I was just gifted a treadle hammer. Needs tweaking, as the current springs aren't strong enough to lift the head. I'm thinking I may also end up moving the head out a little as well, to strike more squarely on the anvil. Having only had a hand hammer before, I'm thinking things are about to get interesting around the forge. Any thoughts on what else I might need to do? It currently has a 1" square hardy underneath the anvil plate. I'm thinking some kind of drawing die or fuller? Maybe some arrangement for top dies as well?
Jason, Nice gift even if it does need some tweaking. I agree with both your observations about the springs and repositioning the head to center on the anvil. I personally haven't seen one that the head and anvil didn't line up when in the downward striking position.
Have fun with the upgrades and when you get it hitting hot steel.
Mike
Jason,
Besides the spring issue, this hammer has a fixed working height. The head is swinging up and down in a arc motion, it only lines up to the anvil at a set height. The easiest fix would be to cut the top pivot bracket loose and attach it so it slides up and down main upright with a way to fix it in position, your spring will need adjusting each time you move it. ABANA has plans for building a modified hammer that you could easily do to your gifted hammer. A better solution would be to make it into an in-line hammer, plans also available from ABANA. Check your locale blacksmith group as they may have plans in their library.
https://www.abana.org/store/ABANAStore.shtml
Steve Seib
Just had a brain flash... The anvil post is just square tube, empty, with a piece of 1/2" plate on top. One possible solution would be to get a 9 or 10" long piece of 3 or 4 inch round or solid and increase the height of the anvil. This would put my striking alignment better, and would also add mass to the anvil post. The hammer seems to be made for long dies. Some of the bigger tools like a guillotine fuller would be nearly OK with where the head alignment is now. If I built a post anvil like I described for regular drawing out, etc, that would work. If I hand set my welds then drew out on the hammer, we could be in business. If I want to use a spring fuller, I'll need to raise it up somehow. I could buy a bunch of harbor freight hammers and grind out some top tools with handles. The more I think about it, the less I'm thinking about cutting into it and the more I'm thinking of accommodations for using like it was built.
Jason, you must have good friends to get a gift like that! I'm lucky to get a card as a gift. I think your exactly right that it probably had some anvils that closed that gap and brought the upper up into alignment with the bottom. I'm sure you could fab up some sort of slide on anvil plates fairly easily, then you could change them out when worn down, or if you needed to reshape them a little. Very cool little hammer.
I've got some 2" square 4140 stock. Need to get some plate to attach it to and I'll be in business. The anvil is 6" square. I'm thinking of some 5" dies with 2.5 flat and 2.5 rounded for fullering, so I can draw out and flatten a billet without a tool change.
I also modified the spring arrangement and got that part working since I took the pics. Getting closer...
So two years later, having moved and had twin boys since I was gifted this hammer, I finally today got it set up to do work. I built some dies out of the 4140 square stock I had. I did them 4" wide, with 2" of rounded for drawing, and 2" of square for flatting and having a sharp corner. I had the dies welded to plates, drilled holes through the hammer and anvil plates (drilling 3/4" steel with a hand drill was fun), and bolted the die plates on. Here's what I ended up with. I still need to figure out a better base system. I may throw sandbags on it for now, but I need to build a proper foundation and bolt it down.
