The Armour Archive

Thinking of investing in one of these for production work,any reviews from owners on this punch?

Link to a page, or are we going to have to go googling it up on our own?

I sort of figured that anyone who had one would know without looking at pictures man. I'm looking for user input,not a photo op. It's a $600.00 tool.

The value of this site is that everyone has the potential to benefit from one person's question. If you're looking for reviews, it's entirely possible that many of us might one day be looking for a similar product, so for the sake of those of us on the side lines, a brief description and a picture would turn this thread from helping one person, you, into a thread that can help many.

I'm in the market for a punch myself, but they vary wildly and I've never heard of this one.

http://www.heinrichco.com/metalwork.htm

hand operated, bench mount.
1/2" hole through 1/8" mild steel Max
8" throat depth.
looks promising though I would rather see a tonnage chart.
It looks like its designed for race car fab.

The only time a RW #8 hasn't done the trick for me was when I was putting together spangens and I wished I could just slide the whole helm skull into a punch so I could punch the inner hole based on where the outer hole is, and rivet as I go.
This Heinrich punch looks like if they had angled the bottom half by about 30 degrees instead of being flat across, it would have been perfect.
But as is, it's about as useful as a RW.

Personally I'd go with a RW. Looks like even on ebay you can find a #8 for under 200 without trying, and a #7 or 7a for under 100 pretty regularly. I've kept my eyes open over the years and picked up large RW punches (#2's) for as little as $35.
If you need tooling, the stock sizes are actually quite reasonably priced at RW's site. Plus they'll do custom tooling for you like ovals or squares. Not sure if Heinrich offers a similar service.

I liked the 6 inch deep throat for making viking helms. A 2 inch is pretty useless for making helmets.

I'll post a link next time.

Using RW tonnage specs, I'd estimate the Heinrich at less than 5 ton pressure.
Its pretty much on par in throat depth with RW #17.

http://roperwhitney.com/chart-1.html

I have a RW#16 and its is seriously more efficient than a #7 or #8. It was worth moving up.

yes,I needed something that could deal with 14 gage stainless. I never made much of a profit doing mild steel stuff.

Bender wrote:I liked the 6 inch deep throat for making viking helms. A 2 inch is pretty useless for making helmets.

Right but what I was saying before is that extra throat doesn't matter if it's a flat opening. A flat opening will only accept flat pieces. If you shape them then they won't fit in that flat opening anymore, and a Viking helm doesn't have holes that are more than 2" away from any edge unless you've already riveted them, so I'm not sure what the extra depth does for you.

What is it you want to do with it?

I used to try to punch everything. But as has been mentioned, things get round and then the punch doesn't reach very well, even with a deeper throat. And I rarely want to punch the holes before the piece is formed.

I now drill a lot more than I used to. Stainless makes it a bear, but cobalt bits help.

Wade

Bender wrote:I liked the 6 inch deep throat for making viking helms. A 2 inch is pretty useless for making helmets.

Except for spangenband rivet holes and stitch holes for bascinets (smallest punch & die, very good) and barrels and greats, whose rivet holes are at the plate edges. Useless for sure, yep. Now the minus is a 2" throated punch can only manage half the job: the other half of the rivet holes take locating, and for handworking, drilling.

In theory you could locate, then punch, then assemble and rivet the quarter-panel into the frame quarter it is destined for, but in hand work theory and practice don't line up reliably.

But your locator action can be done with making a pilot hole while you're locating, if your panel is well clamped in and doesn't wander around on you. Pilot holes make drilling 'em out to final size a lot simpler and easier on your bits. I would: 1) secure panel somehow in the spangenframe; 2) mark all holes in its edges w/Sharpie; 3) remove panel and centerpunch all Sharpie marks; 4) drill itty bitty pilot holes in all centerpunchings; 5) test fit again for at least some holes lining up perfectly and drill or even punch a few of these, two or three being enough for starters; 6) rivet the panel in through these; 7) with panel now fixed in place drill all other panel holes out and finish riveting.

So, punching, with drilling.

I may just go back to what I had before.

http://www.trick-tools.com/Roper-Whitne ... dJrNZenmf4

The bottom die is crowned,it did do curves up inside of helmet skirts. You could also get slotting punches for it, though they were 110 bucks a pop. I had a jousting group that wanted a lot of German Gothic back then. I'm more interested in doing high end production items for people like that now, but no custom with any sort of time limit.

I don't need this work to pay bills these days, I have a day job for that. There is enough pressure to deal with there already. Off time should be fun, not stressful.

Bender wrote:Off time should be fun, not stressful.

Absolutely, but I'm looking for as many time-savers as possible. I'm gonna die some day, and when I do I want to think "I didn't waste any of my shop time".

Konstantin the Red wrote:But your locator action can be done with making a pilot hole while you're locating, if your panel is well clamped in and doesn't wander around on you. Pilot holes make drilling 'em out to final size a lot simpler and easier on your bits. I would: 1) secure panel somehow in the spangenframe; 2) mark all holes in its edges w/Sharpie; 3) remove panel and centerpunch all Sharpie marks; 4) drill itty bitty pilot holes in all centerpunchings; 5) test fit again for at least some holes lining up perfectly and drill or even punch a few of these, two or three being enough for starters; 6) rivet the panel in through these; 7) with panel now fixed in place drill all other panel holes out and finish riveting.

I've found that if you use larger hole sizes then it makes the whole thing go much easier.
If I'm using 1/8" rivets (I almost always am) then I'll pre-punch the outside holes exactly where I want them, but I'll punch them to 5/32". A transfer punch would be ideal for finding the inner hole location. Then I punch the inner hole at 1/8", and the slop on the outer hole is taken up by the rivet upsetting.

My lames and such come out of press dies,so if I use the same pattern I get extreme consistency. I make three witness marks at the edges and in the center to indicate where it needs to lie, in the extended position. Punch the outside holes in all of the lames with a center punch mark to drop in the top die. If you use a bolt that has a shoulder you get more accuracy. I just take cap head allens and hand thread them up to about 1/8 inch from the head. You lose accuracy with threads in the holes, as they chew off. Once I have the bolt in it's easy to just line up my center reveal mark and side mark and drop the punch into the other hole.

There is no drilling involved and I don't have to deal with chips all over the place, or a drill wandering.