Stop.... It's hammer time: New power hammer!

[Lewill2]

The belting pictured looks to be a standard rough top belting used on package conveyors. It might work fine for powering the hammer but it was intended for conveying product. Good thread.

I've never fooled with flat belt drives for equipment but with package conveyor belting the head and tail pulleys are usually crowned to help keep the belt tracked on the center of the pulleys. I have attended a few antique tractor shows and when they setup a flat belt drive from a tractor to a piece of equipment the belt never seems to be very tight. I never noticed if those pulleys are crowned or not. If your motor isn't square with the driven pulley you might have issues with keeping the belt on the pulleys. The weight of your motor might be to much for the drive setup and you might have to add an adjuster to reduce the belt tension. The belt lacing has to be put on square to keep the belt joint straight. If you are close to a major city/industrial area there will probably be a conveyor belt company in the area that would cut and or lace the belt for you. If you can take it to their shop it wouldn't cost to much to have it laced.

[turnnut]

to check the Siegling co.  google Forbo belts.

they are having their 60th anniversary this year.

If you go to their site, they have all kinds of belting.

Forbo Movement System
Forbo Siegling LLC
12201 Vanstory Drive
Huntersville, N.C. 28078

[Twilight Fenrir]

Sorry it took so long,our internet was down over the weekend. The belt is easy to cut with a box knife and a straight edge, I used to have quite a bit more but I cut it up and used it for bumpers on my dock so I know it is easy to cut. These belts are sort of similar to a timing belt but you can see the difference in the pictures. You could try googling the manufacturer to get more info on the belts but the label does say it is used for power transmission so it should work fine. The manufacturer should give info as to what type of clips are best to use for splicing. Let me know if you want it before the end of August and I'll throw it in the truck and send it when we get to Portland. Sounds like one roll would give you two belts but you can have it all if you want it.
  Sure like to see some pics of the the new blower and forge when you have time. Jim
.

Hmm, I'll look into how to join the ends when I get off work, but it's certainly an interesting idea. I wonder now if steel lacing on traditional flat belts would chew up the aluminum pulley over time... I'll tack a picture of the forge on the end of this post. That's how I picked it up. I'm almost done whipping it into shape, and will post a picture again when it's done.

The belting pictured looks to be a standard rough top belting used on package conveyors. It might work fine for powering the hammer but it was intended for conveying product. Good thread.

I've never fooled with flat belt drives for equipment but with package conveyor belting the head and tail pulleys are usually crowned to help keep the belt tracked on the center of the pulleys. I have attended a few antique tractor shows and when they setup a flat belt drive from a tractor to a piece of equipment the belt never seems to be very tight. I never noticed if those pulleys are crowned or not. If your motor isn't square with the driven pulley you might have issues with keeping the belt on the pulleys. The weight of your motor might be to much for the drive setup and you might have to add an adjuster to reduce the belt tension. The belt lacing has to be put on square to keep the belt joint straight. If you are close to a major city/industrial area there will probably be a conveyor belt company in the area that would cut and or lace the belt for you. If you can take it to their shop it wouldn't cost to much to have it laced.

Well, the pulley I got for my motor is crowned as well, and usually old flat belt pulleys are crowned as well. However, it doesn't seem that the flywheel on my hammer is crowned, so I'm slightly concerned about that, but we'll see how it goes. If it comes down to it, I can get it spinning and hold a file against it to give it at least a little bevel...

There's nowhere I know of.... That..... Hmmmmm.... Maybe that place in Virgina I vaguely recall hearing about.... I'll have to look into that!

My motor mount/tension setup is based on someone doing a similar restoration to the same type of hammer. Though, they were using a V belt on the flat pulley, so it may be different. My drill press runs on a flat belt, and is screw adjusted very tight. There's nothing to do but try, and see what happens!

[gibsontool]

Lewill2 makes some good points, the splice must be square or it will be very hard to get it to track properly and you may some adjusters on each side of the motor to get good alignment. I have seen flat pulleys that have been modified to crowned by using a thin flatbar 1/8" or so wrapped around the center of the pulley  and fastened by welding or drilling and tapping holes in the drum and fastening the bar with counter sunk bevel head screws. If your belt is 3"wide a 3/4 or 1" bar should do the trick,each outside edge should be ground down to thin edge to make it a smooth crown effect. This would take a bit of time but I know it works.
 Nice looking blower and forge.

[Twilight Fenrir]

Lewill2 makes some good points, the splice must be square or it will be very hard to get it to track properly and you may some adjusters on each side of the motor to get good alignment. I have seen flat pulleys that have been modified to crowned by using a thin flatbar 1/8" or so wrapped around the center of the pulley  and fastened by welding or drilling and tapping holes in the drum and fastening the bar with counter sunk bevel head screws. If your belt is 3"wide a 3/4 or 1" bar should do the trick,each outside edge should be ground down to thin edge to make it a smooth crown effect. This would take a bit of time but I know it works.
 Nice looking blower and forge.

I was wondering if that would be a way to crown it or not... But, that would fiddle with thr RPMs a little bit too. 1/8" x 2 is 1/4"....  *does some othet math* actually, that's a perfectly acceptable tollerance on the flywheel end...

