Brass VS Lead for soft hammer

[Jwest7788]

Title really says it all. I'm working on making a soft hammer, how does brass compare to lead?

Thanks @Alexander for the brass cutoffs, and @Kris Jensen for the idea.

Toxicity of lead a consideration?

Any other materials for consideration?


This is more project for practice on the lathe than anything, but figure I should do it as best I can.


In for sake of discussion: would indium work for this application?
Start at :54 to get to the point.

--> Discussion only, indium is like $250 per kilo, haha

 

[Johnwa]

Both have their place. Brass is much harder than lead so it doesn't wear down like a lead hammer. Lead doesn't bounce so it works as a dead blow hammer. Lead is also inexpensive and easy to cast into any size you want.
Personally I use a cheap plastic headed hammer.

 

[Alexander]

I made some hammers a while back. I have attached a picture. I think for automotive work like fixing your car the brass hammer works best. If you need to smash on something with all your might it is the right hammer for the job. For machining the lead hammer is nicer. It is softer and heavier.

 

[Jwest7788]

I went with removable heads,

The brass section and the opposite part come off. I'm going to gather some lead to cast a replacement for the steel head.

 

[Alexander]

Did you make that today?

 

[Jwest7788]

Mostly, started the other day. Got off early today.

It's easy to whip out a project like this when I am paying very little attention to exact measurements, haha

 

[PeterT]

Nice knurling! What kind of knurling tool was used?

I want to make a mini dead blow hammer... but only the head part. Purpose: tight spaces in the mill to tap down a part in the vise but where I don't have headroom for typical hammer whack. A little cylinder of brass was the first thought, but what is actually inside a dead blow hammer head?

 

[PeterT]

I hear some of my RC comrades mix tungsten with epoxy & cast in nose to ballast gliders. I think its in powder or pellet form, maybe like this?

http://www.golftown.com/High-Densit...rKeNdEPU0A4P0SS7LznUBsWBCnQY0q0bpAaAnpM8P8HAQ

 

[Janger]

Fantastic Josh! My cheap princess auto dead blow hamer has some sort of shot inside. You can hear it rattling around. Re toxicity - lead is toxic as we all know. I guess decades of firing lead shot around hunting is silently killing loads of birds (they eat it when foraging - one pellet will kill a big bird) and its a horrible death. What about maching 12L14? Are there risks? Filing & finishing? There's a company in the Usa making a 12L14 substitute without lead. I think we should start the safety thread. Safety of the metal worker and safety of others as initial topics.

 

[Janger]

--> Discussion only, indium is like $250 per kilo, haha

Just like everything else at metal supermarket!

 

[EricB]

@Jwest7788 that hammer looks gorgeous! Do the faces have a female-thread in them? How is the handle attached to the head? Great job!

@Janger machining steel with a bit of lead in it can indeed be bad for you, but like most things it's only really dangerous if it's repeated exposure over long periods of time. NAIT used to use a lot of lead alloyed steel because it was easy for big dumb apprentices like me to cut and not wreck stuff, but they've now completely moved away from it for this reason. That being said, machining a bit of it at home now and then is no worse for you than using a bit of lead solder every once in a while. If it is something anyone is concerned about though, then there's more than just lead to watch out for. Bronze for example can either be aluminum bronze, or potentially harmful Beryllium bronze. Aluminum has been linked to Alzheimer's as well, which actually does worry me a bit considering the amount of aluminum coring pipe we do at my work which involves a fair bit of aluminum dust floating around when we are deburring it.

Anyways, like I said unless you're working with it for hours every day it's probably not a big issue but if you have the option of a leaded alloy or a non-leaded I'd take the non-leaded whenever possible.

If anyone's buying indium to make a hammer face I think they better also buy us all a round to show off their new titanium-handled, gold-head (for weight of course), indium-face hammer.

...damn, that'd actually be a really cool hammer...

 

[PeterT]

Re 12L14 lead content, this question gets asked a lot. Use precautions of course, but also note it's also in many other alloys & sometimes much higher concentrations. Not to mention how many times we handled the 'pure' form in mis-spent youth: pellets, BB's, buckshot, fishing weights... I might have it wrong but I thought the bigger danger was fumes as in melting it for hobby casting.

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/general/lead-exposure-handling-12l14-173988/
The lead content of 12L14 is between .15% and .35%. The amount of lead in the brass that your water faucet is made of can be as high as 8%

 

[Jwest7788]

@Jwest7788 that hammer looks gorgeous! Do the faces have a female-thread in them? How is the handle attached to the head? Great job!
If anyone's buying indium to make a hammer face I think they better also buy us all a round to show off their new titanium-handled, gold-head (for weight of course), indium-face hammer.

...damn, that'd actually be a really cool hammer...

Thanks! Yep, female threaded heads on this hammer.

Haha, that would be a hammer for display, not for hammering, for sure.