Ive decided im going to anneal or at least draw back the temper on all of my hammers. last night while forging i was using the peen of my cross peen and due to my lacking hammer control, missed 3 or 4 times putting dents in my anvil face. not very deep but enough to upset me. has an incident like this happened to anyone else before?

Yes it happened to me when I was learning on my first anvil, lucky it was on an old anvil that was already dented. I found that when I missed the blows, it was because I was forcing the hammer, not letting it down by itself. Now I'm better with my hammer control and generally, my hammer faces are a bit softer than my anvil face, but not annealed. Recently I missed a blow but it didn't dent the face. Also, I have an annealed hammer for hot cutting on the hardy.

You did not say how many hammers you have or wot experience you have in annealing or heat treating them. A thought might be to anneal one or two and learn to use them. It is not the easy thing for a beginner to heat treat a hammer head properly as most of the time you are working with an unkown composition of steel. With several to do that may actually be a different procedure for each head. If you are experienced at annealing and heat treat procedures do not read wot I just wrote. If you wish to shorten the time alot on learning hammer control join a smithing club or get an experienced smith to give you some one on one lessons.

That and a couple of other reasons is why I like the medium carbons like 1045 for forging hammers and some tools.

What kind of anvil ?

Grind the edges of your hammer faces instead.

I start a lot of my students off with an old french crosspeen hammer that is nearly dead soft and some of them on an HB that has quite a hard face. That combination makes for few divots on the anvil!

Don't try to grind the dents out. Just pien the ridge around the dent back into the divot the steel is all still there now move it back to where it came from.

What kind of anvil ?

thats what makes it all bad... 125 pound hay budden.

A couple of points, first like Mr. Brazeal said, your first consideration is to properly face your hammers. It is difficult to describe facing hammers but that said, the face should be slightly domed with the edges and corners rounded. Properly faced hammers are less likely to leave dents in your work or your anvil. Secondly, work near the edge of your anvil. That way if you miss your work, your hammer is more likely to hit either air, or a spot somewhere on your work piece. Also when working at the edge, your hammer is less likely to touch the anvil when tapering an edge of your workpiece. Thirdly, practice hammer control and good posture. With practice, working near the edge of the anvil, and with a properly faced hammer, your work experience will be more pleasant, you will get more accomplished in less time, and your equipment will remain in excellent condition.

Its kind of like saying your going to pull out all of your teeth because you bit your tongue. Having a few hammer marks on your anvil is not the end of the world. My 400 lb anvil is full of small hammer marks It really does not effect my work much. Be more careful and practice bet even the best of us miss from time to time.

Go buy a junk crosspien or ballpien. Find a hammer in a box from a sale that already has a face that is soft. Handle the tool and use it to train. The junk hammer will be good later for striking handled tools. As Brian says, properly dressed face will make a difference as well. Holler me up on PM. I don't live too far from you and may have a hammer to fit your needs.

Timothy, outstanding analogy.

Its kind of like saying your going to pull out all of your teeth because you bit your tongue.

:o Love it :lol: :lol:

im not that upset about it, really, but upset enough to post it on here.

im definitely not losing any sleep over it.