About two months ago I had an idea to restore old hatchet heads as gifts for my family for Christmas. It all started when I saw a few old axe heads at a flea market and snowballed from there.
After lots of searching I was able to get my hands on 6 hatchet heads for reasonable prices and started down the path!
I thought I'd share my adventure on the forum for anyone who wanted to check it out.
This post is about the first hatchet.
Here is the before picture:
I had tried the vinegar soak to remove rust on an old double bit I found and didn't love the experience. So I wanted to try the angle grinder with a wire wheel on it to see how that faired. And I must say it was WAY better. Faster. Easier. And better results. Wins all around.
I have a lot of experience sharpening knives but had never had sharpened an axe before. I watched lots of videos and went to town with a file I had.
Got it pretty darn sharp with only one cut on my pinky (small win?). It took a fairly long while to get the bevels where I wanted and the file did hit the wrong mark a number of times - this led to a streaky shine in some places.
Next came the hanging. This is the part I was worried about. Rightly so. I got a handle from house handles and went to town with a rasp. I found eventually that the eye of this particular hatchet head wasn't quite straight so had a lot of work to do to get it straight. I wasn't exactly clear on how tight it should be either, but figured experience is the best teacher. In the end I got it straight, but I was so excited it was straight and nervous that it would become crooked if I tried to drop it lower I hung it just shy of the top - which was a mistake.
Anyway. It was a good time. Here are some pics of the hang. The top down view is so ugly I'm nearly ashamed! Hah. I took it out to trim my willow tree out back and it worked great. I really enjoy using it. The balance is great on the 16 inch broad hatchet handle.
Still need to treat the handle with BLO, but I'm liking it. I'm not worried about the loose looking hang because it was such a bear to get on in the first place. If you can't tell from the pictures, it is an old cedar pattern Boy Scout hatchet.
I'll be using this thread to post the other hatchets as I progress.
J
After lots of searching I was able to get my hands on 6 hatchet heads for reasonable prices and started down the path!
I thought I'd share my adventure on the forum for anyone who wanted to check it out.
This post is about the first hatchet.
Here is the before picture:
I had tried the vinegar soak to remove rust on an old double bit I found and didn't love the experience. So I wanted to try the angle grinder with a wire wheel on it to see how that faired. And I must say it was WAY better. Faster. Easier. And better results. Wins all around.
I have a lot of experience sharpening knives but had never had sharpened an axe before. I watched lots of videos and went to town with a file I had.
Got it pretty darn sharp with only one cut on my pinky (small win?). It took a fairly long while to get the bevels where I wanted and the file did hit the wrong mark a number of times - this led to a streaky shine in some places.
Next came the hanging. This is the part I was worried about. Rightly so. I got a handle from house handles and went to town with a rasp. I found eventually that the eye of this particular hatchet head wasn't quite straight so had a lot of work to do to get it straight. I wasn't exactly clear on how tight it should be either, but figured experience is the best teacher. In the end I got it straight, but I was so excited it was straight and nervous that it would become crooked if I tried to drop it lower I hung it just shy of the top - which was a mistake.
Anyway. It was a good time. Here are some pics of the hang. The top down view is so ugly I'm nearly ashamed! Hah. I took it out to trim my willow tree out back and it worked great. I really enjoy using it. The balance is great on the 16 inch broad hatchet handle.
Still need to treat the handle with BLO, but I'm liking it. I'm not worried about the loose looking hang because it was such a bear to get on in the first place. If you can't tell from the pictures, it is an old cedar pattern Boy Scout hatchet.
I'll be using this thread to post the other hatchets as I progress.
J
