Hammers! They’re good for knocking in nails, breaking things apart, and generally smashing up the joint, if you’re in such a mood. Typically, they’re made of iron or steel and come in a variety of sizes depending on the purpose — from tiny chipping hammers for delicate sculpture work, to the heavy-duty sledge for tearing through building materials. But what if you built your own comically large mallet? Enter UnMaker 2.0.
Basically, it’s a really big hammer. It’s vaguely reminiscent of a dead blow type design, in that it consists of a moderately shock-absorbing outer shell filled with heavier material. In this case, steel ball bearings find a home inside the shell made out of maple and with a traditional tapered handle. In many ways it’s quite a typical build — other than the fact of its gigantic size and 34-pound head weight. Both of these make it a shoe-in for the ACME catalog. That roadrunner won’t know what hit him.
[Kevin] reports that it is not so much “swung” as it is “raised and allowed to drop”, due to its impressive weight. Clearly, it packs a punch. It’s a solid follow-on from the group’s former work – a truly gigantic utility knife.
A hollow hammer made of wood? Looks nice but probably not long för this world…
I’d go with an inflatable hammer with nylon meshing in the material so any holes you get won’t become huge tears. With a small pump and a roll of same colored duct tape you are golden to swing all day hitting anything you want. That would be much more “practical” and I use the word loosely.
Hacks don’t need to be practical, it is usually considered enough to be practicable.
I have a near endless supply of rough cut oak 2×4’s and I have made lots of “normal” wooden hammers out of them. From having sharp square heads that are good for cleaning up the corners in sheet metal construction, to gavels that are good for any kind of non marring tapping. I used one to knock the ice off the walls of the chest freezer. It is just the right combination of head side to weight to not crack the plastic of hurt the coils. I am not sure what I would do with a hammer with a 34 pound head. Perhaps get some PVC and try making one of the strong man dinger things you see at the fairs. But if I was going to go for building a fair type thing, I have this really strong desire to make a wooden ferris wheel. I would probably try that instead.
Aaahhh!! :-) The science of choosing just the right size, material, mass, and length of hammer for various applications. Now that’s an article I’d read. :-)
They’re used in timber framing for persuading posts into place and to seat joinery or pegs. The names for these tools range from the unimaginative ‘persuader’ to beetle or commander.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XSR4-_X5LMU
Um… I don’t think that the giant utility knife is “the groups former work”. The knife, as you noted in the article about it is by Jackman Works (JackmanCarpetry on youtube). He’s currently in Washington, District of Columbia, and not, as far as I know, associated with the Omaha Maker Group. They just really liked the hackaday article about Mr Paul Jackman’s utility knife build for the utility knife blade made by some dude who finds stuff on the streets of new york.
The utility knife is not our former work. The box case, a tour of our space and several mini maker faires are Omaha related. http://omahamakergroup.org/2017/03/22/bankers-box-storage-plans/
Usually when the “not a hack” brigade pipes up, I’m on the other side, explaining how some random project actually deserves to be here. So it’s with some surprise that I find myself, in this case, baffled at why this is here.
That animated GIF really introduced the project.
I had really no idea what to expect with the headline mentioning “Hammer”
Funny though, that the most interesting part of this hammer (the “not bouncing up”) isn’t visible in the video at all ;)
Sledgeomatic: https://youtu.be/ErppAlOIGQE
There is a hammer blow in Mahler’s 6th. It is supposed to be a loud dull thud. This hammer might be perfect.