dead blow hammers-

I bought a Lixie a month or so ago after putting up with the same durability problems you note as plaguing the cheap molded kind. I haven't needed to use it yet, but it appears to be very well made.

I didn't buy from Berntsen, opting instead for a lower-cost eBay vendor.

I have four of the fancy ones that I own, three of which I leave on campus for student use. Got all four in the middle 1980s, with light use - since then I have yet had the need to replace one of the urethane faces. The things seem to last forever to me.

I have no idea how long they'd last under daily heavy use. They ARE heavy, though. Might be annoying on long treks.

What exactly do you use these for? There was always one around in most of the survey rigs I've been in but we never used them for anything.
Honest question. I really don't know.
E.

> What exactly do you use these for?

Installing stamped disks on rod monuments, usually. More generally, for hitting anything harder than the hammer face that you don't want to ding up.

Thanks Jim,
I see. That would explain why I didn't know. I've only set one al. cap but don't remember what we drove it with.

A search reveals:

What is the difference between the dead blow hammer and the traditional mallet with wood handle and round rubber?
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Old 03-31-2008, 01:24 AM #2
Stuey
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Posts: 10,163 Default Re: Dead Blow vs Mallet

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I believe that with a mallet you get some bounce back when it recoils, and with a dead blow, the internal lead shot absorbs the energy loss. You run less risk of damaging the target, and since there's minimal rebound, one's strikes are a bit more controlled.

Typically dead blows are heavier and are used to apply more force than is possible with a regular mallet.

With a regular mallet, most of the energy is lost at the time of impact. With a dead blow, the energy is still lost, but gradually since the lead shot, or sand, or whatever fills the cavity has to catch up towards the impacting surface. (The effect is similar to a person in a car being flung foward in their seat a bit when the vehicle stops suddenly.)

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Last edited by Stuey; 03-31-2008 at 01:28 AM

I got them for driving turning points into dirt for Invar Leveling. My students use them for driving temporary metal stakes for their first highway curve. Essentially a couple hour's work four Labs per year.

I bought one years ago from Berntsen. Best hammer I have used, still use it today. Gives nice smooth hits. It works really well with stakes, laths, hubs. Sometimes, I use the side when I need to smash. A bit on the heavy side, that's true. For trecking through the woods, I'd get a geologist pick hammer: light and useful.

A dead blow hammer is filled with shot or other to give a softer impact.

I use an 8oz palm sized hammer for lath and 60d spikes and short stake that fits in my pocket.

For anything needing more hammer I will use a 2 lb shop hammer or a 42oz ball peen from Tractor Supply.

Have used them on 100’s maybe thousand mons and have replaced many heads both hard and soft and they are worth the money. The only way to damage them is use the side to drive rebar and other than leaving it at corner you will have it when you retire.

To lighten my load when setting my control for roadway projects, I have taken a piece of 1.25” diameter round bar 2” long and drilled a 0.75” about an inch deep in it. When I drive my re-bar this eliminates the glancing blows and the cone from the drill puts a nice smooth taper on the top of the re-bar that allows the aluminum cap to seat easily with a wood hub as protection from marring.

This allows me to only carry my driving hammer.

@jim-frame six years on now, how's the Lixie hammer??ÿ Did you get the 2" 3.5 pound (56 ounce) model??ÿ Malleable iron or aluminum head??ÿ Has it proved to be useful enough that it is worth the weight of carrying it while working??ÿ Any suggestions if you were thinking about it again?

It's still going strong, and I like it a lot.?ÿ I don't know the weight offhand, but I got one with plastic faces -- a green soft face, and a black hard face.?ÿ As for weight, I don't carry it around unless I'm setting monuments, in which case I'm carrying a lot of heavy stuff anyway:?ÿ rebars, rebar driving head, and a 3 lb. Estwing hammer, in addition to the Lixie, which I use to set aluminum caps on the rebars.

I also use to for setting 1" drilled-in disks in concrete.?ÿ The Lixie gets them down about flush, but what really sets them is the punch mark.?ÿ I first mark the corner with a scribed cross, then drill the counterbored hole with a rotohammer, then slam the disk into its plastic stem sleeve with the Lixie.?ÿ Then I reproduce the corner location from the scribed cross and punch it with a wide-angle carbide punch that I made from a discarded pavement grinding tooth.?ÿ It usually takes 3 bangs with a 24-ounce hammer to get the copper disk fully set -- you can feel it when it completely conforms to the concrete below.

?ÿ