Framing and hammer technique

[Steve]

Puckdropper wrote on 18 Jan 2008 in group rec.woodworking:

My dad was a shop teacher for more than 20 years. Here's what he told me about hammering technique:

• Hold the hammer near the end of the handle. Don't choke up. You'll get a longer lever and the hammer will do more of the work. (Dad actually advocated holding the hammer with thumb and two fingers, but I never could get that to work. Maybe it was his little joke.)

• Don't hammer by bending your wrist -- use your whole arm. This gives you more power, but it takes practice.

• Watch the nail head, not the hammer.

• Nails get bent when the face of the hammer strikes the nail at an angle. Don't do that.

I had a chance to teach a woman how to hammer just yesterday at a Habitat for Humanity work site. She was there putting in her hours so she can buy a house. She was proud of the work she was doing for someone else, and I was proud to help her. Please consider donating a few hours to your local Habitat project.

[Puckdropper]

[e-mail] wrote in news:567db8e8-a716-46c6-847b- [e-mail]:

My thumb's ok, how'd you know I got a splinter at Lowes? I managed to avoid damaging my nail-holding hand in this project.

Where I ran in to trouble was at the base of my pointer finger. The hammer tends to pivot a bit from my bottom two fingers, so the handle rubs on the pointer finger. Other than maybe holding the hammer with two fingers on the handle, I'm not sure how to avoid this. (Maybe I should tape the finger?)

Puckdropper

[Puckdropper]

Steve wrote in news:Xns9A2B71A88980184365720018436572@66.250.146.128:

I've heard of others doing this. If I try this, I'm definately going to put on steel toed shoes.

Nails get bent by the wood piece when you miss almost completely. They get bent about 1/8" from the head when you hit the head at an angle. Learned that one last night.

Take a step, overhead toss... and the cans go flying into Habitat's can bin.

Thanks (everyone) for the advice.

Puckdropper

[George]

In my hands, it makes a big difference whether the "standard" hammer has a flat or a bell (convex) face. On a project where I was nailing shiplap siding on a garage all day long, the flat face was an enormous help. When your tired hands don't dead-center the hammer face on the nail, the nail still goes in nice and straight.

The waffle-face framing hammers, suggested by others, work well too; they are designed to have the same advantage. And for big nails they are much faster than a 16 oz hammer.

-George.