What did you rehang today?

[Yankee Josh]

This is a Collins Legitimus on a great NOS handle. 3lb head, 29.5" handle. Treated with BLO/Turp, then pine tar.

IMG_20181113_075522 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr
IMG_20181113_075542 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr
IMG_20181113_075609 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr
IMG_20181113_075624 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr
IMG_20181113_075632 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr
IMG_20181113_075707 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr
IMG_20181113_084001 by Justin Lyttle, on Flickr

Man what a beauty! I find the longer I'm collecting that nice handles are more and more what I'm really looking for. What a gorgeous axe and hang though! Must be hard to let that one go?? Sweeet!!

 

[FLINT77]

I am in full agreement with the above statement

 

[Square_peg]

I find the longer I'm collecting that nice handles are more and more what I'm really looking for.

Axes survive. Handles don't.

 

[Yankee Josh]

I was going to split this one up in to two posts because it's really long. But i changed my mind! It was a bit of an adventure! Lots of pictures. Like 17 i think.

I brought this one home a few months ago. Being painted and fairly flat cheeked i really didn't think much about it till the other day. I had an excellent 36" hickory handle that someone had really screwed up the eye on. I had done a fair amount of work already but look at the eye. They tapered it way too much. I shortened it and tried to make a palm swell out of what was left. You can see the idea forming!

I will take more time and make a couple of structural changes next time. (Including better joints)If this one holds up over time. It's done well so far.

I used a brace to drill the holes and made a couple red oak dowels.

My jointery is pretty bad. And I'm a carpenter! I was using hand tools and i don't have a bench or a good wood vice here yet. I've since done about a half hours worth of chopping with it and incredibly it's doing just fine! Not so much as a wiggle!

I seated the head before doing this so i wouldn't subject it to all the smashing. Nice tight fit on both sides.

Do you guys know what the letter H could signify in front of the eye?

The last thing I wanted to mention is how utterly shocked i was to find in this the hardest steel I've ever encountered! BY FAR! It took me SO LONG to file this thing. I mean I'm still scratching my head over how hard it is! Like i was trying to file some super metal or something. Odd i thought in what i figured was a cheap axe. Last photo, fairly good amount of temper.

I apologize for the short volume on a not very special axe. This project took awhile and i thought someone might enjoy seeing it. Thanks!

 

[Square_peg]

Turned out pretty good.

 

[FLINT77]

Looks great! Very good job . I bet that will hold just fine.

 

[crbnSteeladdict]

I was going to split this one up in to two posts because it's really long. But i changed my mind! It was a bit of an adventure! Lots of pictures. Like 17 i think.

I brought this one home a few months ago. Being painted and fairly flat cheeked i really didn't think much about it till the other day. I had an excellent 36" hickory handle that someone had really screwed up the eye on. I had done a fair amount of work already but look at the eye. They tapered it way too much. I shortened it and tried to make a palm swell out of what was left. You can see the idea forming!

I will take more time and make a couple of structural changes next time. (Including better joints)If this one holds up over time. It's done well so far.

I used a brace to drill the holes and made a couple red oak dowels.

My jointery is pretty bad. And I'm a carpenter! I was using hand tools and i don't have a bench or a good wood vice here yet. I've since done about a half hours worth of chopping with it and incredibly it's doing just fine! Not so much as a wiggle!

I seated the head before doing this so i wouldn't subject it to all the smashing. Nice tight fit on both sides.

Do you guys know what the letter H could signify in front of the eye?

The last thing I wanted to mention is how utterly shocked i was to find in this the hardest steel I've ever encountered! BY FAR! It took me SO LONG to file this thing. I mean I'm still scratching my head over how hard it is! Like i was trying to file some super metal or something. Odd i thought in what i figured was a cheap axe. Last photo, fairly good amount of temper.

I apologize for the short volume on a not very special axe. This project took awhile and i thought someone might enjoy seeing it. Thanks!

