Blacksmithing Tools: Ball swage

[@robscott4723]

FANTASTIC!!!All the way from the southern tip of Africa!

[@FeatherForge]

Lovely to see someone using a press for something other than punching a hammer eye or forging Damascus. Great looking swage John. Looks handy. All the best

[@rigoniironworks]

This press is Awesome and yes, it can do a hell of a lot more than that.

[@powellmrp6335]

A well-planned economy of motion and industry. Bravo, Sir. Cant wait to see how you incorporate it into your pieces. Also, congrats on working at a forge while the Houston Chronicle describes the Comfort Index as 0's and 1's out of 10 ...

[@rigoniironworks]

thanks, yeah it's always rough in the summer. I can forge until 2pm then it's just too hot.

[@swblacksmith.7445]

Iv've been enjoying seeing the press in action. Very nice job on the ball swage.

[@truecockney438]

Enjoy watching this even though I don’t know what it is and I’d love to see you make a claw hammer if at all possible

[@keithspaniel]

Thanks!

[@MichHedberg]

very cool. Liked and subscribed

[@rigoniironworks]

Thanks for the sub!

[@jamesperkins9833]

Thank you for this video!

[@HouseMadeUS]

Really enjoy these videos. Thank you.

[@Alanbataar]

Noice! Your channel makes me want a power hammer, which is completely above my skills as a smith.

[@hedbergforgemetalworks7783]

Always a inspiration! Excellent work and great video! Thank you

[@hammeredanvil7377]

Intriguing !

[@Vikingwerk]

Very nice!

[@threeriversforge1997]

That press almost makes things too easy!

[@rigoniironworks]

Dude... I can't tell you how great it is to have "dial in" compression. Need something forged down +/- to 1/16" no problem.

[@marty01957]

Great job!

[@SchysCraftCo.]

Very nice job. Love seeing your videos. Always absolutely stunning and very clean design and video quality. Hopefully you get great use out of it for many years to come my friend. Can't wait to see more videos soon my friend. Keep up the great craftsmanship and hard work my friend. Forge On. Fab On. Weld On. Keep Forge lit. Keep Making. God Bless.

[@ghzatomic]

Great job ❤

[@firenbubble]

jolie. Merci pour la vidéo =]

[@henrywhite8098]

What is that large mallet like hammer you used? I’ve never seen anything like it.

[@shaungibson2033]

4 jaw Chuck is best for turning non bright stock to avoid damage.

[@mattsawyer2730]

Kung Fu masta. Respect.

[@tokolosh11]

Nice video as always. The handle mild steel or spring steel? Thanks for sharing.

[@rigoniironworks]

thanks! handle is mild.

[@ericrose419]

What kind of steel is your 'positive' (the ball) made from? I tried this using a hardened chrome ball bearing and it squashed the bearing flat.

[@rigoniironworks]

weird, I just used chrome and kept the dies hot and cooled the bearing between heats.

[@ElderCristhian]

👏👏👏👏👏

[@TheDIMONART]

I though, you are from Italy...But you are from Texas)) Rigoni reminds me italian names/surnames🙂

[@rigoniironworks]

I'm an American, live in Texas. My Dads side is Italian, from Asiago.

[@kaseymathew1893]

I had a question which was answered by video's end: Is it a ball that swages things, or a thing that swages balls?

[@rigoniironworks]

Yeah, you have to make an initial die to make the shape. There are other methods to create a sphere, if you look at my gambrel hook video, I show a rotational version.

[@davidjuarez5263]

Homie has to get ...flashing? Is that what it's called? The extra bits of material that squeeze out in between both sides of the mold.. I caught the edit when the hot steels going in for hammering.. then it cut's to him pulling out a finished product. You gotta be real about it man.. we'll appreciate it.

[@dicksargent3582]

If the proper amount of material is put into a ball die there should be little if any flash. You can see the extra material at the top of the ball in atleast one shot where it appears as a small tit. In other types of dies the amount of flash is determined by how close the preform fits the finish die. He is not doing drop forging.

[@erikcourtney1834]

There is no flashing. He forged it under the hammer while rotating it piece. Basically upsetting any extra material back into itself. If he took it to the press and just squeezed it then there would be some flashing, if the exact amount of material wasn’t used and slightly preformed .

[@rigoniironworks]

Yes, there are two ways to forge this sucker. You can slowly rotate, which eliminates flashing or drive down like a die forging which creates flashing. I do both. First heat I drive down, then take it to the belt sander to rough grind away the flashing. 2nd, 3rd heat I rotate until complete. *I do this because it's faster. If the tooling was bolted to the lower die then I could just rotate, but then it requires more tooling.

[@Brandon-so9fp]

This didn't go well for me lol, I'm the proud owner of a pear shaped swage.

[@andrewneilson227]

Steel pears are the next big thing in the metal fruit space though….

[@tymz-r-achangin]

Interest material but would be nice if you learned to talk to explain some of the processes as you go along, or can come back later to edit in the narration of some of the steps/misc

[@rigoniironworks]

My Patreon series of videos are longer and have me talking and explaining my tooling/process. My videos on youtube are more of an art piece/entertainment to the public.