If both pulleys are crowned, alignment doesn't matter nearly as much. You can bend around corners with a flatbelt with crowned pulleys. I think up to like 20 degrees if I remember right.

But, I'm going to be as precise as I can be. I plan to hang a plumb bob off the outside of the hammer pulley, and measure out from the body of the hammer, then reproduce that measurement on the motor pulley.  Only way I can think of to do it, other than just a really big straight edge, but that would take 4 hands. :P

[turnnut]

 do you have a laser level ?   you could center it on the hammer pulley and then shine it on the center of your motor pulley.

 just a 2 cent thought.

[Twilight Fenrir]

do you have a laser level ?   you could center it on the hammer pulley and then shine it on the center of your motor pulley.

 just a 2 cent thought.

Oooh! That's a great idea! Haha, thanks! Super obvious now that you mention it, but it never would have occurred to me!

[Twilight Fenrir]

And, I'm now getting ready for the Fur Trader Rendezvous, I'll be leaving tomorrow, so I've been working on my forge instead. It's all done, and pretty now! It's somehow even better than I ever dreamed it would be. That little blower really moves a lot of air. It will be MUCH better than the little no-name Rivet forge I've been using.

But, work on the hammer will continue next week.

[Twilight Fenrir]

to check the Siegling co.  google Forbo belts.

they are having their 60th anniversary this year.

If you go to their site, they have all kinds of belting.

Just got around to looking into this tonight... A very interesting site indeed. After poking about, I did find the belt Gibson is offering, and it is conveying belting, not power transmission belting, so it's probably not compatible with my purposes.

http://www.forbo.com/movement/en-gl/products/conveyor-belts/siegling-transilon/pmjqhv#panel_0

I really appreciate the offer Gibson, but I just don't think it's what I need. The "Power Transmission and Conveyor belting" printed on the packaging seems to be a reference to what the company produces, rather than the specific item in the package... that's my interpretation anyway...

[gibsontool]

OK I have to agree, I think my interpretation was wrong as to what my belts were designed for. I had looked at one of your earlier posts showing some similar belting that I thought you were considering. I  was pretty sure I had some similar belt so I threw it out there.
   Hope you find what you need.

[Lewill2]

The conveyor belting would probably work because all belts power transmission or conveyor are rated by the smallest bend radius and the lacing. The lacing is rated so much pull per inch of belt width. The bend radius will affect the belt life due to flexing of the woven belt fabric materials.

[Twilight Fenrir]

Whew, sorry for the lack of updates, it's been a hectic time, and will continue to be until after the 25th. I sold almost everything I had with me at the last fur trade rendezvous, and the next one that's coming up is historically where I sell the most! So my shop work has been sidelined while I try to replenish my inventory...

In the mean time... I picked up some new hammers! :D I snagged a 3lb Atha cross pein, which just came in the mail today, and a 6lb Atha straight pein which is scheduled to arrive tomorrow morning! Both will be handled, dressed and stove-polished for use tomorrow. The 3lb looks like it has never been swung! (It's a little rusty, but there are no other marks on the face/pein.)

[Twilight Fenrir]

Wooo! My last fur trade rendezvous is finally out of the way, so now it's back to remodeling my shop, and rebuilding my hammer!

I ordered, received, and installed my belt the other day. I also got the motor wired up.

Today, I picked up the hammer using the chain and holes I made for it, which worked stunningly well. Kept the whole thing nice and level while I moved it around... The moving.... didn't go as stunningly... my garage floor isn't the flattest thing, so I wound up jamming a crow bar under my engine hoist and levering it slowly across my garage to it's final resting place.

Plugged it in and... yes! The motor works! The informed guesswork I did on wiring it up seems to have been successful! Awesome.....

So why isn't there right now a video of me using said hammer attached to this posting? Wweeeeellllll..... not everything is perfect :P The pipes I used for the motor mount twisted with the torque of the motor, disaligning the drive pulley from the machine. Woops. To counter this, I'm going to straighten it, then drill and tap holes through each connection and thread a small bolt to keep everything from going anywhere.

I still need to de-tweak the treadle loop, too.

Also, there is work to be done with the dies yet.... As it turns out, the dies I received are not hardened. Which, is good actually, because I need to make the upper die significantly narrower than it is. I plan to slap it on my horizontal bandsaw and slice off about half an inch to make it fit, so it being annealed is great! Though, there's some niggling concern in the back of my head that perhaps the dies aren't annealed high carbon steel, and are just mild steel... but I'll try hardening the lower die and see what I get. My current suspicion, is that they were made, but the creator forgot to heat treat them before putting them into use, which is how they wound up somewhat deformed as they are. Time will tell on that one...

Anywho, here she is all belted up. In this picture she's not finished being wired yet, but she is done in that respect right now.

[Twilight Fenrir]

I've been fiddling with it here and there, but I haven't made any progress... My motor mount has to be torn off, welded, and put back on. I also need to put some tensioning springs, as the weight of the motor doesn't tension the belt enough...

But! If you' d like your own Easy-Helve, one just popped up on CL!
http://cnj.craigslist.org/for/5816930230.html

[Nolatoolguy]

Hey how is the project coming?