On 20 Mar 2004 18:21:31 GMT, (Veeduber) wrote:

Cheap tools are no bargain... but about half of my bucking bars and bumping
dollys started out as the head of a large ball peen hammer... or small drilling
sledge. (You can pour the hole full of lead for added mass.)

Most homebuilders aren't aware of the fact that the basic bucking bars are
MEANT to be modified. You'd start with a standard #149 (or whatever), mark the
part you wanted cut away, fill out the ticket and send it over to the machinist
to be modified. It would come back, cut to the required shape with the edges
all smoothed up and the face polished. Then it would go onto the rack

I never could figure out why you guys go to allt he work of polishing
the things.

A little rust, a bit of pitting, and they aren't near as likely to
slide off. I'll admit they are a bit messy to use and it does take a
bit of cleaning up afterwards. Well, that and your leather gloves
leave hand prints on everything they touch after that.

snip

Nowadays, the hardest part of making up a buck is finding a suitable lump of
steel without having to take out a second mortage. For me, those Harbor
Freight hammers and sledges have been like money from home :-)

I've found our local steel supplier has a big bin/dumpster of small
pieces of all sorts of sizes and thicknesses and it's generally free.
Course I have purchased a small fortunes worth of big pieces from him
too.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

-R.S.Hoover