COTS Project Thread

Yeah, never much of a poster anyway, but somehow got wiped to zero on the count.
I have been inspired by what I see here and done a few the past year. Some good, some notso, but a great tinkering hobby.
 
It's a fun way to stay busy.

Who needs an axe head to make a handle am I right? ..... :\ The more I think about my "black" Locust - that is probably some freak genetically modified Honey Locust - the more I couldn't help but start hacking on it. I had this one piece that I felt was the least likely useful and decided the best way to see how it would work as a handle, was to make a handle. I have this bad habit of starting with way too much material and spending way too much time on material that is going to end up on the ground. I gotta get better at that. But this took WAY too long, by anyone's standards. And I could have made two handles. But that's beside the point.

Along the way I confirmed that I do not like the SFA handle - I never have but I got a blister today that really drove it home for me. The handle has a tear drop cross section (it's like the eye) and the front is too pointed. My Wards on the other hand, good to go. I have to admit that I prefer the curved handle for carving. I find that my wrist hurts after using a straight handle. I used the SFA because I needed to hack off all the bug damaged wood and wanted more heft for that. My mind began to wander to thoughts of a froe and the stupid amount of time I was spending on this. On the bright side, I decapitated MANY borers, and took demented pleasure in it.

I think the pics tell the story (I took many more this time), but as you can see, the goal was to find a straight line through this piece. With such wide growth rings, I'm just not confident there will be enough good wood in the finished product and I was concerned that it would be impossible to get even 2 continuous rings end to end.

24inch_locusthandle1 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

24inch_locusthandle2 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
Bugs mostly removed.

24inch_locusthandle3 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

24inch_locusthandle4 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
Gotta wicked bend but for a 24 inch handle (give or take) most of the bend is going to be in the swell.

24inch_locusthandle5 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

24inch_locusthandle6 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
I brought in the draw knife for some thinning and fine tuning but without a shave horse .... sigh, all the things I need. This is all I got done today so the rest will have to wait. This piece is still ginormous and I think you can count the number of growth rings on one hand.
 
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COTS I can tell that you really like that Ward's hatchet so I thought this might interest you.

16189400227_5f293d749b_h.jpg


15755284823_a74cbea926_h.jpg


I own 5 of these hatchets that are all very similar in size and shape. I'm convinced all of them are made by Kelly. Two are unmarked with eye ridges. One is a XLCR hatchet with no ridges and no nail puller. One is the pictured Kelly stamped with no ridges and a nail puller. And the last of course is the Ward's Master Quality which is just like the Kelly say for different stamps.

I can tell you my example though it my not look like it is somewhat worn down and is missing about a ¼" I believe compared to other examples I own. Whoever owned it however did at least sharpen it evenly. Anyway figured you might appreciate knowing the likley manufacturer of your hatchet.
 
Hacked I think you should get a Plumb boy scout hatchet and look at it with the master quality. They line up very well too except for a lighter poll in the boy scout. I'm not insisting the MQ is a Plumb but I'm not convinced either way.
 
halfaxe said:
Hacked I think you should get a Plumb boy scout hatchet and look at it with the master quality. They line up very well too except for a lighter poll in the boy scout. I'm not insisting the MQ is a Plumb but I'm not convinced either way.
Click to expand...

I actually have one, but it's a national pattern not a Dayton. The eye on the Plumb is quite different where as the Kelly is near identical. Actually those two axes overlap each other almost perfectly aside from the wear on the bits and polls. The nail pullers are ever so slightly different, but within reason. If you could look at them in person trust me you would agree they are from the same manufacturer.

One distinct feature I've noticed with the Plumb hatchets is that the poll tapers so that the back of the pole is narrower than the eye at the widest point. This is not the case on the Kelly Hatchets. I'll try to post up another picture comparing more of the heads.

Snapped a couple of quick photos of all but one of my Kelly made hatchets and tossed the Plumb in for good measure.

28472741491_2df8d7355f_b.jpg


Can you tell which is the Ward's from the above picture alone?

28444379062_ba52559dd5_b.jpg
 
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Interesting stuff. The Wards axes I have are all very nice, so I wouldn't doubt that one of the big names made them. Hacked, your pics confirm that my hatchet is missing a little steel. Are yours 1-1/2lb heads? The Plumb is second from the left?


