Old timer at the farmer's market made me rethink my hammer faces

Last Saturday I was demoing at the local market and this retired farrier, must've been 80, watched me dress an anvil for a solid 10 minutes. He finally said 'you're polishing that face like it's jewelry, but you're never gonna use it that way.' I had been flattening and smoothing every hammer I own for months, thought it was the mark of a pro. He showed me his old cross peen with a slightly crowned face and said it lets you move metal without edge marks. I tried his trick on a batch of leaf hooks that afternoon and the difference was night and day. Anyone else get schooled by someone who's been swinging a hammer since before you were born?

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1 Comment

henderson.vera21d ago

I mean, yeah, that old guy nailed it. I spent way too long making every face glass smooth and then wondered why my work looked so scratched up. That slight dome really does keep the edges from biting in. It's like the difference between a flat iron and a rounded one, just makes the metal flow instead of stop. I switched my rounding hammer a few weeks back and honestly, I've never gone back. Good on you for actually listening to him, most people would've just nodded and kept doing it wrong.