Flat cheeks, very hard steel .... sounds like Woodings-Verona but those usually have US+year mark

 

[Jasper33]

I was going to split this one up in to two posts because it's really long. But i changed my mind! It was a bit of an adventure! Lots of pictures. Like 17 i think.

I brought this one home a few months ago. Being painted and fairly flat cheeked i really didn't think much about it till the other day. I had an excellent 36" hickory handle that someone had really screwed up the eye on. I had done a fair amount of work already but look at the eye. They tapered it way too much. I shortened it and tried to make a palm swell out of what was left. You can see the idea forming!

I will take more time and make a couple of structural changes next time. (Including better joints)If this one holds up over time. It's done well so far.

I used a brace to drill the holes and made a couple red oak dowels.

My jointery is pretty bad. And I'm a carpenter! I was using hand tools and i don't have a bench or a good wood vice here yet. I've since done about a half hours worth of chopping with it and incredibly it's doing just fine! Not so much as a wiggle!

I seated the head before doing this so i wouldn't subject it to all the smashing. Nice tight fit on both sides.

Do you guys know what the letter H could signify in front of the eye?

The last thing I wanted to mention is how utterly shocked i was to find in this the hardest steel I've ever encountered! BY FAR! It took me SO LONG to file this thing. I mean I'm still scratching my head over how hard it is! Like i was trying to file some super metal or something. Odd i thought in what i figured was a cheap axe. Last photo, fairly good amount of temper.

I apologize for the short volume on a not very special axe. This project took awhile and i thought someone might enjoy seeing it. Thanks!

I like what you did there! That’s one of the reasons I like reading through this forum, learning from other people’s ideas and experiences!
If I find I have a handle I want to shorten in the future I think I will give it a try, but maybe use a long V shaped joint and the dowels, like this.
| |
|V|
| |

I like the way you think out of the box and just try things and see how they turn out, thanks for sharing.

 

[Yankee Josh]

Thanks for all your positive feedback! If i had it to do over again my half lap would be longer and the ends instead of being a butt joint the inside of each lap would be the long point of a 22.5° bevel. Viewing it from the side. I can tell my lap is too short and there's a fair amount of stress there. I'm roofing again but by myself this time so I don't know when I'll have daylight and energy to go test it. But when i do I'll let you's know how it holds up! And thank you, i do try to think outside the box a bit. Sometimes it's wasted energy but never wasted effort.(if that makes any sense). I always learn something!

 

[garry3]

I like what you did there! That’s one of the reasons I like reading through this forum, learning from other people’s ideas and experiences!
If I find I have a handle I want to shorten in the future I think I will give it a try, but maybe use a long V shaped joint and the dowels, like this.
| |
|V|
| |

I like the way you think out of the box and just try things and see how they turn out, thanks for sharing.

I use a Z splice quite a bit. More forgiving than it looks as it can be further tuned with a rasp or file after it is cut. It's a very strong splice. I use dowels to keep things lined up during clamping, not for strength of the joint. You can learn more about it from a google search. The bow building community has it down pretty well.

 

[Old Axeman]

garry3- My favorite splice for what old carpenters called a dutchman repair is what I believe you call a Z splice. if you turn the vertical (but not now plumb) line of the Z to be plumb and vertical at the same time, you have my favorite dutchman. I describe it as a half lap with splayed or V shoulders dutchman. Not sure I would like it on an axe haft, but, I used it in both horizontal and vertical log and and timber repair. Always doweled and glued.

 

[Square_peg]

I haven't used it personally but I've always liked the look and function of the beveled scarf joint. It's one I want to try. I like how it's self locking even without glue.

 

[Square_peg]

Good video of the above.

 

[Fmont]

Whatever manner of hewing hatchet this Plumb is. I used an old double bit haft to make this one. It's checked, but very sound. After putting on my finish the checking showed up really handsomely. I'm assuming the bit is supposed to line up as I have it.

I love this thing. I was playing with it a bit after I had it roughed out. It would be a great bushcraft hatchet, that chisel edge feathers like a pro and would be great for crafting all the various notches and tips involved, stripping bark for cordage, applie Birch just fine, etc. NEAT!