More progress tonight.

Rough sanded.
24inch_locusthandle7 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

A quick fine sand just to get a look at what the finished product will look like. The wood feels wet to me still, though it doesn't load up the sand paper. I may toast the tongue before I hang it, I dunno. So I couldn't capture it to save my life, but the bend in the grain didn't really end up being too much of an issue. You can sort of see that chunk that runs off just above the swell, but it doesn't run across the handle, maybe only half way or so.
24inch_locusthandle8 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
 
That handle is really coming together nicely!

My heads all seem to come in around 1.25 lbs or close enough that it was obviously the original weight. You can see in my photo above that the Ward's (center) is quite a bit shorter than the much newer paper label Kelly to the right of it.

Forgot to say yes the Plumb was second from the left.
 
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Huh, well mine is 1-1/4lb on the dot. Yeah I do like it. I personally don't find a big difference in bit thickness when carving (like compared to the Gransfors for instance). Granted, I don't do that much carving, but the hefty (even after I thinned it considerably) convex on my Wards worked like a charm.

What do you guys think about the wood based on what you see? Obviously I am/was skeptic. But now that the handle is half finished it FEELs solid and it's heavy - easily as heavy as Hickory if not more. I do think there is some moisture in it for whatever that's worth.
 
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I don't doubt that Locust is equal (or better) than Hickory but industry's trying to gather up commercial quantities is probably a serious obstacle. If a mature Hickory tree consistently yields 150 grade A handles whereas a similar sized Locust tree yields 15-20 grade A along with many knotty and grain runout handles it's easy to see which one becomes more desirable from an economic standpoint. Also seems to me Hickory is fast growing and readily obtainable. White Oak was an optional handle material at one time but when I look around here at mature ones I only see them as solitary individuals with very little straight grain located in and along farm fields while Bitternut Hickory groves/stands (sporadically common here and there) can yield a mountain of long, straight, knot-free lumber all in one shot.
 
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That's a good point. These would be lousy trees for commercial quantities. This was my least desirable looking piece and it worked out ok in the end. Gotta do a couple basic hangs for a friend while I wait for the CT HB to show up, then I'll put it to the test.
 
cityofthesouth said:
That's a good point. These would be lousy trees for commercial quantities. This was my least desirable looking piece and it worked out ok in the end. Gotta do a couple basic hangs for a friend while I wait for the CT HB to show up, then I'll put it to the test.
Click to expand...

I've made this known before but Hop Hornbeam (Ironwood) is my 'baby' for ultimate handles. There are no large tall straight ones. You can't split that stuff (for firewood) to save your life and if you really bend it it'll fail but it won't cleanly break! For about a year some 30 years ago an old gentleman (?) with a copy lathe in Cornwall, Ontario supplied Lee Valley Tools in Ottawa with Ironwood axe handles. The fellow was a master at selecting his material but either he couldn't make money at it or he ran out of AA blanks. I really wish I'd laid in a bunch at the time.
 
300Six said:
I've made this known before but Hop Hornbeam (Ironwood) is my 'baby' for ultimate handles. There are no large tall straight ones. You can't split that stuff (for firewood) to save your life and if you really bend it it'll fail but it won't cleanly break! For about a year some 30 years ago an old gentleman (?) with a copy lathe in Cornwall, Ontario supplied Lee Valley Tools in Ottawa with Ironwood axe handles. The fellow was a master at selecting his material but either he couldn't make money at it or he ran out of AA blanks. I really wish I'd laid in a bunch at the time.
Click to expand...

A few years back, on a lake near here..I tied a drop line on a ironwood branch about the size of my little finger. My buddy who was working the boat, asked what I was doing, and insisted I tie the line to a larger branch because a limb that small wouldn't hold a very big fish should one bite. I explained to him that it was not any branch, it was ironwood, and would hold any fish in the lake! I then baited the 8/0 Eagle Claw attached to the end of the line with a 8 inch bluegill.

Later that night when we were checking lines I noticed that the ironwood branch was mangled, broken and pulled down in to water..but motionless. The flathead catfish that tiny ironwood branch held weighed 46 lbs. and change!
 
cityofthesouth said:
It's a fun way to stay busy.

