I thought a similar hammer would be a fitting project to start my experience with the Tormach CNC Lathe, so I thought I would get started doing a little design work while I wait for the lathe to arrive. I think that the Conversational Wizards Tormach provides with the LinuxCNC control for the lathe should make a hammer like this very easy to do. I’ve decide to call the tool the “T-Hammer” (Tormach Hammer).
My design goals for the project included:
– Plan for how to deal with parts longer than 3 or 4x diameter since the Tormach has no tail stock.
– Desire to make the hammer look good as well as be an excellent tool.
– Desire for interchangeable heads to satisfy different applications.
– Bar Stock sizes compatible with the 5C Collet Closer on the Tormach.
– Compatible with off-the-shelf o-rings. In this case 3/16″ with a 3/4″ ID.
Here are my initial design sketches for the project:
A rendering done with Rhino3D and Flamingo of the T-Hammer (Tormach Hammer)…
Ghost view makes the individual components of the T-Hammer more evident…
Building the T-Hammer requires making the following parts:
– Head (Dark Blue): To be made of alloy steel such as 4130. We’ll need to make it a true cylinder with a hole for studs at either end and a hole for the neck in the middle. All holes will need to be threaded.
– Neck (Red): To be made of aluminum. We want a heavy head and a light handle for better feel when swinging. We can’t turn the length of this long piece without a tailstock, but we can settle for a nice satin finish and thread either end by choking up on the piece in a 5C collet.
– Handle (Purple): To be made of aluminum. Semi-circular grooving is designed to hold the o-rings and we’ll organize it so we can turn this piece with a flip so not much overhang. The line at the middle will be located where we’re going to put an o-ring groove so it will disappear and no one will be the wiser that the piece was flipped and not turned in one operation.
– 3 Tips: One each of brass, alloy steel, and hard nylon. Each tip gets a nice chamfer on one end, and a threaded hole for the other. Tips can be interchanged and the third tip stores on the end of the handle.
In addition to the parts we’ll turn on the lathe, we’ll need some o-rings and studs which we’ll get from McMaster-Carr or some other handy source.
I intend to make everything on the Tormach lathe except for the hole on the head the neck screws into. We’ll need a milling machine for that task, though I suppose you could also use a drill press.
It’ll be a little while until I receive the Tormach lathe and get it set up and tooled, but once I do, future articles will cover each part and will include step-by-step shots of how I made the part on the Tormach lathe. I don’t expect it to take too long once I get rolling.
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Recently updated on May 16th, 2023 at 02:39 pm

Bob is responsible for the development and implementation of the popular G-Wizard CNC Software. Bob is also the founder of CNCCookbook, the largest CNC-related blog on the Internet.
What a great metal-shop class project!
I think this would be fun to have these for customized parties / events or other unique situation where this “classic” item like this would be a nostalgic present / parting gift!
I never made one of these myself. I do wish that I had one… and now that I see its so cute and the size and all….
I kinda want it for my little dude….. He’d love it!
CNC programs? I know, terribly lazy. But why not? The fun here would seem to be embellishment and fun. My students made something similar years ago and I still have three that I use frequently. Thanks for the post.
Edward, thanks for joining the discussion.
One of the things I want to demonstrate with the T-Hammer is the power of Conversational CNC–no programming required. Manual machinists often dismiss CNC as being too slow for simple projects and only suited to production part runs. The point to parts like the components of the hammer where they say it would take longer to make drawings in CAD and run a CAM program than to just make the darned thing on a manual lathe. Personally, I find the drawings keep me from screwing things up, so I will always start from at least a sketch on a napkin. But, for these simple parts, there isn’t really a need for CAM. Tormach has built some really nice Conversational capabilities into the lathe, and I offer Conversational CNC in our G-Wizard Editor product, so this will be a good showcase for the concept.
Best,
BW
I intend to make everything on the Tormach lathe except for the hole on the head the neck screws into.
Do you have a four-jaw chuck?