I may be incorrect but I think that when you dial in one of those little giants the dies are supposed to be open by an inch or so to account for the whip on the spring. and if you are wanting a harder or more solid hit, you (from what I have read) are supposed to tighten the linkage in between the coil spring. Send Ed Cafrey an E-Mail he would be a good source of info on those little giants.

Hi Mike!

Welcome to the forums. Little Giant Hammers are becoming harder and harder to find....especially ones that are in good enough shape to rebuild...and if you find one that is ready to use, it's a great find. Now, talking about how much money a Little Giant Hammer is worth can be a broad subject....Let me start by saying that the last 25lb Little Giant I sold had been totally rebuilt about 5 years prior to the sale. It was "plug-n-play" ready. I sold it for $3,000. I also sold my 50lb Little Giant...and got $5,000 out of it. I took the funds from the sale of those two hammers and purchased a 110lb Air Hammer. Just a rough guess, but I would say I have purchased, rebuilt, and "flipped" approx. 20 Little Giant hammers in my life.

OK, that being said, some of those hammers I got for as little as $400, but those required a lot of time, parts, and money to repair. If there are no major parts broken and you could get either hammer for $1,000 or less, I would jump all over it. There are few things to look for on Little Giants. 1. Are there any parts that have been broken and brazed back together? 2. The material in the main bearing journals and the flywheel? Are there any shims between the bearing caps? (this indicates that there is plenty of babbit bearing material left). Don't worry about the dies not meeting.....there is an adjustment on most Little Giants that allows vertical movements/placement of the top die. It's almost a given that there will need to be at least some refurbishing done when you purchase one of these hammers....so that's to be expected.

Honestly, these days buying a Little Giant hammer is like opening a savings account....they do nothing but increase in value, and if you take the time/money to refurbish one, it's "money in the bank". You'll either have a tool that you can use the rest of your life, or something that almost always could be resold at a tidy profit.

There are a lot of "little" things to look for/at, and if you could get some good pictures of each hammer, I'd be happy to take a look at them, and give you my opinion. If you have specific questions feel free to contact me. And if you are able to get good pics, from different angles of each hammer, feel free to send them to me, and I'll give any help I can.

Thanks for reply guys. Ed I did notice some brazing on the Little Giant I looked at yesterday. I have some pictures though not very great. Taken in a pretty dark shop. I will figure out the sizing of photos and post them here. I made an offer to the fellow for 700 bucks . I had heard from other bladesmiths that a good working order LG oughta bring around 1200- 2000, give or take a few hundred. I figured if I have to spend 400 or so for shipping and another 1000 to have it rebuilt then 700 hundred was fair. Besides I know where another one is and Ive gotta lead on two more. Someone is bound to sale me one. Being a State Trooper I get to travel alot of area in a days time. Sometimes I get to talking to the locals and they are great for putting me on to leads. I was sold two anvils really cheap that way. Also had a guy approach me that had heard I was getting into knife making , and he said he had a like new 200 lb anvil hed take 200 bucks for.. Im going to go get this week.. I love my job...LOL

Hi Michael -- I'm jealous. Hope you can score one or both of them. If you do, make sure you post pix here and keep us abreast of your refurb and usage progress. We want to see the steel you beat the snot out of with it/them! Welcome to the ABS forums! Where are you located? You might want to post that in your profile. You'll never know what other bladesmiths you might be neighbors with otherwise. -- Aloha, Phil

Ha, ha...you were posting while I was. Now I'm really jealous! You know how hard and long many of us look to find stuff in our little corners of the world? I can assure you, for instance here in Hawaii, that stuff can be REAL hard to find. Geesh, you could start moonlighting as a "BS" tools and equipment reseller with all the stuff you come across.

Well Phil yr really gonna be jealous now. I took a friend to breakfast this morning and told him about the two trip hammers and the guys not telling me yes or no on the purchase of them. He said he knew where one was and took me to it. It is in an old shop building with the roof falling in on it. It seems to be in pretty good shape . I took some pics of it as well but cant find out who the owner is. One person told me it was repossessed by the bank. Im gonna try to find out for sure Tuesday when I go back to work. The top wheel ( not the one with the spring and hammer but the one above the motor turn but doesnt make the hammer go up and down. The wheel above the hammer will turn manually and hammer goes up and down. The dies seem to be in okay shape and the frame didnt have any welding on it at all. You could even read the serial number. Mike oh and Im in DYERSBURG Tn.

Welcome to the forum Micheal,

A good source of information on L.G.s can be found on their website www.LittleGiantHammer.com. You will also find their phone number there. If you get any of the serial numbers or any questions about the hammers give Sid or Keri a call they will be more than happy to help you out. With the serial number they will be able to tell you who the original owner was and where it was shipped.

