Pneumatic Sand Rammer

Here's a pneumatic sand rammer rammer I built for my backyard foundry. The idea came from a post in rec.crafts.metalworking. The body is a cheap pneumatic chisel. Mine is from Harbor Freight. All you have to do is to cast a head for it.
Here's the pattern I made. There weren't any dimensions given in the post so I took a guess. The pattern is 1/4" masonite about 5 3/8" square.
Here's a close up of the aluminum casting. Notice how faithfully the nail heads were reproduced! It turned out that my pattern was too big. The ram couldn't ram hard enough. I cut the casting down to about 3 1/2" square. Now it works great.

Hand Rammers

Here are a pair of hand rammers. The one on the right is wooden. The one on the left has a cast head on either end. It's brass or bronze which makes this one heavier than the wooden one. Both bases are about 3 1/2" in diameter. Here is my first rammer. It doubles as a carving mallot. The end is turning orange from the reddish colored molding sand.