Why do I need a Tungsten Carbide Tip on my Hammer?

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0:00 Upcycling an old and broken ball peen hammer
1:06 Milling a pocket for the carbide ball
1:54 Brazing and finishing the hammer
3:06 Test and explanation

[BlackBeardProjects]

Check out the way @OUTDOORS55 made his here:

[Battle_Beard]

Speaking from 10+ years as a machinist and working with a lot of carbide tools and also machining tungsten itself: wear your safety glasses when using this hammer. Carbide is prone to shattering with tremendous energy under a sufficient impact. It’s a powdered, sintered metal and tends to eject minuscule particles in all directions.

[OUTDOORS]

Thank you for the shoutout my friend! This straightening hammer is such a valuable tool. I couldn't believe I've gone all this time and haven't heard of it before. Works SO well and will save so many knives. Anyway, hope you, and yours are well!

[seasaw]

I work in a machine shop, and we have "straighteners." People who use these specialized straightening hammers to flatten TiN coated blades to a half of a thousandth of an inch across the whole surface. Invaluable on work pieces that can not be re-cut or ground after they've been finished. There is a big learning curve to straightening, and it's cool to see it done in a hobbyist fashion! Nice work as always

[thesweetone]

I had a tungsten carbide ring, just becareful as the material is very hard but also brittle compared to steel and like my ring can explode under certain conditions. It saved my hand from being crushed by a trailer... two weeks later it bounced off a wood desk and exploded. It's an amazing material but not flawless.

[Raven_Leblanc]

I once made a blade, where I wanted to do a pitted finish using my ball-peen hammer. Once I finished one side, the blade had bent to a curve of almost 15-20 ish degrees. When I did the other side, straight as an arrow. It's interesting to see a tool that is designed for this so specifically, and how to use it! Great job!

[leesass]

A way I discovered to straighten a warped blade is before tempering to clamp the blade tightly between two pieces of thicker and straight billets and then temper as usual. This method has worked for me very well.

[WandereringFamily]

Would never have thought of this in a million years. And I really appreciate your clarification that it should be used on the concave side, as I was really wondering about how stretching the already stretched side would straighten the blade!

[davidvanderwoude]

I was confused as to why you would use tungsten carbide at the beginning of the video, but I've got to say, this is a clever way to straighten a hardened blade, and it's one I haven't seen before. Just keep in mind that tungsten carbide has much lower impact resistance compared to heat treatable steels, which is what most hammers are made of. Thanks for showing such an interesting tool, I hope it helps out as much as it should. (:

[Rsama]

I am using this method since my apprenticeship as a tool and dye maker back in the late 1970s. In the mold shop we used this to straighten thin componets used in the mold cavities. During thst time I made a couple of similar ball hammers using bearing balls (5 mm and 8 mm balls) I still have them and started to use them when I started making knives about 12 years ago.
I do not agree that ist must be tungsten carbide, hammers using bearing bearing balls will just work fine. But I agree that ball peen hammers you buy in hardware stores, like the one you used to make yours are too soft to do this job, those hammers will deform.
About two years ago I made a straightening hammer with a flat carbide piece that is formed like the hammer of an impact testing machine. The hammer is light but created a pretty aggresive notch that straightens fast (I think Japanese use hammers like this).
I also saw the same video and made hammer with a 10 mm carbide ball.
Now a have the full arsenal in my shop.
One last comment, I never had any luck straighteing blades using the other methods shown. As said above I use hammers exclusively and never had a broken blade.

[Trader_Spero]

Never thought to try this. I'm definitely curious to see where this goes.

[rafaeltrentin]

I use this method about 8 years, its by far the best way to straight a warped blade, takes less than 5 minutes and rarely you screw up.
Using a tungsten ball is defenily the best way to build this tool, but if anyone wanna try this method you can easily do a simple and cheap tool using some spring steel, make something like a welding hammer with a 5mm point, quench the point and dont temper, it will work for almost any steels we use on knife making.
i use this cheap solution for 8 years, here in Brazil this method became popular from the tips of Luciano Dorneles JS.

[Emanemoston]

First little machine shop I worked in, we made these rings, about 13” in diameter. Some of these would move out of round when we cut them off. We would set those aside and once a month this old machinist would come in and set to work on them with a ball peen hammer. Peening them back into tolerance. Amazing.

[mndlessdrwer]

You can also use ground down tungsten carbide cutting inserts to create something similar to a cross-peen hammer.

[vermillionwarrior]

I love any solution that only requires a single hand tool. Great technique.

[steveballzack]

I made one of these after seeing OUTDOOR55's video. Works exactly as described and makes straightening really easy and quick. Definitely beats waiting around for hours and crossing your fingers hoping that a shim temper will work. I had three warped blades that had been sitting around for years unfinished, which had already spent hours and hours clamped in the oven. I got them all straightened in a few minutes with the hammer. The stress of the quench will now be a thing of the past for me.

[jasonwhite]

Im glad you were able to repurpose this beautiful old hammer

[JohnDoe-lsww]

I too ordered a pack of the carbide balls as soon as I finished watching Outdoors55’s video

[BeHeaven]

You look and sound so happy while talking

[davidgillies]

I don't know if this is still the case, but propeller shafts for ships used to be peened in by hand to straighten them.