I made a tool holder yesterday and a few quick wooden tools today for my arbor press. Then I made a black urethane anvil for it, approx 4" diameter, 1" bore and 2" tall.


I'm trying to work without causing as much damage that needs address later. There's certain trade secret methods I use with stone work that enables me to exclusively do special and very dramatic work in granite without leaving any tool marks. With this tooling, I'm trying to do the same type of work in metal.
Using this equipment plus a little with a UHMW Tuck Puck when I needed a harder anvil to smooth some spots, I did the majority of the shaping of the central/top piece of the seat's rear hump. All of this shape was done with the arbor press, nothing else. I spent a little over an hour, working slow and checking the fit. No scars, dings from the edge of the hammer, witness marks from the anvil. Just a few minor walnuts this time.

The protective film was left on the aluminum during shaping. The only damage to it occurred when I tried to press the tooling against the film to lower some high spots I accidentally raised.

It doesn't fit the buck 100% as is, but it's really close for a first try-

It needs a little more aggressive work to pull it down for a better fit and some wheeling or planishing to smooth it up. Sure is nice to work clean, completely quiet and nothing hurts afterwards. The bigger purpose of this experiment is this rear hump is essentially a trial run for the pieces I need to make for my Guzzi tank. All works as I hoped it would. Very cool. It was a good day in the shop.
Edit- next will be to make a few larger tools to limit the walnuts even more.
I'm trying to work without causing as much damage that needs address later. There's certain trade secret methods I use with stone work that enables me to exclusively do special and very dramatic work in granite without leaving any tool marks. With this tooling, I'm trying to do the same type of work in metal.
Using this equipment plus a little with a UHMW Tuck Puck when I needed a harder anvil to smooth some spots, I did the majority of the shaping of the central/top piece of the seat's rear hump. All of this shape was done with the arbor press, nothing else. I spent a little over an hour, working slow and checking the fit. No scars, dings from the edge of the hammer, witness marks from the anvil. Just a few minor walnuts this time.
The protective film was left on the aluminum during shaping. The only damage to it occurred when I tried to press the tooling against the film to lower some high spots I accidentally raised.
It doesn't fit the buck 100% as is, but it's really close for a first try-
It needs a little more aggressive work to pull it down for a better fit and some wheeling or planishing to smooth it up. Sure is nice to work clean, completely quiet and nothing hurts afterwards. The bigger purpose of this experiment is this rear hump is essentially a trial run for the pieces I need to make for my Guzzi tank. All works as I hoped it would. Very cool. It was a good day in the shop.
Edit- next will be to make a few larger tools to limit the walnuts even more.
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