[TheForge] air hammer

[Steve howell]

>I know Steve Howell  
>spent something like 2 years, and many thousands of dollars,  
>rebuilding his Nazel- maybe he will chime in- but it wasnt cheap, and  
>it wasnt easy.

True, Ries. Try 8 years.
Total waste of time in hindsight. The guy I sold it to spent 1800$ getting it back to Bob Bergman who told him the same thing I did. A new forged ram to replaced the cracked one, Bob apparently quoted 2500$ for. That's pretty darn reasonable. I was going to make one from a piece of 13" solid round, but having already put a fortune into it, pulled the plug.  I'm way more impressed with the hydraulic press I picked up for 400$ from Pacific Industrial. I did the Batson thing with it- log splitter pump, etc. and with a 3 hp motor, does in one stroke what it took the 3B three or more strokes. Granted- it's not glamorous but it doesn't need the infrastructure, either. FYI, I did have 5 yards under the 3B when it was running. Cost for that was beer and pizza for 15 friends, a haphazard rebar cage and $500 for concrete. A year later the place was a sports bar! I have to grin when I hear of owners remodeling buildings that have housed smiths and trying to jackhammer all those gnarly foundations. Hee!!

Currently, I'm running a pristine 1998 KB-1 Kuhn I picked up in 2003. These are supposedly the only Kuhn's worth their weight before they went to the 'CF' series. It is rated at 75 lbs however, I've put my Varnamo shaper to work and made some beefy new flat dies for it that probably added 20 lbs between the top and bottom die. The hammer does have a little more lope to it but now hits closer to an 88. The factory dies for the Kuhn's are the size of a 25 lb little giant's, so it was a natural progression.
Despite all that I still don't think it could compete with the 100 lb. Kinyon I made back in '98. That hammer hit a better single blow than anything I've ever used. I sold it at a loss thinking 'manufactured' was better. The reliability thing looms large if you're not into tinkering all the time. For me the original Kinyon guides were the only downside of his design. I see people are now using the tube in tube ram design with great success. If I were to do it again I would dovetail the ram and guides and possibly go with a bigger (125- 150 lb) design.

Or- I seem to have caught a slight fever for a Bradley compact or Beaudry Champion. Anyone here selling?
 
Steve Howell
Seattle
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