Sabre Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 well i was thinking that i could use a cone and turn the end into a point with a piece of sheet and then fill it with concrete. but have a smaller cone sitting inside the biggerone to make the cone a little hollow in th middle... does this make sense to anyone? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 The only problem is concrete is not resilient where the sheet metal cone will be, eventually being pulverized. It'd work for a while though. Another option is to make one out of rod. Roll a few rings, one the diameter of the base, another about mid sized and maybe another smaller one. Then you weld steel rods to the rings in a TeePee. The result is a mandrel cone without the cast iron or weight. I've never used one but have heard they work fine. I've seen pictures somewhere but don't recall where. Frosty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philip in china Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 I got a small one turned out of some 40mm bar with a piece of square stock on the base that fits my hardy hole. Works fine for what I need. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimbob Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 found this link Fabricated Cone Mandrel its welded up scrap Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 What size cone you need? There are a couple of small cones in the IForgeIron Auction. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primtechsmith Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 I can also put you in contact with a few individuals who make and sell these things... Peyton Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sabre Posted July 14, 2008 Author Share Posted July 14, 2008 well frosty your right.... the concrete idea is a bad one i will make a cone with some round rod and strengthen it with some smaller rod and then mig some sheet on... i have a 3 or 4 foot long piece of 1 inch round and a 10 foot long piece of 1 inch square witch is better? thanks jimbob il follow that. Glenn. i would like it to be 3 feet tall and about a foot wide at the bottom i would like the end to go into a point... the point will need to be strengthend and primtech its ok i am mostly looking to make alot of the tools i dont need badly and just to use for a few projects Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimbob Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 (edited) you might try a brake drum for the base with 1" pipe in the center ...you could forge the end square so it would take a cast cone for the top... also you take a look at the one in this video it's made of sections of pipe welded up.http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6057149132039979958 Edited July 14, 2008 by jimbob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 I have NOT made a rod cone so my comments are speculation. I would think that the rods built into a cone frame would work BUT the gaps between the rods could cause problems where the ring would "flat side" in the spaces. Covering it with sheet metal, the sheet metal would be too thin and would "flat side" in the spaces. This could be solved to a certain extent by more rods, up to the point of having a solid skin of rods. Even then there would be a "flat side" in the spaces, most likely not enough to be a concern at this point. Why not make up a rod frame as suggested, then cover it with some 3/16 inch plate steel. This can be done in strips of flat bar, or a cone laid out and bent on a press in 2, 3, 4 sections. Weld it all together, smooth out the welds with a grinder. Another way would be to make several rings with the top diameter smaller than the bottom diameter (sloped sides) and weld it to the rod frame. A sloped sided ring jig could be used if only a couple specific size rings were needed. Drop your newly formed ring down over the ring jig to true up the shape. Once you make the cone mandrel, moving it may become a problem. You may want to do some calculations on the weight of all this metal. As to the pointy end of the mandrel, make or have made a separate cone that can be used in a vise or on an anvil. It will be much easier to work with and move. Besides, no one said you had to have just one cone mandrel, or that it had to have a specific taper of xx* amount of degrees. You going to guild a tong groove into your cone mandrel? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brucegodlesky Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 Is that what ther groove in cone mandrels is for? To get a grip on the workpiece with tongs? I always wondered how they could cast those things and still be strong enuff to pound on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 I don't know what size rod would work best for fabbing up a mandrel cone. From what I've heard the gaps between rods isn't as much of a problem as intuition says it should be. I haven't tried one, it's just what I hear. I also hear it's not a tong groove, it's a link groove to allow a ring to be trued after it's been welded to a chain. Either way, some have em, some don't. Mandrel cones are for truing rings, not forging them so there isn't or shouldn't be any heavy hammering going on. It will get hit, just nothing like an anvil. I don't have one and I'd like to but when it comes right down to it I don't really need one, I can true rings on the horn, by eye. Of course I don't make a lot of rings, if I did I'd find or make a tool to do it efficiently. Frosty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
welder19 Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 The concrete would work since you really don't hammer that much or at least that hard on a cone, they are mostly for bending hot metal around it, I only use light hammering since if your making a rod into a ring you really don't want it full of flat hammer marks, but a better choice might be to make the cone and pour lead into it, really I guess it depends on what your going to be doing with it and if you need to move it a lot. If you were to do concrete just put a lot of wire in it. There are a million ways to do it. Be sure to show us what and how you do it. welder19 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 Anyone have the proper name (and references) for the grove in a cone mandrel? We may as well call it correctly, or at least know we are using a name chosen from a proper list of options. Frosty, I am not questioning your nomenclature, just calling it what I was told. Doesn't mean it was right, but was the information I had from a couple of sources. And as I have requested of others, posting references. A smith's cone or mandrel is a cast-iron cone with a round section and an even taper. It is used to make rings truly circular. Some madfrels have a long groove into which the tip of the tongs can fit when putting a ring in place. the size of the mandrel varies according to needs but in a general blacksmith's shop it might stand up to 4 feet high and weigh over 100 pounds. For smaller rings, there could be a mandrel with a square projection to fit in the hardie hole of the anvil or be gripped by a vise. Some large mandrels have their tips formed by one of these pieces that can be lifted off to use elsewhere. Practical Blacksmithing and Metalworking page 27 calls it a tong grove in the illustration. I like your idea of using the link grove as a way to true a ring welded to the end of a chain. