Jura T Posted April 18, 2009 Share Posted April 18, 2009 Now that my PH is up and running, it is time to learn how to use it. I checked the UMBA video library page and there seems to be quite a few DVDs on power hammers. Can any of you recommend any of the DVDs? I've got flat dies, so I'm mainly interested in learning how to use them and making tooling for them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
james gonzalez Posted April 18, 2009 Share Posted April 18, 2009 Clifton Ralph at his place. audio is shaky and there are dull spots, but he sure knows his stuff. The bendele/bonifas is good too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
patrick Posted April 18, 2009 Share Posted April 18, 2009 I have them all. Get them all. They are only $5 each. If you have to be selective, get the one with Clifton Ralph, Steve Parker and a third guy whose name escapes me. It was filmed in Indiana in 2007 or 2008. I'd also plug the one with Pat Nowak (me) from November of 2007? The audio is good and there is a lot of blackboard drawing/explanation to explain why certain things are done the way they are. The Clifton DVDs are great, but it helps to have a bit of power hammer background already when you watch those since some things are shown but not always explained. If you are willing to spend a bit more, contact Clifton directly and you can get a 10 hour series he did in 1990 on power hammer work. That one is just him and another man runnng the camera. Excellent information that is very well explained. Patrick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jura T Posted April 20, 2009 Author Share Posted April 20, 2009 Thanks. I will get the ones you guys suggested (and a couple more ).I have them all. Get them all. They are only $5 each. The problem isn't so much the money but limited time. There are twenty or so DVDs with power hammer work. Watching something 100 hours would take me years... I ordered 12 DVDs about year and a half ago, still haven't watched all of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted April 20, 2009 Share Posted April 20, 2009 Watching 100 hours of videos should take , , , , , about 100 hours (grin). Watching them over and over taking notes could take a bit longer. (Bigger Grin). Applying the knowledge from the videos to your power hammer to become as good ad the demonstrator, that could take a while. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shane Stegmeier Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 (edited) The third guy was Kurt Farenback also an industrial blacksmith, who has a complete set of LGs and a couple steam hammers. Clifton worked in a steel mill in Gary IN, till he retired. Steve Parker makes tongs for big hydraulic forging press work, he works all day long on a Nazel B3? or B4? and it was 2007;-) You didn't make it to the 08 IBA conference;-) I was agrueing with Clifton last weekend at a local hammer-in... He was poo pooing the small selfcontained hammers, and contending that you had more power and a wider range of blows on a mechanical hammer, and you could get it cheaper. Which is all true, but I was explaining that I was a "timid";-) and didn't like a mechanical hammer eating my lunch, when I could get an air hammer to ease up to the work if that was what I needed... The other advantage of an air hammer is that you do not need to make physical adjustments to the hammer to use tooling, which you often should do with a mechanical hammer. Clifton would like to see me get a little more gumption and a decent sized mechanical hammer, so I could get some real work done;-) If I got to work on one everyday, and could get a really accurate feel for how the hammer is going to behave, I might. But right now I don't get into the shop everyday, let alone every week, so walking in cold I would rather have a nice polite but less "capeable" or "aggressive" air hammer, rather than a mechanical hammer that hits harder and faster... YMMV Air hammers suit my temperment better, I will likely get around to buying and or building a mechanical, maybe after getting a decent small steam hammer??? ;-) Depends on what God drops into my lap first, and hopefully he only figuritively drops it in my lap, any hammer I would likely buy would certainly kill me if it literally fell in my lap of course... ;-) Anything remotely well behaved is better than working too much by hand (this said by someone who regularly forges 1" square by hand, urgh!) ;-) Edited April 22, 2009 by Fionnbharr (finn:-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
781 Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 Finn You make good points about the air versus mechanical hammer. I know you should adjust a mechanical hammer but the only time I losened the adjusting nut was when I rebuilt one of my 50# LGs but with my air hammer I can chisel/ butcher, put in top/bottom tools ect. I also know there is not much chance of changing Clifton's way of thinking either. Most of the large hammer people I have watched can trace at least some of their learning back to Clifton Ralph as in at least my opinion HE IS THE HAMMER MAN You listed the people in the DVD Correctly. They were using an Iron Kiss hammer built by John Larson. It was about the only demonstration I saw Nathan Roberson (hand hammer maker) sit through the whole thing. Usually he is out in the tail gate area talking Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shane Stegmeier Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 Yep Clifton is the man for power hammers. Flat dies and furniture, and a good bit of daylight between