Anyone hike with a pocket hatchet/axe ?

[BarberFobic1992]

very cool double bit ebbtide

 

[AeroNautiCal]

For me, its the GB Mini each time (with a Gerber Gator Exchange-A-Blade folding saw too).

 

[R.Russell]

What I've always wondered is:
With a large knife you can seat it and baton through the wood with minimal risk of the wood "jumping" into your face. It seems with the force of a small axe you're coming down on it with force with no distance between you and the exploding wood. Do you seat it and baton the back like a wedge or maul?
I'm talking for bigger stuff.

 

[sicily02]

Yep every day it is part of my EDC. Here is one that I made.

I just love little hatchets.

Bryan

 

[MBTull]

What I've always wondered is:
With a large knife you can seat it and baton through the wood with minimal risk of the wood "jumping" into your face. It seems with the force of a small axe you're coming down on it with force with no distance between you and the exploding wood. Do you seat it and baton the back like a wedge or maul?
I'm talking for bigger stuff.

I baton with my pocket ax. I seat the ax head on the wood to split and wail (wale? whale?) on it with a limb that I have shaped with the ax held like an ulu.

 

[Marcelo Cantu]

Wail.

I find I'm not very good with anything with a handle shorter than a Fiskars hatchet or an Estwing hatchet. I have the Timberline minihatchet or pilots hatchet and a Gerber back paxe or whatever it's called. They're both very cool and compact, and if kept very sharp can be useful for shaping wood or even skinning or food processing, but for processing logs into fuel of various size, I'm more comfortable with an ax or even a fairly large knife with a baton. Methinks it is a matter of preference.

 

[Fonly]

I certainly love the mini wetterlings, great little tool to work with. On a day hike I usually dont take it, the RC6 comes along.

That said, I want to take it with me more often.

 

[Ebbtide]

Thanx BarberFobic...from one longhair to another

Russamuri, I tend to scale the wood to the size of the hatchet
In my photo the wood was cut with a lightweight folding saw.
I stood the cut pieces on a flat surface (available stump), held it in place with another piece of wood NOT my hand.
Tapped the hatchet into the piece to be split just hard enough to stick it.
Then lifted the hatchet and wood together and tap-tap-tapped it thru.
I guess you could whomp it real hard and get thru in one hit, but I was taught to never use brute force when using sharp tools.
Pop always said "let the tool do the work"
YMMV, but it works for me

 

[NoFair]

Small sharp Axe and large folder (Spyderco Millie) will do almost anything I need in the woods. My axes are from Wetterlings and a bit larger than the GB Mini.

If I'm only carrying a knife it will usually be a ~4" fixed blade (Northstar, Bravo, Canadian Special, Aurora or Helle)

 

[akennedy73]

Do you seat it and baton the back like a wedge or maul?

Exactly - with my Vaughan pocket axe I seat it and gently tap the back. I essentially use it as a wedge - a very tiny wedge. It won't even split the small stuff in one go - I have to pry it out and start if farther down the split, tapping it in gently. Pull it out and repeat.

Although it's a tiny wedge it is an actual wedge unlike the thinner profile of a knife. The drawback is that I can't send it through in one go - it's so small it gets buried in the split real quick. But the handle makes it pretty easy to remove. I actually pack it in order to split wood - I prefer to cut with a silky saw and I'm not too fond of batoning with an expensive scandi that doesn't have a full tang and only a 3" blade.

 

[C Bryant]

The tiny size certainly does get the job done. You might have to work a bit harder because of the size, but you will never know it is there weight wise.