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 I don't know for sure either Glenn, it was just what I heard and it made more sense than a tong groove. I've only gotten to use a mandrel cone a couple times, a grooveless one, and no trouble handling the ring with tongs. I've also seen it called a tong groove in more than one publication. On the other hand if you were trying to true a ring welded to a chain it'd be almost impossible if there were no relief for the attached chain, etc. I don't know what the groove is properly called but logic tells me it's more likely for chain and similar items hanging from the ring. I'll be happy as a clam to know what they're properly called. Maybe some old catalogs? Still, I've read more than one catalog that got the names wrong. Maybe we'll never know for sure. Maybe there is no correct answer. Frosty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hammerkid Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 Okay I had thought about this for a while myself and am not sure if it would work . I thought about taking as many pipe sizes as wanted and put the biggest at the bottom and work the way up by using smaller sizes of pipe. And Weld it Really good!!!! then take a grinder and smmooth all of it out. and have like a plate base. And all the pipe would be 1/4 inch wall . Remeber thats just a idea i had not sure if it would work .:confused: Thanks,Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimbob Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 Chris, thats what is shown in the video on Andersonville Smithy..you got to look quick or look at the others cds Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hammerkid Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 is it really? I didn`t have time to . will check it out though thAnks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
racer3j Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 The groove- is this a groove from near the point to the base. I was planning on machining a groove in one of my steel cone mandrels- like a spring groove. -insert one edge of my coupon in groove, then hammer and wrap around to get those sockets I was discussing.mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 14, 2008 Share Posted July 14, 2008 Rather than welding all the pipe pieces together, leave them separate and put a shank on them. They'll nest neatly, not taking up a lot of space, individually they'll be nice and light and best of all they'll work just fine for two sizes of ring, one outside and the other inside. I've used torched circles of plate for truing and bending rings for years. I have quite the stack from under 2" to better than 10". Frosty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NeatGuy Posted July 15, 2008 Share Posted July 15, 2008 Why not get some heavy plate bumped or rolled into 2 halfs then weld them together?. Grind the flats off the bumped cone. This seems simpler than tring to weld a bunch of rods together. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Leppo Posted July 15, 2008 Share Posted July 15, 2008 My Dad’s neighbor, (an old blacksmith, woodworker, machinist, steam engine builder, etc), has a unique cone mandrel which I believe he built. It has the standard tapered cone on one side, and a STEPPED cone on the opposite side (maybe Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 15, 2008 Share Posted July 15, 2008 The groove- is this a groove from near the point to the base. I was planning on machining a groove in one of my steel cone mandrels- like a spring groove. -insert one edge of my coupon in groove, then hammer and wrap around to get those sockets I was discussing.mike I'm not quite clear on what you're talking about Mike. If I have it right you're talking about a groove that's deeper than wide to hold the end of a piece of stock while you wrap it? The groove we're talking about is about as wide as a pair of tong bits, 3/4" - 1" and maybe 1/2" or so deep. There is of course a lot of variation from mandrel to mandrel not counting specialty tooling and there was a LOT of specialty tooling made. In either case a mandrel cone is more for truing rings than forming them. The position would be really awkward for forging around but is nearly perfect for dropping a ring over and bumping till it fits uniformly around it's circumference. Frosty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
racer3j Posted July 15, 2008 Share Posted July 15, 2008 Frosty- yes, I was thinking of a groove around 3/32nd" wide and maybe 1/8th" or 3/16th" deep-take my hot little fan-shaped piece of steel start it in the slot and hammer around. I envisioned holding onto the cone by the hardy shank, rolling it along on the tip angled down on the surface of the anvil, then laying the mandrel flush on the face and detail hammer around again, slide it up a bit and slightly rotate on mandrel so the inside indexing flange is out of the groove, probably a quick re-heat, and hammer blend the little flange left inside. On the same topic{quickie hijack} I now have two tapered endmills of proper diameter(s) and a bar of tool steel,annealed, to have someone plunge mill out my socket dies-two sizes for chisel proportion.mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 16, 2008 Share Posted July 16, 2008 It sounds like you want to use a mandrel cone as a forming tool. Forming on a sloping surface is (a cone being a circular plane) is problematical, it's usually a real pain keeping the work where you want it. If you're making scrolls the easy way is to make one the way you want it, then pull the center up (at a uniform heat) so it looks something like a spiral ramp. Then you put a retainer clip or slot in the center (I think) and you have a scroll jig. To use it you form the end of your stock to fit the clip, pin or whatever retainer you design, and bend the stock around the jig till you get to the point you want. Then you flatten it out. Violla! Scroll. For forming rings without a ring roller I prefer making a simple jig/die. Plywood for one or two or really large rings and steel for a run or small rings. Mandrel cones are for truing up rings rather than forming them. It's just a major PITA keeping the stock at the proper diameter point on a cone when applying enough force to form it. This doesn't apply to really thin stock, say 1/4" rd and under. However it applies in SPADES trying to form strip or flat stock. Of course I may have the wrong idea of what you're wanting to try Mike in which case all the above applies to something else. Frosty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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