November 11, 201510 yr Hey guys...We'er getting to ready to make some new tooling. We have a homemade guillotine that's been a good one and taken much abuse but years ago when it was made the only thing we had to make dies with was 3/8" thick bar..Didn't take long to find out that 3/8" was a bit too thin for many things..Ive noticed that the smithing magician has 3/4" thick dies and most C frame guillotines have at least 1/2"...What thickness dies do you prefer? Not really talking about the shape or type of die just the starting thickness.
November 11, 201510 yr Greetings Kyboy, I have several gillotine set ups.. I designed the original forming lower die for the Mr. Hoffman. His series used 3/4 in thick dies. I have modified ones with thinner dies by welding the desired thicker form on both top and bottom dies using the thin part just to guide it in the frame.. Another trick is to use a long flat block for the bottom die so that only the top die makes an impression or form.. Great tools and easily modified to suit your needs.. I hope this helps.. Forge on and make beautiful things Jim
May 4, 20242 yr Resurrecting this thread with the same question as the original post. What size dies does everyone have? Thickness and width please!
May 4, 20242 yr I wish I remembered Will, when I built mine I started with the piece of leaf spring I figured I could get the most dies out of and built out from there. I also wanted to be able to work across or lengthways on the stock so my guillotine doesn't look like "normal." Sooooo, I made an open throat frame with the dies on a 45* angle so I can pass stock across or along the dies. Say I want to fuller a piece down or put a fuller in a blade. Rotate the guillotine to suit how I want to address the anvil depending on what I'm doing. The last pic is a detail WIP to show the open throat support and the upper die guides. At first I welded a piece of 1/2" square across the top of the top tie as a striking surface but they didn't survive long so I chamfered the striking surface SLIGHTLY and made sure the temper wwas drawn to dark straw. Version two will have a socket to receive the hardy shank so I can use the guillotine over the center of the anvil rather than on the heel. Frosty The Lucky.
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