"Make your own axe handle" article

S

Steve Tall

Joined
Aug 28, 2010
Messages
5,431
Just found this article (apologies if it's already been posted).

Make Your Own Axe Handle, by Russ Morgan
Northern Woodlands magazine

Some highlights:
- The woodworking is done while the wood is freshly cut and not "seasoned"
- "All you need is an axe, a drawknife, a spoke shave, a rasp, and a sharp knife with a flat bevel."
- A low-cost mixture of white glue and hot water is used to seal the ends while the handle is drying
(I previously saw this mentioned in the Foxfire books).
- a slim 3/4" handle thickness is suggested.
- "The one guiding principle to keep in mind when making an axe handle is to keep the same annual growth ring in the center of the entire handle, from where it will enter the axe head to the fawn’s foot. That annual ring will be split by the wedge in the final step..."

http://northernwoodlands.org/knots_and_bolts/make-your-own-axe-handle
 
The problem is two contradicting actions occurring at the same time. Why does he choose green wood? The article says because it works easier with cutting tools, "it’s like cutting frozen cream cheese". So we can ask why does wet wood cut easier than seasoned wood. The answer has to do with the resistance offered by the individual fibers and vessels constituting the wood material. Take a sheet of paper with a crease in it and cut it with scissors along the crease but first hold the paper or support it a distance away from where you will cut, and then try and support the paper right close to the cut and see which method cuts more effectively. Chances are the cut with the closer support will be easier or more effective because the resistance to the blade is firmer. The sloppy, unsupported paper will fold over and jam between the scissor blades because it offers little resistance to their cutting edges. With green wood, the greener or fresher the better, the structure is filled with water, water of two types, free water and trapped water. The free water is the water contained within the cells and also in the spaces between each cell which begins to evaporate on felling the tree, never to return. The trapped water is water captured inside the walls of the cells. This is water that exists as tiny particles knows as vapor and can travel both inwards and outwards depending on atmospheric conditions which is why we say wood is hygroscopic.While green these bulging cells are firm and offer maximal resistance and so are easy to slice open with a sharp cutting edge like a piece of raw flesh, if stretched taught is easy to slice but when no tension is present it will give way under a blade moving with the blade instead of getting cut. So, the green wood is easier to cut than seasoned wood because of the water. But with the loss of water comes loss of volume of course, the wood fibers constrict in upon themselves so that piece of green wood that was so easy to shape and carve, when it dries has decreased in volume as well, it has gotten smaller. So ask yourself, can the wood handle that was tightly fit into an axe head when the water content was high and the fibers swollen remain tight. The article says let the roughly shaped handle hang out a few weeks. Ok so it is after all seasoned wood we are all talking about but what has happened after a few weeks is only that a good deal of the free water near that end has evaporated. If you are in a dry climate at the right time of the year and conditions are favorable, maybe then the internal cell structure has had a chance to begin to acclimatize to the existing air condition and you will have better luck than otherwise. Still you can take the hasty route and count on your luck or you can give the wood a chance to normalize before fitting. What is normalize? I would say depending on the thickness but let's call it thin it is at minimum the cycle of at least one year from the time the free water has evaporated. Or another option maybe is to stabilize your wood artificially which as I understand it is trying to fill the spaces vacated of free water with a sugar solution which will subsequently crystallize. Oh brother.


E.DB.
 
Yes, I am aware. He will have to answer for the contradictions in his own way, considering the three primary principles of securing an axehead, which I call, compression fit , thrust fit and wedge fit with their own corresponding internal configurations.

E.DB.
 
E.DB

I would not want to hang an axe on a green haft. Wood doesn't shrink / swell much on the longitudinal plane, but it can have significant shrinkage in the transverse direction. It will differ by species of course, but I wouldn't risk the time it takes to hang an axe not knowing if the haft will stay tight.

If the end grain was not sealed, it would not take too long to season a piece of wood that size. Most of the moisture is lost at the end grain.

There's a reason you can temporarily tighten a loose axe by soaking the head in a bucket of water.
 
One could put the square end in a vice for a few weeks while it dries to speed up the shrinkage.

It seems a simple solution, I can't be the only one who's thought of it.


Thanks for posting the article tall.
 