Who needs an axe head to make a handle am I right? ..... :\ The more I think about my "black" Locust - that is probably some freak genetically modified Honey Locust - the more I couldn't help but start hacking on it. I had this one piece that I felt was the least likely useful and decided the best way to see how it would work as a handle, was to make a handle. I have this bad habit of starting with way too much material and spending way too much time on material that is going to end up on the ground. I gotta get better at that. But this took WAY too long, by anyone's standards. And I could have made two handles. But that's beside the point.

Along the way I confirmed that I do not like the SFA handle - I never have but I got a blister today that really drove it home for me. The handle has a tear drop cross section (it's like the eye) and the front is too pointed. My Wards on the other hand, good to go. I have to admit that I prefer the curved handle for carving. I find that my wrist hurts after using a straight handle. I used the SFA because I needed to hack off all the bug damaged wood and wanted more heft for that. My mind began to wander to thoughts of a froe and the stupid amount of time I was spending on this. On the bright side, I decapitated MANY borers, and took demented pleasure in it.

I think the pics tell the story (I took many more this time), but as you can see, the goal was to find a straight line through this piece. With such wide growth rings, I'm just not confident there will be enough good wood in the finished product and I was concerned that it would be impossible to get even 2 continuous rings end to end.

24inch_locusthandle1 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

24inch_locusthandle2 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
Bugs mostly removed.

24inch_locusthandle3 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

24inch_locusthandle4 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
Gotta wicked bend but for a 24 inch handle (give or take) most of the bend is going to be in the swell.

24inch_locusthandle5 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr

24inch_locusthandle6 by city_ofthe_south, on Flickr
I brought in the draw knife for some thinning and fine tuning but without a shave horse .... sigh, all the things I need. This is all I got done today so the rest will have to wait. This piece is still ginormous and I think you can count the number of growth rings on one hand.
Click to expand...

If I had a GB and got a hatchet like that with One of your handles on it I'd throw the GB into a fire,
You did an extremely awesome job on that hatchet. It may not be like the original, but can you just see an octagonal version of that handle on bigfatts' DE sportsman hatchet 👍
 
quinton said:
A few years back, on a lake near here..I tied a drop line on a ironwood branch about the size of my little finger. My buddy who was working the boat, asked what I was doing, and insisted I tie the line to a larger branch because a limb that small wouldn't hold a very big fish should one bite. I explained to him that it was not any branch, it was ironwood, and would hold any fish in the lake! I then baited the 8/0 Eagle Claw attached to the end of the line with a 8 inch bluegill.

Later that night when we were checking lines I noticed that the 'little finger-sized' ironwood branch was mangled, broken and pulled down in to water..but motionless. The flathead catfish that tiny ironwood branch held weighed 46 lbs. and change!
Click to expand...

Wonderful yarn! And had I had no experience with ironwood branches or saplings I wouldn't have believed it either. Tied on to a White Birch or an Aspen branch your Bluegill baitfish would have carried away the 'stick' long before it was attended by a hungry 'cat'. Hanging on to a determined catfish is sort of like trying to reel in an old car battery from the depths of a river torrent/eddy. And your 45 pounder is 35 pounds more than any Channel Cat I've ever tangled with.
 
Hickory n steel said:
If I had a GB and got a hatchet like that with One of your handles on it I'd throw the GB into a fire,
You did an extremely awesome job on that hatchet. It may not be like the original, but can you just see an octagonal version of that handle on bigfatts' DE sportsman hatchet 👍
Click to expand...

Haha! Thanks!


Sounds like Iron Wood lives up to its name. Dang.
 
cityofthesouth said:
Haha! Thanks!


Sounds like Iron Wood lives up to its name. Dang.
Click to expand...

That handle is ironwood ? The grain pattern on that is awesome.
Do you own a makers mark ? Cause if anyone should be marking their work it's you ( I don't have one so I just use a wood burning tool )
 
Hickory n steel said:
That handle is ironwood ? The grain pattern on that is awesome.
Do you own a makers mark ? Cause if anyone should be marking their work it's you ( I don't have one so I just use a wood burning tool )
Click to expand...

Ha, no sorry. I was trying to reply to multiple thoughts without making multiple posts (fail!). The handle on the Wards is Ash. This new handle I've been working on is some kind of Locust. I have thought about a maker's mark a bunch of times. Probably time to get serious about making one.
 
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