Hopefully I can help you out a little when you are examining these hammers and what to look for. On a lot of these older hammers the dies are actually beat down and short. Another common problem is that the die some times gets beat down into the sow block. Run a knife blade along the front of the die between the die and base. If you have that much clearance the die is not down in the base. (Which in the long run it will save considerable time in rebuilding) Coming up from the die look at the ram guide (if your dealing with an old style) and look at the edges. It the dies are to short the toggle arm links could have struck the ram guide. In a lot of cases this is what caused the arms to break (where you commonly see welding or brazing). In some cases the original owner might of cut out the sides of the ram guide to allow the linkage clearance. It was a simple fix at the time but has since made for some interesting repairs when rebuilding. Ed gave you some good advice on the main bearings and examining the babbit and shims. Two other areas that you might want to look at is the clutch pulley and attached to this the clutch collar. The first is the clutch pulley, the wheel that the belt runs on, make sure there is not excessive play up and down. There is also a babbit bearing in the center of this (if the hammer has been left running for along time with out any grease, it tends to eat this lead bearing up). I've seen them bad enough that the pulley actually laid at an odd angle. If you look around this area you will notice a collar that runs around the inside of the pulley. Make sure this fairly well seated. In extreme cases they have almost cut themselves off the clutch pulley.

Hopefully this helps a little. As far a price I can tell you Sid gets 3800 for a new rebuild, the only draw back is the time frame you might have to wait to take possession. I've crunched some numbers, if you were going to buy a non-running hammer and put over 1200 in the purchase you'd have over 3800 in it to get it running properly again. Then again flea bay has driven the market up on these hammers since they are getting harder to find.

Dave from Diller

You're right Mike...I'm raging envious!!! You have a great resource in Ed and Dave. Both of them have rebuilt many of those puppies. I'm not sure about forum protocol and cross fertilization, but there have been some good threads on LG rebuilds on the net. If you haven't seen any of them you might want to ferret them out. Heck for some one like me, just learning the vocabulary and nomenclature would be a learning curve, never mind the engineering and rebuild!

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Great links Phil. I tried to get photos up the other night without anyluck. I have them on photobucket and have rezized them to 640 480. and selected the button 2 over from the right of the smiley face that says insert image, then copied the direct link from photobucket and pasted in the http box that opens,, but it only leave a code on the relpy without any pictures..

Does anyone know what Im doing wrong..?

Oh man the excitement!!!! I found two more little giant 25lb ers today. A friend told me about them and I called the owner he said told me to come look at them. I got there and one and a minor restore done on it. Basically just painted and greased . It ran good and seemed to hit hard. It seems to be in pretty decent shape from what I can tell. It is the transitional style. The 2nd one was under a canopy out in his shop. It didnt have a motor but seemed in decent shape if the rust doesnt bother you. The die beds, dies on both seem pretty unused and un worn. He really wanted too much for the one that was running and then told me he wanted close to the same for the rusty one. I told him thanks for his time I couldnt pay that for either.he told me how much they were getting for them on ebay and I told him how much shill bidding I thought went on there too.. He asked what would I give. I asked how much for them both and we agreed on a price..I bought them both!!!!! I got them home tonight without incident. I will have to get a bobcat to unload them in the basement tommorrow..

ps I still have one more to go look at, not that I need it now but I might be able to get it a home in the knife making community...

As soon as i get help w pics I will post them..

A few pics added... I bought these two yesterday..

I DELETED THE PICS THEY WERE OVERSIZE... sorry

Way to go Micheal, That's quite a score.

I'd still check the die height on the new style one. The lower die needs to be around three inches in height.

One thing that I'd like to note on your transition hammer is the pitman and the cross head. (The mickey mouse ear looking thing in the middle of the fly wheel.) The cross head looks like it is hanging extremely low in the photo. The pitman is actually made out of bronze. With the cross head this low it has caused the pitman to break. My recommendation would be to flip the cross head over, that would allow you to get a better bite on the pitman.

Good luck.

Dave from Diller

Dave thanks again for you comment and help. Im going to try and add a few more close up pics. The transition style hammer had several bolts loosened by the owner. He said he did this to keep it fron having troubles while sitting up. The pitman arm is loose, I dont think any of the parts are broken but I may be mistaken. I hope they are not broken. There is a line of oil there that kinda looks like a crack , not sure if thats what you saw. In the die do I measure the entire block or how much is sticking up? The block measures , from sow block to top of the die 2 and 1/2 inches.. Im a little worried about this. Is it a problem? Mike

Does anyone have a good E-Mail address for Sid at Little Giant? [email protected] isn't working I keep getting return to sender notices when I try to send him pics of a 25 pounder I found.

Jared,

The address of [email protected] is Keri's email address.