the dies and he can do some really interesting stuff. I have had the opportunity to take a private class with Clifton and Kurt, and have enjoyed listening to Clifton at a bunch of conferences tell stories about working in the forge shop in the mill, and any number of thing. And I know Jo Ann is a saint, cause she is such a sweet person to talk to in her own right, and she hasn't killed Clifton yet... ;-) I know he really knows his stuff, and he has been instrumental in diseminating much of this information about flat die forging. Clifton is a treasure, an opnionated, crusty and cantankoris treasure, but a treasure none the less... :-) Clifton is also a confrontational type A personality, I am not. I can recognise that we both want the same thing, to get the peice made correctly quickly to the best of our ability. But what that looks like when I do it is different from when he does it, but he pushes and wants to work faster and smarter, and has a lot of confidence in the machine he is working on and in himself. I am more cautious, and I don't trust myself on a mechanical hammer. But in my own defence Clifton is fond of saying 'Anyone who says there is ONE right way to do something is full of ..... If my way works, and it suits me better, then for me it is 'the right way'... Clifton just doesn't have a lot of patience (I could end the sentence right here;-) with people with more money than sense who buy these little self contained hammers, and love then and watch then tup' but don't manage to produce much of anything. If you can make the machine sing and can produce something, you might get a little grudging respect, and a lot of ribbing;-) Nathan has seen a lot of demonstrators, and to be honest that flattens out your learning curve, you don't tend to run across a "new" useful bits of information very often, so you look for situations where you are considerably more likely to be able to pick up a few "new" ideas to add to your toolbox. That demo had a huge wealth of experience and there were some neat tricks that most smiths have never seen before, having never worked in an industrial setting with a bunch of immigrant blacksmiths and steam hammers. I stayed glued to the demo for as long as I could, but I had to get up occasionally to stay awake and/or still be able to move, and to check on my son. I missed most of Steve's demo on tongs on the hammer, and the dvd focuses on Clifton while Steve is working. Steve's paddle for making tongs works just slicker than snott, he makes it look just so easy... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
basher Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 bringing this one up again. Is the full moon press the place to get this DVD? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Larson Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 The tire hammer man did a demo/tape that shows lotsa tooling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
781 Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 Clifton lowered his price on his set of 12 hours of blacksmithing so going direct would be the best price as I dont know if Judy at Blue Moon has got the word to lower her price also Hopefully Clifton will be at the Pontiac show this weekend Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ric Furrer Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 Clifton lowered his price on his set of 12 hours of blacksmithing so going direct would be the best price as I dont know if Judy at Blue Moon has got the word to lower her price also Hopefully Clifton will be at the Pontiac show this weekend So...what is the price from Clifton? Ric Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ric Furrer Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 I have been using mechanical hammers for most of my life. I am so used to them, that I kinda avoided even trying out an air hammer. Recently, I attended a PABA meeting, and John Larson was there, with two of his hammers and an air compressor on the back of a flatbed trailer. John was nice enough to allow me to "test drive" his air hammers, and I was shocked at how hard they hit, and how easily those blows can be controlled. Another asset to his design is that the top and bottom dies are rotatable, due to the set screw arrangement fastening the dies in place, which can be used to tremendous advantage. If I get some excess capital, I am going to buy one of his machines! Odd how that works eh? Being perfectly fine with what you have till you try something else. I agree that John makes a good tool. Ric Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
basher Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 does anybody have a contact email for clifton as I would rather go direct... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
781 Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 This is what I have for clifton his email is hammerman @??? but here is his phone Here is Clifs address and number. Clifton Ralph 4041 west 47th Gary Indiana 46408 Phone 219-980-4437 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Freddie Posted July 14, 2011 Share Posted July 14, 2011 So...what is the price from Clifton? Ric Somewhere around $200 (as I recall... sorry, I'm a victim of CRS).. and worth every penny! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
781 Posted July 14, 2011 Share Posted July 14, 2011 I belive that was the old price Dont recal the price possibly 125 they are on dvd now and 12 hours long Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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