R&D,18th c.American axe

FWIW

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Bob
 
I assumed cracks and wavy delamination close to the poll pointed to misuse of the axe. I thought the axe at some point belonged to somebody with poor aim. He kept messing his morise cuts and opted to use this axe in hot chisel fashion using mallet or even sledge hammer.
People believe what they want to believe. I have run into general contractor with 35 years experience who was 100 percent sure his barrel auger was some kind of timber framing tool. :)
Speaking of the origins of personal knowledge - how you know what you know - and the use of these, so-called mortising axes I recall Eric Sloan's illustration depicting their use just the way you describe, wailing away on the poll with a wood striker. In and of themselves these axes make no sense to me. Only when they are qualified as used to make a mortise in posts for fencing does it begin to seem plausible. In other words for the crudest kind of work, even almost primitive. Maybe it explains the material and workmanship that has apparently gone into making this axe.
 
Speaking of the origins of personal knowledge - how you know what you know - and the use of these, so-called mortising axes I recall Eric Sloan's illustration depicting their use just the way you describe, wailing away on the poll with a wood striker. In and of themselves these axes make no sense to me. Only when they are qualified as used to make a mortise in posts for fencing does it begin to seem plausible. In other words for the crudest kind of work, even almost primitive. Maybe it explains the material and workmanship that has apparently gone into making this axe.
I am glad you are here to share your experience and point out my misconceptions. Thank You.
I assumed that long handle (20 inch and longer), extra heavy head pointed to 2 hand short stroke, controlled (relying more on gravity than force of muscles) chopping movement. And then, at the back of my mind was angle of the bit on this McKinnon axe.
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https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/vintage-mckinnon-mortising-axe-1888664801
 
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I only pass on what I once saw from out of the Sloan book, for the rest I'm not so familiar. From out of my point of reference the thing it reminds me of is knutyxa. It's an axe used for joinery but not chopping mortices, short handled as you describe swung mostly two handed. Beyond the two-handed swing, which I think is a warranted assumption, how further to describe the mortice axe in action, broadly? Fence making? Log construction?
 
Much of this is Such valid,important,constructive discussion,i'm very grateful to everyone for help in attempting to think of such things.
It requires information from so many a quarter,and fortunately we've many of these covered,represented, here.
Ernest brings up a Very good question,what exactly justified the forging of a separate complex tool of such narrowly specialised purpose.
My own log building experience doesn't suggest much,but i've never done any historic restoration in any of areas inhabited during the Colonial period;any of those early techniques that were still a blend of the old European and the new evolving local methods.
Timberframing usually required a higher precision mortising,and was well served by augers and assorted chisels in that.
One thing that pops up in my pea-brain is some kind of hogging-out in a restricted space,trough /gutter work or the like,where wider bit would be a pain.
The iron issue Ernest brings up is in itself terribly complex,and depends severely on exact location and time in history,on specifics of micro-economics there.There was always imported iron of good quality available,while Colonies struggled with straightening out their iron production,it was of course a matter of justification of that expense...
The very slaggy material in that particular mortising axe was most likely produced locally,by very hands-on kind of means,like "refinement" by means of a few neighbors taking turns with their sledges while passing around a jug of moonshine...Again,exactly Where and When is crucially important.
Actually such a potentially important artefact,unattributed/untested/unstudied,sold off on fleabay into obscurity of some annonymous private collection is a crying shame,a net loss to all of us and future folks as well of course...
 
Ernest brings up a Very good question,what exactly justified the forging of a separate complex tool of such narrowly specialised purpose.
My own log building experience doesn't suggest much,but i've never done any historic restoration in any of areas inhabited during the Colonial period;any of those early techniques that were still a blend of the old European and the new evolving local methods.
Timberframing usually required a higher precision mortising,and was well served by augers and assorted chisels in that.
Thanks,that is So cool...Beautiful tool,dirtiest iron ever!:)...
Seller unsurprisingly is in Annville,PA...
Is it possible that it was specialty tool designed for timber framing in mining industry? Those heavy poll mortise axes seem to be made and usually found in mine rich Pennsylvania.
https://archive.org/details/manualminingtoo00morggoog/page/n118?q="mortise+axe"
 
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Jake-the configuration of the mortise axe in question would not be of any use in log or timber frame construction or restoration to me. I have worked on over 500 constructions/restorations and never had any use for this pattern mortise axe, except for the very crudest work, post and rail fence would be a good example. I personally find other mortise axe patterns, like the twibil/twivel to be inferior to the auger/straight & corner chisel method of making a mortise. I have found that swinging any of the above to give unsatisfactory results. Pushing or using a wood mallet gives somewhat better results, but still not up to my standards. One word of caution in doing restoration work--your job as a restoration carpenter in a significant historic structure is to repair in kind. That means that if the original work (in this case a mortise) was crudely made, your job is to make the replacement to match the original, not improve just because you can.

While I really like Eric Sloane's books, he was an artist not a mechanic (I use mechanic in the old definition of a manual worker). Like so many people these days he speculates or repeats what he was told instead of putting his own hands to the tools and continuing until he becomes proficient.
 
commodification of the historical record

It's true,but when it threatens to be too depressing i quickly recollect myself;it's scary how full the world's internet-based marketing platforms are of actual museum artefacts from USSR and satellite states...museum numbers still on 'em...And those have actually been kinda invested into,however feebly dysfunctionally...
(and if i Still feel whiny why then i think of what happened in the last couple decades to museums as well as all sorts of archaeological sites in Iraq,Syria,Afganistan....).
So in comparing i get all cheered up:)
 
your job as a restoration carpenter in a significant historic structure is to repair in kind. That means that if the original work (in this case a mortise) was crudely made, your job is to make the replacement to match the original, not improve just because you can.

