AXE ID Help

[garry3]

Here is what I have.

So far what I have came up with.
The waffle pattern seems to have been applied before the head was fully forged, based on distortion of the pattern.
The 6 or 9 seems to match with an example of a Plumb axe. Including stamp placement.
The second example has "CAMPFIRE" stamped on it. Would very much like to find out any information on this axe.
Some place on this form there was a third example of an axe with a matching waffle pattern.
Does any one have any information about these axes?

 

[Agent_H]

Could it be Belgian?

I've run down the rabbit hole on many searches but haven't come across one like that.

Is that a filled pinning hole on the first one?

 

[garry3]

Could it be Belgian?

I've run down the rabbit hole on many searches but haven't come across one like that.

Is that a filled pinning hole on the first one?

Oh ya, some one pinned it. The pin is still in there nice and straight. We probably don't want to know how they removed the old handle.

 

[Steve Tall]

Here's another thread with a "waffle" pattern:

This one is odd, it is 3.25lbs and is 7" long with a 45" edge. It looks like a slightly elongated Dayton. Even so it has an eye that looks slightly smaller than the typical boy's axe eye and has two sets of quad-diamond shapes stamped onto both sides. Anyone seen one like this before?

 

[garry3]

Good work Steve. That might have been the other one I was thinking about. That last picture seems to show that the pattern is likely a match with the circle in the center of the square.

 

[jblyttle]

I'm up in the air. I've seen a few others, there is no correlation between styles or sized, and they are usually in a random pattern that covers the back half of the head. I mostly think that it is an unusual vise mark on soft bodied axes. The only thing keeping me from being very confident is that one I posted a while ago that is very symmetrical. But again, none of the heads had anything else in common, just like your two. Seems like one owner for those two heads and they both got squeezed in the same device.

 

[garry3]

I'm up in the air. I've seen a few others, there is no correlation between styles or sized, and they are usually in a random pattern that covers the back half of the head. I mostly think that it is an unusual vise mark on soft bodied axes. The only thing keeping me from being very confident is that one I posted a while ago that is very symmetrical. But again, none of the heads had anything else in common, just like your two. Seems like one owner for those two heads and they both got squeezed in the same device.

Have the ones that you have seen have a makers mark or stamp? If anyone would come across these it would be you JB. They do not seem to be rare, but maybe just not common.

If the mark was put there by a vice after the head was formed the pattern would be the same size. I am not seeing that on either of these two examples.

Was it some kind of a production problem with the steel billet?