Jump to content
I Forge Iron

Show me your Stake Plates!


Recommended Posts

John, I will get better picks and a display. I used the pic I bought them from. I need to get them cleaned a little and then show how it all works. I have done wrought iron items but I have only done one forge project and that was a knife from a file in high school and I am closing in on the 50 year reunion lol. Thanks for your comments 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 6 months later...
  • 3 months later...
  • 1 year later...

Does anyone know the proper height a stake plate should be mounted at?  I came across a Pexto plate that fits some stakes I have.  Thinking of making some sort of stand for the plate out of wood.  Just need to know proper height.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.  Sorry to bring back such an old post.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What are the stakes you use the most?  Mount it so they are in the best working height. There will always be stakes that are too high or too low.  Note that if you work sitting on a stool factor that in too.

I know an armourer whose stake bench has two levels to deal with different stakes and how he uses them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 years later...

You got a great deal there with the plate and stakes!  The plate is typically mounted flush into either a wooden or metal table.  It would be almost impossible to find a matching metal table, but you could make or buy a wooden bench/table and first cut out, then route out, then chisel out the corners, to the right depth so that the plate is flush to the table/bench. It has to be clear underneath so that you can insert the assorted stakes without obstruction.  Should you decide not to use them, let me know! Keep in mind that these items are for non-ferrous metals; that is, they are NOT for beating steel or iron for blacksmithing or bladesmithing.  The stakes are not hardened, made from soft steel, and using anything other than the appropriate hammers will ding them up quickly. 

 

Edited by Mod30
Remove excessive quote.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hello and welcome to the forum, 

if you haven’t already then you might wanna read the (read this first thread) it’s full of information that will answer some questions and help you navigate through the forum, 

On a side note if your afraid of dinging up stakes you should see some that Thomas made from recycled railroad hammers, I’m pretty sure you couldn’t break one with a 10# sledgehammer lol, 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good!  I'd like to see your take on them.  Once I have power to the powerhammers;  I plan to do another and draw out the cylindrical  ends into tapers as I like a small diameter bick for a bunch of projects I do.  If I do a 1.5" sq shaft I can mount it in my Fisher or my bridge anvil's hardy holes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

One of mine I traded labor for, one I found at a yard sale for $2 and the last one was free from a customer of mine who was a truck driver for a company that contracted out to the railroad to haul scrap off, so he would always pull a few things aside for me before he dumped a load, 

I got a bunch of cool tools and junk that way lol,

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thomas:  I would speculate that the high priced RR spike hammers are going to the collectors of railroadiana.  I've got one marked D&RGW (Denver and Rio Grande Western) that probably has decent collector value.  I wouldn't recommend modifying any of them that are marked for a particular railroad line.  The unmarked ones are better to modify.

For replacing the wooden handle with a steel base do you treat like a big rivet and make it a bit longer than the depth of the hole through the hammer head and then forge it down into the handle hole and file or grind off anything proud?  I recall seeing these when we were set up near each other at Battlemoor (an SCA/medieval re-enactment event for you mundane folk) about 6 years ago  but I don't recall looking closely at the construction details.

Thx.

GNM

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I hear you about the "collectors items"; but the prices didn't seem to be correlated with marked  RR IDs.  I don't usually shop in the "collectors" sales so it may be people having seen such prices but not knowing the *why*.  Like a dealer a friend of mine ran into in Ohio:  Going rate for "farm tongs" was $US5-10 and the dealer had a set marked US$45 and as he was trying to figure *why*, th e dealer came up to him and said---that's a great price and showed him a book where a set of tongs made by Henry Ford (?) as a demo with solid provenance had sold for $90 and so they assumed that common tongs would be a good buy at 1/2 that.  Sort of like saying Diamonds are worth $5K  per carat  so limestone gravel must be worth $2 a carat!

As to how my stakes were made, yes I forged a tenon on the end and used the eye of the hammer head to fit it till it seated good. Then I trimmed for length, reheated the tenon and riveted in place with a heavy hammer leaving it a bit proud for cooling shrinkage.  Flattened it out after cold with a heavy hammer and then ground smooth.  The small one with the twisted shaft was tig welded around the interface by a friend to gussy it up.  The long shafted one I was planning to hard face the "flat" and use it for an anvil---still waiting on power to my welder...However it hasn't shown any movement at all in the last decade of use!

Liked them so much I've been saving hammer heads to make more; as I'm in an old mining area some "funny hammers" show up from time to time at the scrap yard. (Like that RR spike puller hammer, been smithing 40 years and that was the first one I had seen like that!)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...