Blacksmith made?

[RickeyB]

Found this about 6 inches down on a hill side in washed gravel. Have found only primitive items in the area such as square nails, axe head and some civil war lead and cannon ball fragment. This piece came out of the gravel so clean I thought it must have been fairly new until closer inspection shows it to be crudely formed with some uneven grooves cut on the inside. Items weighs 143.5 grams. Any Ideas?

 

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[haraldmartin]

It is a bit heavy to be small, but i have seen these before, but do not remember where they come from. I'll message u when i find it out.

 

[mical66]

looks like a impact driver socket to me. i used these alot building metal fabricated buildings . there are 2 in this picture. yours looks like it was wore slap out..lol

 

[vpnavy]

looks like a impact driver socket to me...

IMHO - the uneven grooves cut on the inside eliminate possibility?

 

[pippinwhitepaws]

no..not a blacksmith...a big factory forge...notice the splines inside the object?

 

[mical66]

IMHO - the uneven grooves cut on the inside eliminate possibility?

i know what you mean vpnavy and i should have elaborated on that some more , picture number 4 if you look closely you can see the some of the corners still there , but its been stripped out real bad which would round the hole out leaving small traces of the corners .
the " Drive " end where the impact goes does throw me though , because it should be square but there are sockets made for a star shaped driver like this ,
if that was also stripped out you would lose the outside points but the inside ones would remain.

i can not say this is 100% what it is , because anyone can be wrong at any time
but i have used alot and yes stripped out alot of these,,lol but granted i have never used the star tip impact , just seen them in catalogs. and this looks like a well wore impact socket to me .

 

[RickeyB]

Thanks for all the input. My pictures do not properly depict the crudeness of this piece. It was forged long before star sockets. It does look like a socket from its shape, but it is a very uneven, inpercise shape to have been formed in a factory mold. The only other items anywhere in the general area are square nails and civil war artifacts. The splines are very uneven and crude. When you shine a light on the inside you can see the splines have not been stripped at all. The large end has been hammered with a mallet. More pictures later. Thanks!

 

[pippinwhitepaws]

ok..it appears to be the removable tip for a hand held impact driver....

if it is crude, I have no idea...those splines are problematic for an ancient piece.

 

[RickeyB]

The splines are wavy from front to back. The waves are not uniform at all. They appear to have been made when the metal was hot with some harder metal object being forced through. After close inspection with a magnifying glass the splines are not worn off on the ends as they appear, they just come to an end in a somewhat jagged pattern. When were impact drivers and sockets first invented? It does make sense that it would be some type impact socket its just so crude in its manufacture that its confusing. Thanks again for the ideas.