Seeing Brian Brazeal and Mark Aspery demo and teach for us in the past couple of months I have seen a lot of tooling...and got thinking about why we do certain things certain ways....

Maybe we could get a discussion going on when, why, and how we all go about differentiating our tooling from being handled and hand held...

Possibly some reasoning behind our decisions could come out too on why...


Peyton

Well I've noticed how most folks that use power hammer, treadle hammer or screwpress generally use handled tools or ones that can be held in a holder or tongs....

like you seeing Brian and Mark work I like Marks style of punches; but I need to wear a glove or risk getting burned; while with the style that Brian uses I don't need the glove.
I've been toying with the Ideal of making slot punch the way Mark showed us but putting the end on it like Brian showed ...call it the AB punch!

I have made and use quite a few tools, both with handles and without. I use what I feel is best at the time for the task at hand. For sure I use a handled punch when I am striking or use a striker. For center punching cold steel I use a punch, for hot steel a handled punch. For slitting hot steel I use a handled punch as I orient the end of the slitter in line with the handle and can start the slit in line that makes it start right. My touchmark has a handle, Keeps it straight and I can use it on hot or cold. Some of my handled tools have wood, some have welded steel handles. Ones used with strikers are wood.