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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;RonSanderson, post: 2630028, member: 77413&quot;]That all sounds exactly sound to me. I have worked in metal-working in my 20&#039;s and still have a bunch of hardened bits, drills, and files in the basement. I also operated punch presses built around 1900, according to the patent date cast onto the housing.</p><p><br /></p><p>So you really have me thinking that maybe I do know more than I thought...</p><p><br /></p><p>I have definitely held work pieces between dies as the jaws of the presses slam together. If misaligned it can send quite a shock up your arms.</p><p><br /></p><p>But, since any machinist would expect this to happen, you would never use a brittle steel for this. It would just shatter. Instead you need a steel harder than the workpiece but probably softer and more flexible than, say, drill metal or a file.</p><p><br /></p><p>When the workpiece is a planchet the material is about as soft as it comes. That leaves a lot of latitude for the die material. It has to be durable and resilient to abuse. Ideally it would be fairly elastic for steel, given the way the dies hammer together. You want it to deform slightly and flex back, repeatedly. But it doesn&#039;t have to be anywhere near as hard as a file.</p><p><br /></p><p>There is a lot more thinking I need to do. I appreciate your nudge to realize I actually know more than I realized.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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