamlining. However, literally nothing beats the huffa-huffa sound of a self-contained. :-)

I wasn't being gruff and ornery. Some guys like the old rounded castings from the cast iron era. If you surround yourself with them you'r better like them. And I know curves rule the roost in art. Those old machine shapes often were there to ward off cracks in castings. Shiny paint and pin stripes and polished brass pieces on steam engines are nice in a museum. Short lived, however, on hammers when forging, at least from the bottom die downward. Modern Iron Kiss design is in the 1930s era of American Art Deco--skyscrapers, bridges, battle ships. The self-contained hammer that you suggest is Stalingrad style has no style other than cut-and-try forms, I admit. Bling is not for Iron Kiss, but neither is ugly. Form follows function. KISS in my double entendre name stands for Keep It Super Simple.

This posting is of a test machine that has been through more changes than I can even remember, not one for appearance. WTF is power hammer bling?

I haven't done measurements except by touch. It does not get hot. I had a Ukranian smith in the shop for an afternoon as he made tree limbs from heavy stock. He worked it hard and it moved around badly. It didn't get hot, however. That was the episode that started me thinking about either scrapping it or doing more work on it to improve it. Don't copy my valving with the check valves. Nazel had a better idea IMHO. I think a 5-port valve timed with respect to the crank could be an improvement. If you use Facebook, try my daily post on johnc.larson.14 where there are many knife guys posting.

I've spent some time recently on an old shop made self-contained hammer that I built in 2001-2002. I was doing exploration without much guidance. I read all I could find about Nazel hammer valving, pestered Tom Clark, and used a few of my own ideas. I'm going to try to import some pictures. The first one is sideways despite my having uprighted it before importing it. It shows the basic configuration, especially the newly minted anvil made from slabs in the stash, after machining. The stepped pyramid anvil is very convenient for welding the slabs top and bottom. Previously I just had the central 5" block and that was too little. Now the mass ratio is about 15:1, or a bit more. The tup is now 155# and a bit more than I wanted given the cylinders. But it works fairly well. I think 125# would be much better. The second shot shows the driver side where the 7.5 HP 3 phase 1140 rpm motor, throw switch, and one-shot oiler are evident. Picture three shows the passenger side with the tower plate removed. I just cut the crank's 15 x 3/4 disk to improve the balancing, but more balancing work is needed. Picture 4 shows the top end. The crank pivots the pump cylinder off the top clevis and the cylinder's oscillating mass makes it tough to balance as compared to an articulated connecting rod and rigid cylinder body. Three hoses are used to enable more air flow and two throttle valves are used (top and bottom). They work akin to Nazel's. I use check valves to admit air and use a shimmed pop-off valve to keep the bottom pump chamber's pressure under control; on the top the throttle bleeds off air to ambient via the treadle. I use a one-shot machine tool oiler to put oil into each end of the pump cylinder. Picture five shows the elementary treadle that is actuated by toe with heel on the floor. Sixth is a shot of the top throttle valve. Its three exhaust ports to ambient are apparent. The guts' profiles were copied from old Nazel info. Seventh is a shot of the key-in-keyway guides. This is where I first used this scheme and I used it many more times on utility hammers before developing the octagon system. The tup is really too short. Some time in the future I'll create a whole new setup based upon my current knowhow. So why am I showing this old mule now? I've been talking about it on my blog and someone asked for pictures. The machine was created as a study and not as a production piece. I learned a lot and will be learning more, but for now I wanted the larger anvil mass and the counterweighted crank to improve full song stability. It worked.

I sell to ordinary people, not plant engineers. I will continue to recommend copper. EVERY customer I've had using black iron pipe, typically installed before they buy my hammer, has had internal rust problems.

I personally recommend copper instead of black iron pipe. The inside of the iron pipe ALWAYS rusts SOMEWHERE in the the system and that fouls up valves. One replacement valve can pay for a lotta copper over iron price differential.

If you have a taper tool and hold the stock at one half the angle the flat die gives you a nicely finished taper. Grant Sarver used to tell of this, but I'm sure others do the same. Too large an angle will cause your stock to kick back, so be sure to stand to the side and hold the stock/tomgs close to your side.

I have qa rectangular sofa pot and it does not give a rectangular fire. The air hole is round and just like the round pot. So if you are looking to have an elongated fire, you nwill have to modify the pot to get it. Tghis is in high contrast to an older (Buffalo?) pot I had with an elliptical air hole.

The purpose of an air drier with an air hammer is most important in cold weather when condensate can freeze the valves and cylinder. And then hurt the synthetic rubber rings and seals. And promote rust inside in the winter, especially between the piston faces and the cylinder cap insides. There is a simple solution. Use air tool oil with an antifreeze additive. Ingersoll-Rand sells it by the gallon on their web site. There are other brands for sale on the internet. Carpenters in cold climes have been coping with this air tool problem for a very long time. The old time solution, I was told by a Detroit smith, is 50% air tool oil and 50% alcohol. I don't like alcohol's behavior, so I'd use glycol. One valve manufacturer recommends straight glycol. The whole quest is no ice/rust and oil for lubrication. Even with an air drier the use of antifreeze oil in cold climates is smart. And, once you start using an oil do not stop. Valves do not like dry.

Larry, contact Bob Bergman.

An expert on tooling for under a power hammer is Ralph Sproul up in Maine or NH. Send him an e-mail via New England blacksmiths and he can be of a lot of help. My two cents.

Thanks for taking the time to explain, Danger. No need to comment here: If I've got this straight, Grant just created a second way for feeding air to the hammer valve so he could control "idle" speed and he uses the chain on the treadle to the control valve so as to be able to set the idle location of the tup rather high and then when he stepped on the treadle he brought the center of reciprocation movement downward. In my head, at least, this makes sense. I guess his treadle movement still mostly controlled air flow.