blacklabel

On 1/23/2017 at 6:18 PM, ThomasPowers said:

no handle so she can use it as a branding iron to mark *her* property???

Lord dont give her ideas! ROFL 

Good job man! Looks great! 

Sounds like a good woman! =) My wife also keeps me focused. I mean she will not allow me to settle on somthing I want. If I was looking for a 6" vice and found the 4" she would say something like that as well. 

Yeah I tried to dress it with a grinder and got it more flat than rounded, Just havnt had a second to go back with the angle grinder and round it up.  

I made a heart for my wife for her birthday over the weekend.  It was my first heart. 

I love it! Good job! 

I am about 20 minutes in to the show currently!  This is awesome! 

Thanks for all the replies guys!  2 Big Blu hammers are on my Christmas list a 2.4lb #2 Cross Peen and a 2.6lb #5 Rounding hammer.  Until then the Estwing will do just fine. 

If it makes me pretentious well....If only I cared!   Happy Smithing! Hope to meet some of you one day and have a beer! 

Thanks Frosty! We did discuss handle lengths, I was told your hammer handle should be the same distance from where your wrist breaks to just about your funny bone.  

1 hour ago, ThomasPowers said:

  You pretty much have to go with the custom hammers made by smiths for smiths to get something applicable---or find an old one that a previous owner had properly dressed and even then both types may not be dressed to suit *YOU*.  Quality is not necessarily correlated with price especially when working in a less common craft.

That was my reasoning behind BigBlu.  Their hammers said they were made and dressed by professional smiths for blacksmiths.  I also agree more money does not always mean a better product. The better tool isn't always the most expensive one.  Which is why I kept going back to BigBlue, I found hammers ranging from $60 to $300+. BigBlu fell in the middle of that range. 

1 hour ago, SmoothBore said:

I would suggest a $10 "Horror Freight" drilling hammer.

When you've swung it long enough to discern the difference, ... and modified it to your own, personal satisfaction, ... you'll be ready for a "high dollar" hammer.

Or, ... more likely, ... ready to make your own, "priceless" personal tool.

Either way, ... you can't "buy" skill out of a tool catalog.

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Don't take the above personally.

It's a theme that I belabor "ad nauseam".

Good Luck.

 

 

I was not attempting to buy "skill".  I know skill comes from practice, and experience.  But with all tools I buy and use, I buy the best quality I can afford.  I have been using a Estwing Cross Peen hammer from Home Depot, and I noticed a major difference between my instructors hammer and mine.

Hey every one!  Just wanted to say HI!  I started smithing a month or so ago. Saturday I spent all day with a smith of 30 years getting some formal instruction.  It was a great time and I learned so much.  Cannot wait to take some of what I learned back to my home forge and get busy. 

I am in the market for some hammers, does any one have any experience with BigBlu hammers?  Are they quality?