August 20, 201015 yr This thread has inspired me to make my first tool. A punch. I was so keen in fact, that I didn't even bother thinking about what size punch I wanted to make. lol. The overall length is 13 inches (pretty long I know). It is also on the thick side. After further thought I have decided to taper the other end to a thinner punch then cut the whole thing in half and taper the ends a little ending up with two punchs roughly 8 inches long each. I have had a smile on my face since making it last weekend and have finally had the chance to post photos. Thanks to everyone who has contributed their time and info on the subject. Sorry about the size of the photos. Will figure out how to resize before posting more.
August 20, 201015 yr Nice looking first attempt... I bet you will find a little thicker handle and shank will make it easier to use though... Make sure you keep track of that thing... 10 or 20 years from now It still will hold a special place because it was numuro uno
September 26, 201015 yr Okay..... first off... sorry for bringing the post backfrom the dead this post is GREAT i have read and studied it all (seems nerdy dosn't it !) I saw mention of a video on the making of brian's hammer..... where can i get hold of this? thank you everyone and brian and hofi! alec
November 17, 201015 yr Where is the "top right corner of the screen" blueprint spot?? I can't see it anywhere. Thanks, Eric. Thanks so much for the pictures Brian!!!!!!!!!
November 17, 201015 yr lol There's soooo much history on the Blueprints thing. Let's just say for a long time they weren't there, but now they're slowly coming back. http://www.iforgeiron.com/page/index.html/_/blueprints/
September 16, 201114 yr I have been reading on this forum for about a week now and this is the most awesome and informative thread that I have found yet! I do have a question tho, I have no idea what all of these numbers mean, and no money to spend on special steel for tools. I do have access to coil springs, dynamite drill rod, and an assortment of old chisels and other old tool steels, these would work for making these tools, wouldn't they?
September 16, 201114 yr I have been reading on this forum for about a week now and this is the most awesome and informative thread that I have found yet! I do have a question tho, I have no idea what all of these numbers mean, and no money to spend on special steel for tools. I do have access to coil springs, dynamite drill rod, and an assortment of old chisels and other old tool steels, these would work for making these tools, wouldn't they? Coil spring (5160 typically) is excellent, but gets soft if you overheat the tool. Drill rod may be many things, including super-alloys that are quite red-hard and a bear to forge by hand. Start with the coil spring, there is instructions for heat treat, but using a hot tool as-forged if made from coil spring is going to work just fine. The tool is going to start going soft by the time it gets to red heat, so you will have to cool frequently to prevent your tool getting that hot. Doing a full heat treat will improve coil spring's cold hardness, but the temper will be drawn to about the same as normalized the first time the tool gets to red heat. The hot-hardness of coil spring is not significantly altered by heat treat. Coil spring also moves fairly easily under a hand hammer, and will allow you to make several tools without a whole lot of effort. Now here's a wrench on the heat treat discussion and material choices: use mild steel for your first one of these. It will wear out quick, but it will be easy to make and you can get the feel for making them quickly. Mild steel tools will work fine on hot steel if kept cool, but better steels last longer. Mild steel also moves much easier, and you can make one of these in many fewer heats to see if your procedure is on target. Make your second tool of the type from coil spring. Phil
September 20, 201114 yr alec glad you brought it back to the top of the list forgot it was there great reference material.
April 9, 201214 yr I have decided after reading this whole thread that I will probably do this at my hammer in on Black Friday in November this year. I am in eastern MO. There are many opportunities to slit and drift and It has to be done all the time. If we take a day and do nothing but slit and drift and make the tools for it it will be good. Anyone in eastern MO is wellcome to my hammer in, message me if you are not a BAM member and need directions.
March 17, 201313 yr This is the most informative thread I have ever encountered. I still don't understand the blueprint references. How are they accessed?
March 17, 201313 yr Access "blueprints" by clicking on the "pages" tab at the top left of the page. When the pages page comes up, find "blueprints" under "categories" on the right. Enjoy! :)
February 1, 201412 yr Where are all the picture posted by Brian Brazeal? I have referred back to this thread several times over the years and now every picture he posted is gone. What's up with that?
February 1, 201412 yr Yeah, what happened with the pictures? I used them for classes, also. I spent a lot of time taking those pictures, and now they are all gone.
February 1, 201412 yr Steve, Brian, I concur with your thoughts on the loss of the photos. I too have referenced Brian's, submissions to make sure I was getting it right. I previously used to slit and drift separately, but Brian's one function tool sold me on his technique. I still have an eye drift to finish off the hole but the slit/drifter does most of the work. A thank you to Brian for sharing his ideas and photos. They have moved me forward on tool making techniques. Bring back the photos. Peter
February 1, 201412 yr Someone has to have them, I bet they were downloaded a lot. I am pretty sure I have one or two.
February 2, 201412 yr They must be on an IFI server backup somewhere . . .no? I Site admins your help would be appreciated here. Brian's thorough efforts to document his processes where extremely well photographed and explained. This post with photos should be a sticky or blueprint as well as some of the other techniques he has documented here.
March 26, 201412 yr Also disapoined to find these pics missing. This is one of my favorite threads on IFI. I have a few pics of Brians punches I'll post here, but not sure which thread I actually downladed them from. This certainly is not all of them by far. This would have been an awesome permanent BP.
March 26, 201412 yr Thanks, Eddie! Look the third picture shows the undersized slot opening drift and the true size sizing drift. No one ever asked about that, but Dave Custer put it on another thread and made a YouTube video of I it after he came here.
March 26, 201412 yr Besides the ones Eddie posted, I can add these that I grabbed as well from Brian's ealier post:
March 26, 201412 yr No problem Brian, I am just glad I had saved them. I also just saved Black Frog's too - thanks for adding them. I'll have to look for Dave's thread and video, unless you care to elborate on why you use 2 drifts instead of 1.
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