I believe that G-pig works his handles when they're quasi-seasoned rather than fresh-cut green. They're still green in the sense that they're not done drying out entirely, but they're not exactly 100% green. I may be mistaken, but I'm sure he'll chime in shortly enough. :)
 
Peter Vido has told me that he will re-set the wedge if the handle seems to be shrinking in the eye. To facilitate doing this in the future, he fits the handle well to the eye, leaves some extra kerf below the wedge, and does not use steel wedges.

A story from him about a supposedly "weak" handle he made from freshly cut white birch:

Steve Tall said:
(written by Peter Vido)
...
IMGP2139.jpg

...
Without exception, every instructional source on ax handle making I’ve come across suggests that you begin by selecting a piece of straight grained tree trunk, 8 inches (20cm) diameter or larger, split out the billets, season them, etc.

Well, mindful that (sometimes) “rules are made for fools”, I stuck as much as possible to the continuous grain concept -- but in every other aspect broke the rules. That handle is made out of a non-seasoned branch less than 3 inches diameter from a white birch tree which I had just cut for firewood. It had exactly the curve I was looking for, so I shaped it still green, fit that 1¾ lb (800g) Sandvik head to it, gave it a coat of boiled linseed oil (cut with a little turpentine) and began to use it – carefully at first. I liked that handle instantly. At its slimmest section it is 18mm thick, by the way.

About two years later, during winter, I lost that ax in the woods. There it laid for a season and a half, in snow, wet leaves and snow again. When I found it the following spring, some fungus was beginning to make a Slow Food meal of it. (Note the surface wood deterioration below the head on the side which had been touching the Earth.)

As some of you may know, white birch (Betula alba) is not a particularly weather resistant wood; in fact, some would say it is absolutely “no good” in that respect. Having once been oiled, and already seasoned before being lost did help its survival – but some damage was there to stay.

Nevertheless, we’ve used that little ax rather extensively ever since. Occasionally, it has (again forgotten) spent an additional night under the stars...

The chief point of this story: A functional ax handle does not always need to be made of what is considered first class wood. The handle being discussed here has 3 major knots (seen from both sides) and 2 minor knots – a flaw that every handle-making how-to source would consider a serious no-no. In addition, white birch is considerably weaker than ash or sugar maple, never mind hickory.

Admittedly, a 1¾ lb head on a 24” handle (which probably started as 25”) is not a serious tree-chopping or firewood splitting ax – and thus does not need to be excessively strong. However, we do not baby our axes (as might some weekend campers with their $100 hatchets) – and this little “orphan” has done its full share of what I’d expect of that size of an ax.

To be continued...

http://axeconnected.blogspot.com/
Click to expand...
 
Steve Tall said:
Peter Vido...

A story from him about a supposedly "weak" handle he made from freshly cut white birch:
Click to expand...

He's got me going on that too. At least one of his axes is helved with maple (sugar maple, I think). Canada ain't got a lot of hickory, quelle suprise. :D

I know he's made axe and sledge handles out of birch, maple and hornbeam. I have some seasoned maple limbs in the shop that I want to try hanging an axe on.

But it's harvest season and the hangings will have to wait a few weeks until things finally freeze.
 
Operator1975 said:
why you would make a handle out of birch.......
Click to expand...

More of the story from Peter Vido:

I also wanted to retain that “head slightly back of the line of grip” feature which many old axmen incorporated into their single bit handle design. The easiest way to accomplish this, and still end up with a through-running grain (which most single bit handles do not have nowadays) is to find a naturally grown piece of wood in already that shape... That handle is made out of a non-seasoned branch less than 3 inches diameter from a white birch tree which I had just cut for firewood. It had exactly the curve I was looking for...
 
I went to work on a handle of birch just two days ago but couldn't get the shape I was after without cutting across to much of the grain pattern so I tossed it aside in favor of some ash. This birch, seasoned and out of Sweden, was overly straight and I was aiming for a curve suitable for an old timmerbila, a sort of hewing axe. I wouldn't go so far as using local birch but will make every effort to get my hands on some good Scandinavian birch for another handle. Not only is it typical handle wood in places like Finland, Norway and Sweden and Russia - no axe handle slouches these - but I really liked how it worked in my hands with knife, spokeshave, drawknife and axe. That one old Finnish axe here has a birch handle which most axes up there had until all that changed and factories started shipping their axes out already handled and a lot of times with imported hickory wood to boot.

