designing our own pattern?

jblyttle said:
Honestly, people may be better off spending $300-500 on some blacksmith courses and practicing. Then they can make whatever they want for themselves and have a skill.
Click to expand...

You make a good point. I would happily pay $200 to have an ax made to my exact specification. I have a feeling it would not end at one.....
 
jblyttle said:
I'd want one but I'd never be a buyer.
Click to expand...

I think many of us would be in that group. We know how to restore and modify a vintage axe. That's probably why this won't get done. The public couldn't appreciate it and the axe snobs like me would just mod their own.
 
Square_peg said:
I think many of us would be in that group. We know how to restore and modify a vintage axe. That's probably why this won't get done. The public couldn't appreciate it and the axe snobs like me would just mod their own.
Click to expand...

And our own tastes tend to be dialed in so precisely that we likely wouldn't be able to be fully satisfied with a "design-by-committee" model anyhow.

Would be kind of interesting to see a head made as a blank with modding specifically being the intention, though.
 
Here's what a straight beardless rendering looks like.

17353181_10212262592468418_523340738513486152_n.jpg
 
And with lugs instead of a full eye. I personally prefer with beard and full eye.

17499480_10212262649749850_4135359186134340944_n.jpg
 
I voted for a hatchet. Several years ago I posted this drawing to this forum. Since then, I've perhaps been persuaded that a hatchet eye would be better:

hawk-design-1-small.png
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
And with lugs instead of a full eye. I personally prefer with beard and full eye.

17499480_10212262649749850_4135359186134340944_n.jpg
Click to expand...

Now if gb's looked identical to this I'd actually like them 👍
For some reason I just can't stand the curved beard GB axes have, it just doesn't go with the HB pattern.
Lugs aren't particularly necessary, I just thought that pointed lugs looked aesthetically pleasing.
 
The bevels are way too close to the bit. If I recall that was the largest complaint about the woodcraft. Here is where hands on experience and testing come into play.
Edit, I imagine that is why it was so important to plumb to be involved and associated with axe racing. Both the advertisement win, but also the testing and results.
 
Last edited:
I agree you Woodcraft, when you sell it to normal customers it's very difficult to collect the quality and amount of data you need to improve in the correct way. When you take part in races you talk to people who has higher than standard axemanship knowledge, they get the tool to the limit and it's easy to get real and fast information when your changes affect in any way to the axes. I'm actually seeing this in two companies.

I love the idea to designing our pattern, but I see we have very different needs so it's difficult to agree. I will propose an axe it has been rounding my mind for a long time. It's good for the people who looks for an axe for both, hard or soft wood, and it will be a completely new type of axe. I'm proposing to build a 4lbs double bit Michigan pattern with tapered eye, with two different angles (one bit of 16 degrees the other of 19 degrees) in 4340 steel (C 0.43%) at 55 HRC. There will be different sizes of handles depending the needs of each one, it can be changed in seconds, there will be zero handle tightening and loosing problems, the handles will be cheaper and stronger and you wont lose any time and effort with wedges.

It's basically taking the best features of new and old axes and putting them in our axe.
 
Ugaldie said:
I agree you Woodcraft, when you sell it to normal customers it's very difficult to collect the quality and amount of data you need to improve in the correct way. When you take part in races you talk to people who has higher than standard axemanship knowledge, they get the tool to the limit and it's easy to get real and fast information when your changes affect in any way to the axes. I'm actually seeing this in two companies.

I love the idea to designing our pattern, but I see we have very different needs so it's difficult to agree. I will propose an axe it has been rounding my mind for a long time. It's good for the people who looks for an axe for both, hard or soft wood, and it will be a completely new type of axe. I'm proposing to build a 4lbs double bit Michigan pattern with tapered eye, with two different angles (one bit of 16 degrees the other of 19 degrees) in 4340 steel (C 0.43%) at 55 HRC. There will be different sizes of handles depending the needs of each one, it can be changed in seconds, there will be zero handle tightening and loosing problems, the handles will be cheaper and stronger and you wont lose any time and effort with wedges.

It's basically taking the best features of new and old axes and putting them in our axe.
Click to expand...

