Power hammer build

oldanvilyoungsmith

oldanvilyoungsmith

Joined
Feb 7, 2011
Messages
427
Well, I've spent enough money on supplies that I decided it was time to start a thread about this.



I've been slowly planning out this build, and am finally pulling the trigger on some materials.



Last week I brought home this used motor to power the beast, 1.5 HP industrial motor, single phase, 220 v.








Then today whilst wandering the scrapyard I found the right hunk of steel for the anvil, 9.25" dia steel, 3' long. Weighs in about #700.








That's all for now, I'll keep ya'll updated as I slowly get together the stuff to start the build.



Stephen.
 
This will be neat to watch , cant wait to see your wip...nice looking truck btw
 
You are off to a great start. The anvil and motor are two of the main checklist items. Good luck! I'll stay tuned for sure.
 
I've had my eye out for a chunk of steel for an anvil for years, but no luck yet. Good score...and good luck!
 
Wolf Creek Forge said:
You lucked out on that steel for the anvil..Great find!!
Click to expand...



Lol, now if I can only convince my wallet of that! :D



Timos, thanks, I do love my truck. Now I just gotta figger out how me and dad are getting this thing out without mangling my bed. ;)


Phil, they've got 2 or 3 more of these sitting around there, I can pick one or two up and ship it off to you :)
 
With the preferred 10:1 anvil to ram weight ratio, you can run a 70 lb. ram, a decent-sized power hammer.
 
I warned you it'd be a slow thread! :D

Here's my latest acquisitions for the cause - two pillow blocks an some grease fittings. Just getting stuff fer this as I can afford it.




___________________________________



The other night me and Dad got the anvil block unloaded, and to make it easier for moving next time, we decided to leave it upright. Not wanting it to fall on somones toe, I made a frame and braces for it so it'll stay up.

In the pic is my 147 lb anvil for comparison.

 
Also, I was able to get my hands on (for free) a 10' length of 4" diameter steel pipe, (sorry, no pic yet). I'm trying to decide if it'd be sturdy enough for the column, my dad thinks if I weld on some wings to the sides it'd give it plenty of flex strength. Thoughts?
 
Since this is a slow build, I'd keep an eye out for something a bit bigger... 6" pipe, or better yet square heavy tube, would be better. Scrap metal gets a lot more expensive when you start having to do a lot of welding and adapting to compensate for it's limitations. Square tube would be nice because that gives you a flat reference point to weld things like ram guides and helve pivots onto... don't know if you're going with helve or DuPont linkage?

The heavier your machine, the better, and a bigger tube or pipe will hold a lot more sand/ballast of some type. Local well drilling outfits will sometimes have cutoffs of fair length, sch. 40 well casing in 4,5,6,8,10". Pick some up for a quench tube while you're at it!
 
Yeah, that's along the same lines I was thinking... Oh well, back to searching!

Right now my plan is a guided helve hammer, similar to StormCrow's "Gunnhilda"
 
the upright for my hammer {it was heavily based on Gunnhilda also!} is a 6" square tube with 1/4" thick walls, and as Salem said, it was really nice to have that as an upright cause it has four flat sides. once I got her up and running, I filled the tube with sand and it works well to add weight and deaden sound.

Id say to get the thickest piece of steel you can find for the base. mine is 3/4" and id have rather had double that. it was flexing really bad until I welded some rebar at an angle between the upright and the base and that helped, but if I had it to do over again, Id get 1.5" plate even if I had to buy it new instead of the salvage yard. and then weld on the braces right from the start.
 
Its about 2" shorter than my garage door. I figured if i ever had to move it i could remove the spring pack and use a small forklift to get it out the door. So tht was my limit on height. Around 7 foot tall i think
 
Next pieces checked off the list!

Made up these rollers tonight in the machine shop, these guys will be used on the top of the ram for the helve attachment.


They're based off the design James gave me, zerk fittings on either side, and a trench milled into it to hold the grease, with a drilled hole connecting the two.









 
Last edited:
Well, I just finished paying back my parents for my machining classes over this spring semester, so hopefully I'll start being able to put some more money towards this and get it going again... Slowly but surely!



While we're waiting, I've got a question.
The ~#700 chunk of steel for the anvil is 3' long. That's too tall as it is. Should I leave it as it is and compensate with a small step around the hammer? Or should I get about 6" cut off it (I can probably get it done with the saw at the college's weld shop, I know the guys there as I got my welding degree from them).

My worry is that I want this anvil to be as heavy as possible, and by trimming 6ish" I'll lose approx #116... And I'll have to go through the hassle of getting it cut.


Thoughts?


Thanks guys, Stephen.
 
how tall are you? 36" is not all that bad a height. Power hammer lower dies is NOT like the old wives tale of anvil height being knuckles at rest. Mid gut to belt buckle, dont want to ever be bending over.

what is your shop floor like? Could you cut a hole in your baseplate and slip through 6" of anvil then bury it, would help to stabilize.
 
Well, I'm fairly average height. But the way I'm looking at is that where it is right now would be nearly perfect, but it's gonna be put of on a baseplate, wood blocks under the baseplate, and I'll have the dies on top of it. So, my assumption was that it's gonna end up being taller than I want it.

I may just leave it as it is until later on and see how I feel once it's more realish looking, and not just a sketch in my head.


My shopfloor is dirt and grass, and though I like your idea, it seems like it'd be more difficult to move and setup later (and Mom and Dad are gonna kick me out eventually... :D) We'll see... my main worries right now are parts... and money.
 
I'd cut it to size. Even at 600#, that anvil will be beefy. If you left it as is, you would have to extend all the other hammer parts 6" to make them fit the anvil height.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top