We have all heard the story of making the metal hot by hitting it with a hammer. Well Moony from Australia turned on the camera and in 30 hammer blows produced color and in less than 50 hammer blows got to white heat.

 

 

'>Moony makes metal hot with a hammer

 

 

I would suggest he take the hot cut out of the hardie hole when he used the anvil. And maybe even put on a pair of safety glasses.

 

 

Let us see your video of getting metal hot by hammering on it. Yes we will count hammer blows.

One of these days I am going to do that to light my fire on a morning.  :D

Moony, looking good there!

I've heard that some Japanese bladesmiths have a little morning ritual where the smith and striker(s) use friction heat blows on a piece of iron. When it glows, they light the rice straw with it and then comes the charcoal and eventually a forge fire.

Frank that is a great way to loosen up and get in the grove for a days worth of work.

I have heard of hammer blows heating metal or maintaining heat, which I did not doubt, but this really was an eye opener.

 

Great video. How about the next volunteer uses larger stock ? : )

Moony is from Australia! Those boys are tough :rolleyes: ... he could probably do it with 2'' (50mm) he just didn't want to scare the nippers :D ....Or put Bic out of business!

Moony probably had a pair of safetys on, just on the top of his head where he normally wears them!

 

You can get it hot quicker if you use a bigger hammer too.

I tried this a few times with some mild stock a little over 1/8". Flattened out and started losing heat again, maxed out a little past where it would make paper smoulder. Think I need to turn it more and maybe use 1/4". Ain't giving up yet.

I have the white hot to stone cold in under 50 blows technique down to a fine art, if anyone wants some tips on that  :huh:

 

I heard on the grapevine that "the moon" gnaws on steel offcuts while he is forging and spits out slivers of perfectly layered damascus.

Super Cool.  I'm gonna try that now.     :)   Gotta add a hammer and anvil to my fire starter kit now.

I don't know about white hot, but here's my attempt;

 

http://s1354.photobucket.com/user/dpcutlery/media/MVI_1546_zps5ebb4e95.mp4.html

 

 

I don't know about white hot, but here's my attempt;

 

Hi  all,  yes, didbrookforge  he got it.  It's not hard to do just good hammer control  

  good on you,  light your fire of life and enjoy  

 moony  

saw a 2 ton power hammer maintain heat on a piece for a few minutes. several inches thick

moony i knew you were a class act :) and you dan! loving the skin test - id have believed you anyway :) i might even have to try this, i refuse to believe it is a man thing....

moony has an advantage, out there it is nearly hot enough to forge so he did not need to raise the temperature much, :)  here it is much nearer freezing so may be harder work

It's really not that difficult, just maintain a steady pace, and as Moony says, make sure you use dead soft wire.

Target starts to get quite small toward the end!

 

So, who's up next?

I have tried and my 6mm round just cracks up after around 20 blows.......I shall try and anneal some.....

i tried recently, after a few seconds it spilt into 4 pieces but went from cold the too hot to touch, will find something softer to try

are we saying anneal to get it soft enough then?

Yes, you've got to anneal it otherwise it goes into little bits. 

And go slow (ish).

ok slowish, but steady rhythm ...

mostly with 6mm i often see very rough cold finished, some looks like a long pitch studding and rarely see black mild steel and it varies a lot.

will try some 8mm next time