That's a very good point,thanks for reminder.I remember seeing a video made by a gent in Germany restoring some missing parts of his house.The place was built in a peculiar very early style dating back to 1500's,and the tool that did best matching that joinery was a small chainsaw...:)
I hear you on the rest as well,a striking motion is not at all handy for any degree of control or accuracy in mortising...(those early German and other European twybill-ish tools were push-tools in spite of having a nominally striking surface/handle...).
That mining drift supports are a great idea,i wonder if there's some precedent in Wales and other places of origin of many of those Pennsylvania settlers...
 
It's true,but when it threatens to be too depressing i quickly recollect myself;it's scary how full the world's internet-based marketing platforms are of actual museum artefacts from USSR and satellite states...museum numbers still on 'em...And those have actually been kinda invested into,however feebly dysfunctionally...
(and if i Still feel whiny why then i think of what happened in the last couple decades to museums as well as all sorts of archaeological sites in Iraq,Syria,Afganistan....).
So in comparing i get all cheered up:)
It only reminds me of my own complicity as a boy scout pillaging ancient fossil artifacts off the desert floor and keeping them in a desk drawer, and worse...
I hear you on the rest as well,a striking motion is not at all handy for any degree of control or accuracy in mortising...(those early German and other European twybill-ish tools were push-tools in spite of having a nominally striking surface/handle...).
No. Great accuracy and speed can be attained and the actual twybil known as kreuzaxt with even Roman origins, a true morticing axe, is a tool of high refinement.
 
The origin of the twybil predates the design of an efficient auger. Therefore, the twybil was used extensively for mortise construction. There must be a video showing "great accuracy and speed" of the twybil, lets see it! Then, I will be able to relate my years of experience to the video. I stick by my statements.
 
It would be not so helpful to suddenly go to the video presentation without first getting a bit more understanding.
Yes, even the Romans were chopping mortices with their axes. In the Middle ages we got the kreuzaxt which got transferred to England and called twybil: twy or zwei (pronounced tvy), German for two, bil or beil, German for axe, so the kreuzaxt of the Continent becomes the double-axe in England,( "Summer our carpenter; and twybil his man..." Ben Jonson 1598), where, by the way, it suffers a significant degradation from a timber framing tool, (sometime after 1598, clearly), to a gardening or agricultural implement used to make transportable sheep pens and who knows what else.

One significant matter in relation to this work with the kreuzaxt/mortice axe is the nature of the mortice in German timber framing known as fachwerk or regelbau. Many times the mortices are very shallow particularly in the wall plates and sills, ± 25 mm or so (a bit over an inch). It seems also clear to me that the work on the frame was a matter of a division of labour with specialists working on particular aspects. So we can imagine one or two of the zimmermannen dedicated to nothing more than chopping, these (often shallow) mortices all day every day for many days and getting very efficient doing it too. I speculate that its demise wasn't even from getting displaced by a better way - boring with an auger and then pairing back with chisels - but the general decline in hand work skill from the late gothic period onwards till today, aided by the banning of its use in Germany in the 1800s sometime. By 1900 it was no longer in use and only remains as a common figure/symbol within the German guild system.

Probably it's all better left to another topic because these original morticing axes are not so directly related to the one brought in here. The only point being to indicate that in principle, chopping a good mortice with an axe that gets swung using a double-handed grip is feasible, not to mention great fun.
 
Great discussion guys!

I can imagine that a specialist could indeed be very good after many years and millions of swings. Who knows how long it's been since somebody of that caliber has even existed? If I understand what Earnest is saying, the use of said implement fell out of favor quite some time ago. I can't help but remembering other stories of incredible feets oh, that I would have been unsuspecting of. English longbowmen able to hit an apple from astonishing distance, draw weights so high that their skeletons became distorted over time. Etc.

I have never built a timber frame structure in my life (aim to change that), but I cannot fathom trying to do it with a mortising axe! I can easily see how the both of you are right in different contexts. I definitely could believe there's nobody alive who can match the precision a chiseled mortise with a mortising axe today. Perhaps if we started a young kid with a mortising axe of the old style and have him work at it for his entire life from dusk to dawn!
 
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it's not for swinging, it's an intermediary tool, like a big chisel, probably made to keep the craftsmen quite far from a striker with a very large wooden mallet

there are different methods of mortising using axes, i dont particularly like the one i'v found but he has the best video about it, it seems the full size heads are the chisel and the hatchet size are for chopping
 
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phantom--the video and the sketch show the axe used to make the tenon not the mortise. The tenon is easy to make with the right axe, it is the way I made the majority of my tenons in timber framing. But what we are talking about is the mortise part of the joint. The video clearly shows the craftsmen using the chisel for the mortise. But, thank you for finding that video. It supports my work experience. I still hope to see a video that supports the "great accuracy and speed" statement. Can a mortise be made with some type of axe? Yes, I have done it many times with my period mortise axes I used in my job. Can it be done with the same "accuracy and speed"of the auger/mallet and chisels, No.
 
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phantom--the video and the sketch show the axe used to make the tenon not the mortise. The tenon is easy to make with the right axe, it is the way I made the majority of my tenons in timber framing. But what we are talking about is the mortise part of the joint. The video clearly shows the craftsmen using the chisel for the mortise. But, thank you for finding that video. It supports my work experience. I still hope to see a video that supports the "great accuracy and speed" statement. Can a mortise be made with some type of axe? Yes, I have done it many times with my period mortise axes I used in my job. Can it be done with the same "accuracy and speed"of the auger/mallet and chisels, No.
here's a mortise "hatchet" (scandi style mortise axe)
it wouldnt be too much of a stretch to image the full size mortise axe being used like this but as a struck tool instead of a striking tool.
 
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