Got bored..

AriesTheCam

AriesTheCam

Gold Member
Joined
Dec 18, 2019
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I got bored earlier and had the end of an old full sized axe handle made of American Hickory laying around as like a tire thumper.

Decided make myself a small handle out of that old large one for my little skatchet using only hand tools.

Made it slightly teardrop shaped kinda like a nice tomahawk would have. Here is the results as well as the tools used.Just gotta throw a coat or three of BLO on it. I'll update with the shiny coat after it's all dry in a week or so.

Thanks for looking. It's my 34th birthday today! I guess trying to distract myself away from it worked.. at least for a couple of hours. Yay I'm finally middle aged HahA 🫠16807244721456248968806376647203.jpg16807245584315746570326133158218.jpg16807247621258880990569096830054.jpg16807248164847682064635060365262.jpg16807248685006945957860160720670.jpg
 
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Good work, and happy birthday. (Although if you’re middle aged, and only planning to live til 68, you might be disappointed to last longer. That’s what happened to me.)

Anyway, I don’t see a spokeshave among your hand tools there. When you find a combination one, with straight and concave blades on the same frame, you’re really gonna like it.

Those carving jacks are quite the little multitool for woodworking though. Mine’s a Flexcut with the corner chisel and gouge. I use it all the time.

Parker
 
catspa said:
Good work, and happy birthday. (Although if you’re middle aged, and only planning to live til 68, you might be disappointed to last longer. That’s what happened to me.)

Anyway, I don’t see a spokeshave among your hand tools there. When you find a combination one, with straight and concave blades on the same frame, you’re really gonna like it.

Those carving jacks are quite the little multitool for woodworking though. Mine’s a Flexcut with the corner chisel and gouge. I use it all the time.

Parker
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I appreciate it as well as the bday wishes 😁.. I hopefully last longer. I was just going off when you can pull ss without a penalty lol.

I don't have one of those but I did look it up. Just bought one (no apparent rust either) made by A.G. Bachelder off fleabay as a result. Thanks for the recommendation.. I'll be putting that to use right away on a table I plan to build out of an old pallet or two.

I have that exact Flexcut (and like it way better too) your talking about as well as a whole set of Japanese woodworking chisels of different shapes. They were all just buried somewhere under some stuff in my safe and I was too lazy to dig (I need to organize it better some point haha).
 
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catspa said:
Good work, and happy birthday. (Although if you’re middle aged, and only planning to live til 68, you might be disappointed to last longer. That’s what happened to me.)
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AriesTheCam said:
Thanks for looking. It's my 34th birthday today! I guess trying to distract myself away from it worked.. at least for a couple of hours. Yay I'm finally middle aged HahA
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I turned 68 two days ago! I fully retired two months ago, after 2 1/2 years of working half time, and I still haven't made it far enough down my need-to-do list to find much time for my want-to-do list. If I live long enough, I may get to cleaning and rehanging the pile of axe and hatchet heads that I've accumulated in my machine shed. If I ever get to it, I'll post pics! Nice work on your skatchet and Happy Birthday! T-A
 
Happy Birthday!! It's my birthday too!! Turned 51 today. I was also out in the garage today tinkering with an axe I had laying around. Someone had pounded 2 metal wedges in this thing and man was it a pain to get those out. Instead of using a wooden wedge they put in the 2 metal ones which filled up the whole length of the eye. They were in nice and tight. It ended up turning out pretty good. Nice little no name boy's axe.
 
JLRubicon said:
Happy Birthday!! It's my birthday too!! Turned 51 today. I was also out in the garage today tinkering with an axe I had laying around. Someone had pounded 2 metal wedges in this thing and man was it a pain to get those out. Instead of using a wooden wedge they put in the 2 metal ones which filled up the whole length of the eye. They were in nice and tight. It ended up turning out pretty good. Nice little no name boy's axe.
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Happy Birthday 2U2!
 
the-accumulator said:
I turned 68 two days ago! I fully retired two months ago, after 2 1/2 years of working half time, and I still haven't made it far enough down my need-to-do list to find much time for my want-to-do list. If I live long enough, I may get to cleaning and rehanging the pile of axe and hatchet heads that I've accumulated in my machine shed. If I ever get to it, I'll post pics! Nice work on your skatchet and Happy Birthday! T-A
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Hey, Happy belated man! I would love to buy up some more old axe heads to do more of this. I love hanging axe heads! Gotten pretty decent.. well decent enough to only need a wood wedge to make it nice. Gotta get me some more handles made. I have a bunch of Hickory currently just drying out in the shed that's probably like 40" or so. I might get like 10 handles out of it. That spokeshave mentioned earlier just gave me motivation too.. don't get me wrong.. I love my draw knives but that thing looks like it will male this so much easier. Like a ?planer draw knife combination? I can't believe I've never seen before. I can't wait to test this thing out!

JLRubicon said:
Happy Birthday!! It's my birthday too!! Turned 51 today. I was also out in the garage today tinkering with an axe I had laying around. Someone had pounded 2 metal wedges in this thing and man was it a pain to get those out. Instead of using a wooden wedge they put in the 2 metal ones which filled up the whole length of the eye. They were in nice and tight. It ended up turning out pretty good. Nice little no name boy's axe.
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Hell yeah! Birthday club in the house lol. Happy Birthday man (well belated now). That is a pita.. drilling those out is my least favorite part of preparing a head.. I've messed up and hit the eye a few times in the last and needed to file the eye back nice so it didn't chew up my new handle on fitment. I only used one on this because handles fit different in a skatchet (being threaded and all). I figured the metal wedge would mushroom it enough to reaaallly fill those threads and mushroom the top enough not to turn when I chop on something. Thing was a pain to screw into the head already since I oversized it a bit so I have high hopes. We'll see!

Old Axeman said:
An old time Radio show host, Paul Harvey, once said that a guy should die with at least 500 unfinished projects. I am almost there, on both accounts !
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Sounds like something my grandpa would've said! He was a tinkered til he got a little too old to get around good.. then he just kinda watched spaghetti westerns with his dog. His birthday would've been yesterday as well! I was born on it and he called it when my mom got an April due date haha. Miss that dude.

Here's to trying to accommodate 1000 unfinished projects! Really give those ungrateful survivors to have to clean up after you when you go lol.
 
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Nice job. If I remember right, the eye is threaded. How did you figure out the thread pitch to cut/carve the handle? I've got one someplace that I used years ago when I trapped to cut trap stakes. I always used green branches to screw into the handle( like the instuctions said), but the head would always loosen up. Finally replaced it with a no name hatchet to save time on the trapline.
 
Brent F said:
Nice job. If I remember right, the eye is threaded. How did you figure out the thread pitch to cut/carve the handle? I've got one someplace that I used years ago when I trapped to cut trap stakes. I always used green branches to screw into the handle( like the instuctions said), but the head would always loosen up. Finally replaced it with a no name hatchet to save time on the trapline.
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I ran the threads real tight until I got the grip lined up the way I wanted after I made the handle. Then I cut the top off where I wanted it and drove the wedge in to stick it, donezo.

Thanks bud! It's definitely easier to screw on a piece of green wood than dried hickory lol. I had the head in its sheath between my legs as support while I cranked on it.
 
Gato do mato said:
A beautiful job. Congratulations.
I didn't know this ax model, is it a carpenter's ax style?
Very beautiful.
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Thanks man. I don't know actually. It's got its own. Unique style. Basically like mixing a Hatchet, Ulu, and a Gut Hooked Skinning Knife together all at the same time. If the handle doesn't give it'll bite pretty deep.
 
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