[TheForge] Interchangeable LG dies

Sat Oct 9 14:15:20 EDT 2004

Hi Walt,  Spring dies are nice and easy to slip in and out......no doubting
that.

I find the lower bolt on dies nice for making a weld up, forged and drilled,
or machined die that is one sided, like if you want to make collars and
drive a piece of stock into a half rounded swage to create that "D" shape
for a collar of that type.  When you want to expand the radius of the lower
die to something greater (like a rail cap), that can be fastened in as well.
Clapper dies tend to jounce around on certain items.....like long runs and
don't have the accuracy of fixed dies running opposite of each other.  Two
handed sterring of the material is nice as well.

Now picture if you want to run a fuller across from a flat die to make a
foot merely by turning your piece.  If you have a few to do........you use a
hand held tool for doing them.......it you've got lots to do, you could make
the dies hold the tool and you can rotate your stock with two hands - to get
the results....... like lets say You've got to make 200 parts for a railing,
then the dies make sense to put something together for that application.

Spring swages also have the added disadvantage when working on thick or wide
stock of things not staying centered.  When you run dies that have a five
inch opening.......that's a lot more controled operation thru out the total
distance instead of having a spring swage "pinch" material to one side.

Also Consider an element where you would make long cattail like
leaves......one could run a V die down the middle for the center vien, then
you could run a "furling" die across from the V to further shape the
material.   If you started a two step process with the lower die, got what
you wanted, then added the top die to make it more pronounced and add more
shape to it (using the lower die as a timing/alignment/locator die).

If your trying to shape something with multiple indentations, spring swages
tend to shake rattle and roll thru something like that due to the resistance
of the material changing direction.  If you have two fixed dies opposing
each other to do a process like that your not repairing tools or dealing
with fighting that resistance movement. As an example - use a taper going
into a ball in mid material, then another taper leaving the ball - that's a
good example of what I'm talking about.  You just rotate the stock in the
die to give that baulister configuration set up within the hammer.  For
doing 10 you'd get away with a spring swage.......for 100+ you might make up
a die to accomplish this.

These bolt on dies are nice for textureing as well..........and sometimes
you want to texture two sides of something.......this is another case of
where they excel.......your not wrecking side one when doing side two.

I've also make up little three step dies to do three different procedures in
one heat - fuller, flatten, indentation of a ball for floral button.  Things
like this just make it simple to make a bolt on flat to do the job then keep
it or toss it when done.  Again, you could use low profile hand held tools,
but if it's multiples, it saves heat to hit 1, 2, 3 instead of changing
tools.

Ralph

----- Original Message -----
From: "Walter L. Mullett" <wmullett at bright.net>
To: "Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Friday, October 08, 2004 8:15 AM
Subject: [TheForge] Interchangeable LG dies

> I looked again at the hammer blow article to see if there was anything I
> missed in it.  I can see how a pair of interchangeable dies would work for
> flat and drawing dies but I would think it would be hard to align them for
> more complicated operations.  I just don't see how you can align them
> properly.  Matt's article suggests that he uses them for many operations
but
> the only examples shown are fullering dies.
>
> The interchangeable bottom die looks to be a great idea.   But if you need
a
> complicated, two part die, I would think a clapper bolted in the bottom
> would be better.
>
> Am I missing something?
>
> Walt
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Schade <schade at acegroup.cc>
> To: Sponsored by ABANA <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
> Date: Thursday, October 07, 2004 7:05 PM
> Subject: Re: [TheForge] ABANA Election Results
>
>
> >
> >On Oct 7, 2004, at 8:39 AM, Ralph Sproul wrote:
> >
> >> Hi Bob,  At first Sid didn't offer the top dies as they were to small.
> >>  I
> >> think the top die is the fellow who wrote the articles doing?
> >> ...........or
> >> did you find the top dies from Sid also listed?
> >>
> >> Ralph
> >>
> >
> >Ralph,
> >
> >According to the Hammers Blow article, Matt Waldrop had  the bottom
> >dovetail (from Sid)
> >and asked Sid to make him a matching top. As you said the top dovetail
> >is smaller than
> >the bottom but Sid made the top base the same size as the bottom
> >(except for the
> >dovetail of course). Hole spacing is the same. It must have worked for
> >Matt. He is
> >very enthusiastic about being able to make matching dies easily.
> >
> >Sid must have decided that if it worked for Matt he would offer it in
> >his sheet.
> >
> >By the way the price I mentioned is for a LG 25lb.
> >
> >If I misread any of this I hope someone who has the Hammers Blow will
> >correct this.
> >
> >Bob
> >
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