How to strike and swing a sledgehammer (For The Apprentice Blacksmith) 

The Hofi technique is worth a try 😊

Hey Simon, Good docu and interesting. Don't forget about the handle lenght when talking about position of the hands. This is clearly shown in some of the historical drawings you show. Also the striking arch / movement plays an important role as it relates to the force applied to the work piece. You might draw a comparision with martial arts, for instance boxing, where the moment of impact ie. momentum, is very important. With striking this relates to both the accelaration mainly at the start the arch movement (which does necessarily has to go way above the head!), the hammer weight, cf. potential energy, hand movement such as squeezing just upon impact,... Hence, applying force all along the strike, cf. increasing kinetic energy, is both more tiresome and causes a loss of control during the strike. Also, improving the impact also realtes to a significant extent to the force from the upper legs. As you mentioned, legs slightly apart and knees 'out of the lock', only strenghtening muscles from the legs and abs upon impact. I believe our friend blacksmith friend Remy demonstrates this when striking hard. This movement and control relates to martial arts and other traditional crafts (mowing with the scythe, felling trees with the axe,...) in my opinion and own experience. Which hand you put were might also differ, both depending on the method used as your dexterity. This should be mentioned for clarity. Using a sledge hammer in this respect differs from swinging an axe. Keep up the good work my friend !

nice video ! keep it going ;)

very interesting video! I liked you showing the short excerpts from the manual (the author clearly dislikes European blacksmiths lol) and the demonstration videos of the methods in practical use. overall I'd say the video is quite good and a good starting point to try things out for yourself, but there are a few things I think could be improved. the difference between method 1 and 2 is not very clear to me. with method 3 and 4 I think it is with which hand you exert the force, right? (either pull on the lower hand or drop/push with the upper hand). with method 1 you demonstrated the technique clearly and paused the video to point out important things, it would have been nice if you did this for every technique. general pointers (like how to stand) would be useful to repeat too, I think. also, listing advantages and disadvantages of each methoud would be a nice addition to the video. the suitable hammer head weight is already very good to know, but things like ergonomics, how easy it is to be precise etc can be useful information as well. then again, if you really want to know you could always just try it out yourself I guess :P final bit of feedback: you mentioned the hammer handle should be horizontal when striking. I think something useful to mention is that if your apprentice is a bit tall for the anvil they can stand with their legs wider apart to lower their body so they can have a correct back position and don't need to slouch to compensate. ergonomics are very important with manual labour!

The following comments are from the first upload ... the ones that were deleted while uploading the new video. @PRINTHESHOP "Nicely done on showing the many different ways to throw a hammer. Enjoyed. Thanks for sharing !" @SchysCraftCo "Awesome video"