Help me Decide on first tomahawk

R

R. Mark Stevens

Joined
Nov 26, 2020
Messages
33
I have been doing a lot of research for buying my first tomahawk for general camping/bushcraft. I am drawn to the H&B GOShawk. The price seems reasonable for a quality hand forged tomahawk., although the wait time is around 14 weeks.
Is this a good choice? Other recommendations? Budget is under 150.00 or so.
Thanks for all suggestions.
 
GOShawk would be my choice. I have the H&B Medium Camp and it is probably my fave among all of my hawks/small axes/hatchets....even among my RMJs, a Winkler, a Felhoelter, etc.

H&B makes a nice product and the GOShawk has it all. It's my next.
 
I got a GOShawk recently, and it was 4.5 months from the time I ordered it to the time I received it. Takes a bit of patience but not too bad really. I'm really happy with it.
 
Cold Steel is a great starter/beater hawk. They are my go to hard use/throwers. Condor makes some good ones too.

I plan on getting an ATC Model 1 for my birthday in February.

Lots of great hawks out there.
 
Look at the 2Hawks Longhunter. A light, fast, using hawk. I prefer the Warbeast, but it's over your budget. Still, it's a very useful outdoor tool. The Cold Steel hawks are good, and cheap. The CRKT Woods series hawks are good, but cost more, too. I got my son a Woods Kangee spike hawk for Christmas. Liked it so much I'm going to get one for myself. And maybe a Nobo, too.
 
One more vote here for the 2Hawks Longhunter. It's light but bites deeply and holds up to reasonable abuse. Good price too.

Cold Steel are cheap and fun, quite a bit heavier than the Longhunter though. Easy entry point. They also come with the heads pinned to the haft, which I detest, that is easy enough to remove.

Look up Walkbyfaith777. He's a BF member and makes some stunning hawks.
 
Steely_Gunz said:
Cold Steel is a great starter/beater hawk. They are my go to hard use/throwers. Condor makes some good ones too.

I plan on getting an ATC Model 1 for my birthday in February.

Lots of great hawks out there.
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I only have two Cold Steel hawks, likely from about 10-15 years ago. The smaller head/longer haft unit is the Frontier Hawk. The shorter stubbier piece is a Rifleman Hawk/modified. The Rifleman normally has a hammer head on the back which I sawed off, then I ground the back to how I wanted it. The long light Frontier swings fast but is lighter weight and what I consider lighter use. Nice little fire starter/kindling processor. The shorter stubbier and heavier Rifleman I used for more serious chopping and thicker wood processing. After I started getting into serious axes and hatchets I moved away from the C.S. hawks. But I still like them for more casual bush bumming/car camping. The modified Rifleman is closer in size, weight and shape to historic northern fur trade hawks/belt axes. But there was variation through time and location.
RH2vPJT.jpg

My C.S. hawk heads have been rock solid/ no wobble for years. Slide head off and sand anything that prevents a decent connection. Slather a ton of clear liquid rubber silicone on shaft and or in head. Make sure that head is super snug. tighten up set screw like you mean it. Wipe off any squeezed out silicone. Put it in a warm closet or whatever for a week to dry/set. Years later mine still don't wobble, but I don't use them all that much, or very often.............You probably don't want to do all that if you are throwing them.
 
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I would say that 2hawks Voyager is a comparable sized hawk to the goshawk. I would consider the goshawk as a heavier tomahawk used for heavier cutting and splitting rather than bushcraft.

The 2hawks Longhunter and CS TrailHawk are two of my favorites but they are smaller hawks than the goshawk and ideal for bushcraft.
 
shortwinger said:
I would say that 2hawks Voyager is a comparable sized hawk to the goshawk. I would consider the goshawk as a heavier tomahawk used for heavier cutting and splitting rather than bushcraft.

The 2hawks Longhunter and CS TrailHawk are two of my favorites but they are smaller hawks than the goshawk and ideal for bushcraft.
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Thanks, H&B quoted me 10 weeks for one of their hawks. I will look at the 2hawks. I probably cant go wrong with either i think.
 
Steely_Gunz said:
Cold Steel is a great starter/beater hawk. They are my go to hard use/throwers. Condor makes some good ones too.

I plan on getting an ATC Model 1 for my birthday in February.

Lots of great hawks out there.
Click to expand...

I bought my first tomahawk, a cold steel trail hawk a week ago. Looks like they stopped painting them with the shiny black paint, came in with a dark forge finish (not sure on the technical term for this finish). Had no edge on it at all. I'm not good at sharpening, but was able to put a razor sharp edge on it with a work sharp belt sander. Probably not at an ideal angle for chopping but it's better than it being blunt.

I bought one of the crkt tomahawk sheaths for it and it fits pretty good.

IMG-20210101-114539216-HDR.jpg
IMG-20210101-124447449.jpg
IMG-20210101-124519824.jpg
 
stonproject stonproject

Excellent edge!
I've also noticed that the last couple of hawks I've gotten haven't had paint on them and have been left "scaley". My Spontoon is especially rough.
 
Steely_Gunz said:
stonproject stonproject

Excellent edge!
I've also noticed that the last couple of hawks I've gotten haven't had paint on them and have been left "scaley". My Spontoon is especially rough.
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I don't have an original to compare it to but I personally like the rough finish, I was planning on stripping the paint anyways. What do you think of the haft on the cold steels? I'm thinking of staining but don't want to waste my time if they're poor quality.
 
stonproject said:
I don't have an original to compare it to but I personally like the rough finish, I was planning on stripping the paint anyways. What do you think of the haft on the cold steels? I'm thinking of staining but don't want to waste my time if they're poor quality.
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I almost always strip the crappy paint off anyway. The steel takes a beautiful deep gray antiqued patina. I have a pipe hawk I have been meaning to hang for some time that turned out really nice after a soak in CLR.

My typical cold steel hawk modification includes:
Stripping the paint off the head
Sanding the wood for fit (pretty much always needed)
Cutting the haft down to about 14"
Staining the wood a deeper brown (i like to use the cheap poly stain for cost and durability)
And finally I usually wrap the throat between the head and handle with a product called Fiber Fix which is a wrap that sets up like a super hard cast. It protects from overstrikes. Sometimes, because this is so permanent, I go ahead and just epoxy the head in the handle. Its going to be a bear to get off anyway, so I might as well keep it from wiggling at all;)
 
stonproject said:
I bought my first tomahawk, a cold steel trail hawk a week ago. Looks like they stopped painting them with the shiny black paint, came in with a dark forge finish (not sure on the technical term for this finish). Had no edge on it at all. I'm not good at sharpening, but was able to put a razor sharp edge on it with a work sharp belt sander. Probably not at an ideal angle for chopping but it's better than it being blunt.

I bought one of the crkt tomahawk sheaths for it and it fits pretty good.

IMG-20210101-114539216-HDR.jpg
IMG-20210101-124447449.jpg
IMG-20210101-124519824.jpg
Click to expand...
Great set up and info, thanks !
 
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