Michael Posted December 2, 2014 Share Posted December 2, 2014 A decade ago I had some free time the day after Thanksgiving, and a cobbled up brake drum forge to try out and every Black Friday since, I've fired up some version of that forge and hammered off the previous days feast. The connection between the consumer free-for-all and black boogers/sore arms kind of day was lost on ours truly until the teenaged daughter pointed it out to me. This year I invited a friend I met at a class and a conference earlier in the year, and while waiting I fired up a bucket of coke in the forge and reshaped a mangled carraige bolt into a sort of rams horn thumbscrew for a pencil marking gauge. Dovid drove up with a bucket of hammer making tools and after we straightened out the drifts with the flatter and cleaned up the punches, a nice billet of 4140 got punched and drifted into a cross peen hammer that, after grinding weighs in at 2 lbs, 5.5 oz. I was shooting for two and a half pounds, (to replace a 2 lb cross peen that recently 'walked away') so I'd call that perfect! Neither of us had ever made a cross peen before, only rounding hammers, so we were kind of winging it. A longer bar of steel would have made shaping the peen easier. We did put touchmarks (a real one for Dov, letter stamps for me) on the cheeks, but managed it upside down. So before the heat treat I might run a drift through the eye again to get it right side up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSW Posted December 2, 2014 Share Posted December 2, 2014 Nice. I really was looking forward to playing with the forge this past weekend, but I've been sick. Maybe next week. I've got things to make for Christmas and times getting short. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ausfire Posted December 2, 2014 Share Posted December 2, 2014 Great!I wouldn't be in any hurry to pick up that hold down chain bare handed! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Posted December 2, 2014 Author Share Posted December 2, 2014 Ausfire, that's orange spray paint on the foot of chain that goes over the anvil, to help remind me of the parts of the chain I shouldn't grab! (Don't Ask Me How I Know This) paint on the part that goes over the anvil burned off pretty quick, but the rest of it serves as a reminder. In practice, I usually hook my hammer under the chain to lift it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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