bad fiskars experience

[Elen]

Sounds like something was badly wrong with the axe. Fiskars warranty people should replace it for you, and if not, raise hell. Their axes may be inexpensive, but they can take abuse. They certainly shouldn't chip seriously when working on wood. I've never had that happen.

The handles, though, can be broken, even though they are much more durable than wooden handles. All it takes is a -30 degrees Celcius weather, chopping the blade deep into hard wood or something similar, and then kicking the handle with all your might. If that doesn't break it, consider yourself lucky. On the other hand, why anyone would ever need to do something like this I will never know.

 

[Kiah]

Now that I think about it, I do recall seeing a Gerber with a broken handle on eBay. It was a Gator model. As for the chipping. Old Jimbo mentions on his site, that his Fiskars chipped when he first used it, but after sharpening, it never happened again. I think the Fiskars has the same problem that Moras and a lot of other production blades have. The very edge gets overheated when being factory sharpened, and you need to take it back a little to remedy the problem.

 

[tholiver]

I love my Fiskars axes and have beaten the heck out of them without any problems. They are great bang for the buck and are very easy to resharpen. Sounds like you got a defective one. With anything mass produced there are the occasional defective duds. Bring it back to the store or write Fiskars about a warranty replacement.

Somebody here did post a pic of a broken synthetic handled hatchet however it was not a Fiskars/Gerber.
I vaguely remember the thread, some member who found a bunch of old knives from his youth one of which was a synthetic handled hatchet with a broken handle, it was a rip-off/clone of the Fiskars/Gerber.

 

[Stubai]

It would take a lot of force to break one of those handles. Also, I have used all kinds of Fiskars products, and they have all been of good quality. The hand axe seems to be one of their better tools, so I am at a loss as to why the edge would have chipped under light stress unless rocks were impacted.

 

[jackknife]

Now that I think about it, I do recall seeing a Gerber with a broken handle on eBay. It was a Gator model. As for the chipping. Old Jimbo mentions on his site, that his Fiskars chipped when he first used it, but after sharpening, it never happened again. I think the Fiskars has the same problem that Moras and a lot of other production blades have. The very edge gets overheated when being factory sharpened, and you need to take it back a little to remedy the problem.

Thats the problem exactly! It happens to production cutlery enough that I have encountered the problem before.

Riley- just stone the edge back a little and you won't have anymore problem. I've been using one of these hatchets for over ten years now, and I had the problem with the edge as it came from the factory. I sharpened it and its been fine since.:thumbup:

I've had a mora do it as well. Just sharpen it.

 

[johnny reb]

Try grinding a convex edge on it. If that doesn`t work, maybe it wasn`t heat treated properly. I think Fiskars is farming out labor to other countries. I have stopped buying thier products. I broke a pair of lopping shears last winter, Bummed me out.

 

[bob bowie]

On the broken handles, www.arboristsite.com has had a few people report broken handles due to overstrikes and such. Most of the damages were splitting at the seam right under the bit.

Here's one of the threads, there are more, but I'm too lazy to dig them up.

http://www.arboristsite.com/showthread.php?t=48007&highlight=fiskars+handle .

Neat site too.

.

 

[GEC]

Nevermind the answer I put was already posted by kiahs

 

[AustinTXShooter]

It looks like the person that broke the handle did so when they were using the back of the axe to drive wedges into logs. (btw, they had the chopping axe, not the splitting axe) I was always taught never to use the axe as a hammer to drive in wedges, as that is what splitting mauls and sledge hammers are for. I have never seen a single book or internet site that advises using an axe in that manner. Wetterlings warns you to never do it in the book that comes with the Wetterlings' axes. I guess the moral of the story is that if you use your axe for the purpose it was designed for, you will be fine. If you try and use it as a sledge hammer, you may be in trouble.

 

[Shotgun]

I've heard of this problem. Oldjimbo.com did an article on this hatchet and said each example he got had this problem. After sharpening it the first time it never happened again. The article isn't on his site but it's still on a server somewhere and of course I don't have the link. I'm sure you could email him though.

 

[Shotgun]

Now that I think about it, I do recall seeing a Gerber with a broken handle on eBay. It was a Gator model. As for the chipping. Old Jimbo mentions on his site, that his Fiskars chipped when he first used it, but after sharpening, it never happened again. I think the Fiskars has the same problem that Moras and a lot of other production blades have. The very edge gets overheated when being factory sharpened, and you need to take it back a little to remedy the problem.

Crap I didn't see this thread went two pages. You beat me to it.