 

[Square_peg]

I believe that's called a flooring hatchet. How long is the handle?

 

[FLINT77]

I liked the way these two turned out so I thought I would share.

First is a small axe head my dad got out of a friends shed for me. The head is stamped Diamond with a stamped image of a diamond. I had previously read that diamond axes were probably chinese, but it looked like a decent head, so I figured it would still be fun to play with. So I drilled and drifted out the little bit of epoxied handle from the eye and soaked the head in evaporust for a little while. I know that most here prefer the wire wheel, but I wanted to try cold bluing on this head, just for fun - just to see how it worked. Figured this would be a good axe to try stuff on that I wouldn't want to do with a vintage US head. I've used evaporust before and its incredible. cleaned the rust off super fast. cleaned up and sharpened the bit and the steel seemed nice and hard. Then I filed down all the mushrooming of the poll and sanded everything down, cleaned with simple green and then alcohol and applied a couple coats of cold blue. Turned out pretty good - looked way better than the bare steel anyways. Then for the handle. There is a really cool local hardware store that gets some axe handles from a small operation in NC. apparently the guy just loads up his truck and drives up through va until he sells them all and then goes back, haha. anyways, his handles are pretty good, too bad they are still only in the typical lengths. anyways, this hardware store had a really nice slim 28" boys handle with great grain orientation and a nice swell, so I bought it for this head. I was wanting a 24" handle for this head as it is only 1.75lbs, but I figured the 28" would have to do so I seated the head as low as I could and got it down to 26" which I actually am really liking. I put two coats of pure tung/citric solvent and hit it really really lightly and carefully with the torch to just darken the grain - which I think turned out ok. As I've mentioned before, when you burn a handle after its had a couple coats of tung it actually somehow physically raises the grain up and creates a noticeable texture to the wood which I actually really like. if you burn first and then put tung oil on it does NOT do this. anyways, I've put a couple more coats of tung on and I'll call it done now.









I really like the feel of this 1.75lb head on this very slim 26" handle. It only weighs 2.5lbs total and seems really handy. The steel seems nice and hard - on par with some of my US heads. and it seems very well formed. much much better than a Collins M 2 1/4 boys axe that I have which is super rough. I'll post comparison pictures. I like the Diamond better. Might be a nice axe to keep in the truck.



below is the collins M



and now the Diamond




Now, the only thing that I wont do again probably is the cold blue. I like the look just fine, but it seems to be wearing off really really easily.

 

[FLINT77]

The second is a 4lb knott klipper that I picked up for a good price.

I found a pretty nice 32" link handle at a hardware store. The handle had a huge swell and a nice shape, but was super fat. I don't have a lot of specialty tools, so my handle process is that I take a woodmans pal and use it like a draw shave and run it up and down the handle repeatedly. originally i just did this to remove the varnish, but then I realized that it also could take off nice long woodshaving ribbons - so I did my initial shaping with the woodmans pal. Then I took one of those little 4 in 1 metal wood rasps to some more serious wood removable around the shoulder and then did some shaping around the belly and then was like, hmmm, what if I tried to "octagonalize" the handle. I figured worse case scenario It wouldn't look good and I would just sand it back oval, but It was way easier than I expected and I think turned out really well and I really like it. WAY better than the house handle octagonalization. Another thing I did - which I modeled after a really old octagonal McKinnon handle I have - was to taper the flats near the bend so that the last section of handle is oval leading up to the swell. Then since the head was already kind of shiny (that way when I got it), I thought that the handle should be dark. Until I get some other ways to darken a handle, I thought I would just burn this one again - I don't really love the blotchy burn look and tried to get an even dark burn, which is really hard to do and I wasn't totally successful. I'll perfect it eventually.

my goal was to get the head seated down so the oal was close to 30" but I had a really hard time seating this head for some reason. I've seated a bunch of heads, but this one was really slow going and I got carried away and pounded the head on too much one time and decided to just commit and I just barely got the haft up to flush with the top of the axe head. In the past, if I beat the pee pee out of the bottom of the handle, the head would always just curl up a bunch of wood and keep going, but this one wouldn't. then pounded in a wedge which wouldn't go in super far before it started deforming, so I put in a metal wedge which I put in too horizontal and was actually wider than the eye, so I had to file the wedge down flush with the eye - anyways, that part didn't go the way I wanted at all, so I hope it stays put, but I imagine it should with the amount of effort it took to even get it there. So the oal is right at 31" which is a pretty good length for me.