E.DB.
 
If you are worried about the handle loosening due to haste/not seasoning, just leave the wedge proud. The amount of shrinkage that occurs after the point there I fit the head (probably 3 or 4 weeks after the tree was cut, depending) is not so great that you cant tighten it by tapping the wedge in a little ways more. Then, of course, you can also tap the wedge in beyond the flush point with the handle using a straight peen hammer or something like that. you can also use metal wedges or saturate the eye with linseed or something like that. There's a lot of ways to address it in the event of shrinkage.
 
My concern is not only limited to the handle loosening in the eye as the wood seasons post hanging, but what further consequences putting a green handle on has and what is happening by subsequent tightening of the wedge regardless of the immediate effect that might limit the useful time span of the handle. What about compression at the base with green wood compared to seasoned wood for example, and internally how does a reseated handle then conform to the shape of the eye or would it produce unseen gaps in there as the wood continually reacts and adjusts to changing air conditions? It may work for some, which is fine, just saying that however, doesn't really answer the question of why green wood and not seasoned, which at least can be justified with a rational explanation behind the practice. What I mean is, the statement, "it has held for 15 years", is more or less meaningless and so doesn't contribute to understanding, which, granted, may be a false aspiration anyway, but that is a question aside.

E.DB.
 
Last edited:
Ernest DuBois said:
...What I mean is, the statement, "it has held for 15 years", is more or less meaningless and so doesn't contribute to understanding...
Click to expand...

I think that "it has held for 15 years" can be significantly meaningful if it has been put to hard work throughout those 15 years. Theoretical understanding often seems to be incomplete and trumped by experience (or the empirical).
 
There is a species of wood in e. North America which makes spectacular tool handles; Ironwood (birch family, genus Ostrya). Blue beech is one version and Hop Hornbeam is the other. These trees rarely get very big but the wood is super tough and cannot be easily split (much like elm). It was traditionally used to make wedges for splitting cedar rails, bearings for water wheels and runners for sleighs, amongst other things. I had read somewhere that it does not split or crack as it seasons and consequently (my 90 year old father had asked me to make him a sturdy cane this summer) unearthed a small tree in order to use a root curve to advantage for making the handle. The green wood worked great with a spokeshave and jig saw. I did take the precaution of treating the ends with teak oil initially and I am happy to report that the wood did not check, crack or split at all!
20-25 years ago Lee Valley Tools sold ironwood axe handles in a fawn's foot pattern for a year or two, crafted by a gentleman in the Cornwall, Ontario area but I guess the demand wasn't there and they were discontinued. I realize that most folks are incapable of installing a new handle (even if it is machine made) and cheap Chinese axes and/or plastic handles are fast becoming the norm these days. I spent 7 months as a school teacher in a fly-in Indian Reserve in northern Ontario 10 years ago and noticed that there are no old axes on Reserves; as soon as a handle breaks they go out and buy another gov't-subsidized axe! Every vehicle, snow machine, boat, ATV and residence wood pile sports a nearly new Garant up that way. The woods and lakes in these areas must be littered with old axe heads!
 
Everyone loves to look at nice grain on a stock or handle and (unfortunately) Ironwood is about as innocuous-looking as it gets. Walnut is revered for gunstocks because it's stable, easily worked and pretty to look at. On an axe this material is worthless (as is black cherry or white birch IMO) but if you're a collector (VS a user) it sure can 'spruce-up' whatever you've got planned for hanging up on the wall, and/or to show off your prowess at making/fitting handles.
 
This is an old thread, I know, but the common practice answer was never given.
Axe heads are traditionally soaked in linseed oil (boiled or not, opinions differ) AFTER the head is fitted, and repeated through the life of the tool. This stabilized the wood and kept the head tight.
Additional, soft wood wedges were used in the head split to create mushrooming and grip as driven into the harder wood and I suspect to act as both a wick to linseed oil and to swell to create further mechanical advantage.
The length of the handle would be treated with oils or waxes that would seal and protect it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top