Power hammer dies

[jheinen 41]

I want to get new dies for my 25# little giant that are more suitable to knife making. Currently I just have a set of drawings dies. I figured flat dies with radiused edges would be the most versatile, but then I saw these "knife makers" dies on the little giant website. Has anyone used them? I assume the beveled part is for forging bevels, but it seems like a pretty obtuse angle for that? Do you think these would be worthwhile, or should I stick with flat dies?

[Alan Longmire 2,752]

I'd stick with flat.

[Joshua States 1,722]

Buy a set of the dies with the removeable face plates. It makes changing from drawing to flat a lot easier. It's called the "two-part system" on the parts page

[jheinen 41]

On 4/20/2019 at 11:32 AM, Joshua States said:

Buy a set of the dies with the removeable face plates. It makes changing from drawing to flat a lot easier. It's called the "two-part system" on the parts page

I was looking at those, but I'm concerned that you lose an inch of length off the dies. They also seem pretty expensive at around $700 for both flat and drawing dies. 

[Joshua States 1,722]

@jheinen, the work faces are all 2" x 3 " (unless you buy the oversized dies). That's plenty for what we do. In 12 years, neither my wife nor I have ever thought we could have used a bigger die face. Even my biggest Damascus billets do not get wider than 2 inches.

When you consider that changing a full die set out from flat dies to drawing dies takes about an hour or more, with removal, install, alignment, tightening, I thought it was worth the $. 

Also something to consider is that sooner or later those dies get worn out. Sooner if you use the hammer a lot. Replacing a set of die tops is roughly half the cost of replacing the whole die.

Edited April 23, 2019 by Joshua States