I'm most pleased with the final shape of the handle though - the curves, the flats, and the swell. Can't wait to put it to work.









the burn makes it hard to see the octagonalization but this pic kind of shows it



also a pic with these last two axes side by side

 

[Old Axeman]

Fmont- nice flooring hatchet. Oddly enough I have only ever found them with the single bevel for a right hander. When I was younger I found a picture of a left hander in one of my old catalogs and thought maybe? But not after 60 years of looking. I now think that the printer reversed the sketch in the catalog. Anybody ever see a flooring hatchet made for a lefty? The nature of them makes it so you can not modify a righty for a lefty.

 

[garry3]

garry3- My favorite splice for what old carpenters called a dutchman repair is what I believe you call a Z splice. if you turn the vertical (but not now plumb) line of the Z to be plumb and vertical at the same time, you have my favorite dutchman. I describe it as a half lap with splayed or V shoulders dutchman. Not sure I would like it on an axe haft, but, I used it in both horizontal and vertical log and and timber repair. Always doweled and glued.

Something like this?

I will usually make the splice about 3 1/4" long for an 1 1/4" width. It's one of two joints that have traditionally joined billets together the other is in the form of a W.
What kind of splice would you prefer for an axe handle?

 

[phantomknives]

The second is a 4lb knott klipper that I picked up for a good price.

I found a pretty nice 32" link handle at a hardware store. The handle had a huge swell and a nice shape, but was super fat. I don't have a lot of specialty tools, so my handle process is that I take a woodmans pal and use it like a draw shave and run it up and down the handle repeatedly. originally i just did this to remove the varnish, but then I realized that it also could take off nice long woodshaving ribbons - so I did my initial shaping with the woodmans pal. Then I took one of those little 4 in 1 metal wood rasps to some more serious wood removable around the shoulder and then did some shaping around the belly and then was like, hmmm, what if I tried to "octagonalize" the handle. I figured worse case scenario It wouldn't look good and I would just sand it back oval, but It was way easier than I expected and I think turned out really well and I really like it. WAY better than the house handle octagonalization. Another thing I did - which I modeled after a really old octagonal McKinnon handle I have - was to taper the flats near the bend so that the last section of handle is oval leading up to the swell. Then since the head was already kind of shiny (that way when I got it), I thought that the handle should be dark. Until I get some other ways to darken a handle, I thought I would just burn this one again - I don't really love the blotchy burn look and tried to get an even dark burn, which is really hard to do and I wasn't totally successful. I'll perfect it eventually.

my goal was to get the head seated down so the oal was close to 30" but I had a really hard time seating this head for some reason. I've seated a bunch of heads, but this one was really slow going and I got carried away and pounded the head on too much one time and decided to just commit and I just barely got the haft up to flush with the top of the axe head. In the past, if I beat the pee pee out of the bottom of the handle, the head would always just curl up a bunch of wood and keep going, but this one wouldn't. then pounded in a wedge which wouldn't go in super far before it started deforming, so I put in a metal wedge which I put in too horizontal and was actually wider than the eye, so I had to file the wedge down flush with the eye - anyways, that part didn't go the way I wanted at all, so I hope it stays put, but I imagine it should with the amount of effort it took to even get it there. So the oal is right at 31" which is a pretty good length for me.

I'm most pleased with the final shape of the handle though - the curves, the flats, and the swell. Can't wait to put it to work.









the burn makes it hard to see the octagonalization but this pic kind of shows it



also a pic with these last two axes side by side

+1 on that VA plate