The Vulcan steam hammer (the use of air came later) began when the company began to manufacture hammers under the patent of Thomas T. Loomis (U.S. Patent 160,781) in 1875. This hammer used many of the main features of the Nasmyth hammer (which had been developed in the UK) but used an improved valve gear.
The success of this hammer led to an improved hammer under the patents of Thomas M. Skinner, who reduced the number of parts and used a steam actuated valve. This hammer had success, as the following letter (written the year after Vulcan was incorporated) shows:
CHICAGO & ALTON RAILROAD COMPANY,
OFFICE OF GENERAL ROADMASTER,
BLOOMINGTON, ILL., Oct. 30, 1882W. H. WARRINGTON, ESQ., President Vulcan Iron Works
DEAR SIR
The Skinner Pile Driver Hammer, built by your Company, has been in use on our Pile Driver Car since last April, and we are much pleased with its work. It has always given entire satisfaction, doing the work effectively and economically.
Respectfully yours,
W. RILEY,
Gen’l Roadmaster .
The Skinner Hammer was not perfect. Its steam actuated valve was a source of difficulties, a problem that did not end with the Skinner Hammer (Menck hammers also had difficulties with steam or air actuated valves, especially when used with rubber-lined hose where the hose pieces would jam the valve.) To address this and other problems, the first “Warrington-Vulcan” single-acting steam hammer, a #2 with a ram weight of 3,000 lbs., was designed and built in 1887. James N. Warrington was granted a patent on this hammer in 1888 (U.S. Patent 378,745).
The success of this hammer prompted the immediate development of the #1 hammer, with a 5,000 lb. ram. This was the progenitor of the “#1 Series,” which eventually included the 06, 306 and 506, and was further developed by Raymond with their 1 and 1-S hammers. The #0 hammer, with a ram weight of 7,500 lbs, was introduced in 1912. (Click here for a detailed study of the “Vulcan 00,” its interaction with the Raymond Concrete Pile Company, and other details of this series of hammers.)
The hammers were an early success. As noted by Charles Evan Fowler in his book A Practical Treatise on Sub-Aqueous Foundations (1914):
Many modifications of this (Nasmyth’s) hammer have been manufactured, and one much used at present is the Warrington-Nasmyth hammer, made by the Vulcan Iron Works. This hammer…is made in three sizes, the weight of the striking parts being 550 pounds (#4) for sheet-pile work, 3000 pounds (#2) for medium pile work and 4800 pounds (#1) for use on heavy work. This machine is provided with a positive valve gear, a short steam passage to avoid the waste of steam, a wide exhaust opening to prevent back pressure as the hammer drops, a piston-head forged on the rod, and channel bards on the side to allow the pile to be driven lower than the leads of the derrick. The hammer is attached to the hoist rope, but this is left slack when the hammer is resting on the head of the pile, steam is turned on and the hammer pounds automatically at the rate of sixty to seventy blows per minute until the pile is driven. The bottom casting which rests on the pile is a bonnet which encases the top and prevents brooming or splitting.
The hammer should have plenty of play in the leads, and the steam-pipe should extend halfway up the derrick to save the length of hose. This hammer has a record of as high as seventy-five to one hundred piles a day, and one account gives the record of 3000 lineal feet of piling per day at a cost of $50, the number of men being employed being sixteen and the coal consumption one ton. This hammer is shown in Fig. 40 (above left) in use driving piles for bridge work on the Fair Haven Bridge. (p. 62)
Vulcan developed a wide variety of accessories for these hammers. One of the most enduring was the McDermid Base, which enabled the #2 and #1 hammers to drive wood piling without the need for a cushion block. Although the Vulcan hammers were first developed in an age when wood piling was predominant, it was quickly adapted for use with the “new” concrete piles, H-piles and steel sheet piles as well. Vulcan also had many other related products in the early years of its pile hammer manufacture, including pipe followers (for driving piles below the ground surface,) pile points, pile bands, and a pile saw arbor for cutting wood piles off underwater. The company was also active with drop hammers and drop hammer rigs as well.
Fowler and others referred to the new hammers as “Warrington-Nasmyth,” while Vulcan itself called it the “Warrington” or “Warrington-Vulcan” hammer. This and the other hammers Vulcan put out (Loomis, Skinner, etc.) bore the names of their American patentees. This didn’t sit well with some people. In 1883 Don J. Wittemore make the following statement in the Transactions of the ASCE:
This machine is being manufactured and is called by the manufacturer after an individual who has added several perhaps very important minor details that have made it a little more practicable than it was thirty years ago. But wherever the members of the American Society of Civil Engineers witness the operations of this machine. I desire that they shall not drop the name of the Scotchman who was its inventor–James Nasmyth.
Although Nasmyth was the original inventor, the improvements made by those mentioned above, and especially the Warringtons, made the hammer a durable and practical machine, some of which (as shown below) have lasted more than a century.
Below we show some earlier photos of Vulcan pile hammers and related products. Other Vulcan onshore products with pages of their own are as follows:
- Super-Vulcan Hammers, Open and Closed, the differential acting hammers.
- Vulcan #5 Hammer, Vulcan’s first closed type hammer for sheeting
- California Series Hammers
- DGH Series Hammers
- Vulcan Pile Extractors
We also have photos of a Vulcan #2 which was featured on The History Channel.
Jobsite credit for #2 hammer in North Carolina Dellinger Incorporated.
But sometimes it breaks: all of the early (before World War I) Warrington-Vulcan hammers had a ram point which was integrally cast with the ram. Since the ram point is the point of impact, and the rams were gray cast iron, the weakness of this became apparent early.
In 1909 Vulcan cautiously advertised a steel “repair” point, stating that:
This method (of repair) we have used once only, hence it is not sufficiently tested to determine whether to apply it or make a new ram when the point becomes so worn as to require replacing.
Evidently the method worked out, because by 1911 it was characterised as “very satisfactory.” The “repair point” eventually became the ram point familiar to Vulcan users. Vulcan’s 1915 literature stated that “(t)he rams of all Warrington-Vulcan steam hammers are now made with a removable steel point instead of the integral cast iron point.”
Although one would think by now that all the integral points would have worn out, such is not the case.
More on ram point installation and removal:
- Installation of a new ram point on an offshore hammer
- Removing the Broken Ram Point (Offshore Tip #4)
More information on this subject is available in the Vulcanhammer.info Guide to Pile Driving Equipment.
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