I have a couple of Michigan patterns that are surprisingly good in both hard and soft woods. For an ax that was "designed by pine" so to speak, I have had acceptable performance in hardwood. If you find yourself in need of dimensions, I would be more than willing to give you the measurements and send any pictures of them.
 
that's a damn decent lookin head. at first i wasnt so keen on the idea of another backpack size single. i love those glassport style bevels. i saw a few people talking about handles, the thing is i was just thinking about making the head to keep price down. now, slip fit and wedge fit, the only difference i see is eye size and the taper of the eye. so why not both. oversized eye for slip fit and just have a shoulder and a kerf for the wedge handle. sure we'd need to make our own handles but... we're kinda already doing that.
 
we could a have a handle that's slip fit but with a shoulder, so if you wanted slip fit, take the shoulder off, if you want wedge fit, take the, the, the... "top" of the handle down until it'll take a wedge and crosswedge
 
For reference, the design iterations that I've posted don't have "phantom bevels" in the traditional sense. The bit has a consistent cross section with a high centerline that tapers towards the edge. The bevel shape is the result of applying a bevel to that cross section. This is more like the way that the chip breaker ridge on a broad axe is done, not like phantom bevels. Phantom bevels will "wear out" as you wear through the thicker region between them and the edge, while a full-length tapered ridge line will remain correct no matter how far back you grind it. If you're familiar with Scandinavian-style splitting axes they use a similar kind of a grind where the bit is given a diamond-like tapered cross section and the edge bevel ground into that.

fig018d.jpg


cas_hsa_c_2.jpg
 
phantomknives said:
we could a have a handle that's slip fit but with a shoulder, so if you wanted slip fit, take the shoulder off, if you want wedge fit, take the, the, the... "top" of the handle down until it'll take a wedge and crosswedge
Click to expand...

You actually don't need a shoulder to wedge-fit. It just makes the job easier. But having a short, extended, removable shoulder region would allow for increased ease of wedge-fitting. Slip-fit eyes taper in all directions, while most wedge-fit eyes only taper side to side, so cross-wedging is typically necessary to fill the top of the eye. I usually use a "‡" double cross wedge. Here's a little 250g Rinaldi "Sicilia" axe I'm making into a shepherd's axe.

16830779_10211961327096972_8742009715055912223_n.jpg
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
For reference, the design iterations that I've posted don't have "phantom bevels" in the traditional sense. The bit has a consistent cross section with a high centerline that tapers towards the edge. The bevel shape is the result of applying a bevel to that cross section. This is more like the way that the chip breaker ridge on a broad axe is done, not like phantom bevels. Phantom bevels will "wear out" as you wear through the thicker region between them and the edge, while a full-length tapered ridge line will remain correct no matter how far back you grind it. If you're familiar with Scandinavian-style splitting axes they use a similar kind of a grind where the bit is given a diamond-like tapered cross section and the edge bevel ground into that.

fig018d.jpg


cas_hsa_c_2.jpg
Click to expand...

FortyTwoBlades said:
It's a matter of how strong the hollowing would be. Bringing it to a hard line shows the ridge clearly, but in practice it wouldn't be so sharp and would transition into the thin cheeks gradually enough to keep it from biting in, but the majority of the hollowed regions would be nice and thin, and would have to be to keep that broad and deep of a bit without turning into an anchor. :D
Click to expand...


Your initial description of the bevels leads the reader to believe they will be deep to save weight and "bowl" shaped causing a problem if too close to the bit. This new description does not save on weight and answers the sharpening issue. Which one is it?

Phantom bevels when done correctly do not have that issue because you run out of hardened steel right around the same time that you would encounter an real issue.

And this is what one thinks of with your initial weight saving description and picture. As you can tell to close to the bit would be a bad idea.

Your new description seems like just a pointy high centerline. With perhaps an ever so slightly concavity.
 
Last edited:
For the record, the new rendition by 42 with glassport bevels and ears and beardless, as phantomknives pointed out and hardened poll looks nice in profile. If you moved the bevels back to the temperline it would solve the sharpening issue. And allow for deep bevels to save weight.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top