Try running a file across the top of the poll. If it won't 'bite' (ie it 'skates' instead) then the steel is hard. There are varying degrees of hardness (and I'm no metallurgist) and it may well be that whoever makes these took that into account. A tool that chips has a much higher potential of causing injury through flying fragments than one that is soft enough not to chip, but still made hard enough to tolerate a lot of abuse.
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Hardened Polls
- Thread starter Marcelo Cantu
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Try running a file across the top of the poll. If it won't 'bite' (ie it 'skates' instead) then the steel is hard. There are varying degrees of hardness (and I'm no metallurgist) and it may well be that whoever makes these took that into account. A tool that chips has a much higher potential of causing injury through flying fragments than one that is soft enough not to chip, but still made hard enough to tolerate a lot of abuse.
Square_peg
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Presumably you live in Canada. I too found a 4 lb Mastercraft (Canadian Tire in-house tool brand) constructor axe head last week. Whatever manufacturer made Craftsman tools also seems to have made this one. As evident via the mushrooming, the poll is obviously not hardened to the same degree as many rafting pattern polls are. On the other hand I have no idea how much of a brutal pounding this axe actually received.
Even a sledge hammer will mushroom. But you're right that it mushroomed instead of chipping so it's not as hard of face as some have.
Congrats on finally finding one of those. I know you've been in the market for a while.
This one was a complete fluke. Stopped my bus to have a pee at the side of the road in a construction zone and wound up spying this on the ground next to a dump trailer full of refuse. I didn't ask questions and scooped it up. It has the classic rafting pattern shape to it and is weighty (4 lb) but the cheeks are flat. At what point Craftsman and Mastercraft products went offshore I don't know but I doubt this one is more than 10-15 years old. I'll post a shot of the =Craftsman= -like stamp as soon as I get a chance. Nowhere does it say 'made in USA' (or Canada) on it.
I'm still enamoured with the mostly unused National pattern axe I have (tall/weighty poll and bevelled edges) and hoping to find someone talented enough to properly harden the poll for me. Then it'll get a straight haft out of the 'dead straight' piece of White Oak I have squirrelled away for that purpose.
Square_peg
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I doubt anyone had rafting pattern axes made overseas. I think the pattern pretty much died before Wall Street decided to outsource everything. I bet you it's a Mann.
Any decent local blacksmith should be able to harden and temper your poll for you. But be prepared to pay for such skill.
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A National pattern with a hardened poll truly would be a sight to see.
There really wouldn't be much to see, except an absence of mushrooming on one that was known to have been beat within an inch of it's life. Ads from the late 40s for new-fangled Nationals said they were suitable for driving stakes and wedges, only the ads never did specify wood or metal.
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I mean it in the sense of "amazing to see as a thing that actually exists" rather than "something visually compelling".
My bad; the stamp on the head says 5 and not 4. It's weighty! First modern 5 lb'er I've ever come across. If Mann USA made =Craftsman= stuff than there is a very good chance they also made =Mastercraft= stamped goodies. I have noticed over the past 10 years that Craftsman and Mastercraft tools no longer feature ID indicating Country of origin.
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Canadian Tire (owner of Mastercraft brand) did have a business relationship with Mann. Canadian Tire worked with Mann back in the 60s to develop the Norlund line of axes, according to YesteryearsTools:
"In 1965 the Canadian Tire Co. approached the principals of the Mann Edge Tool Co. with a proposal that the Mann Edge Tool Co. manufacture a line of "Sportsmen's Axes" and certain other outdoor equipment."
quoted from YesteryearsTools
Gotta hand it to you Steve, you are good! I'll take a picture of that head but =Mastercraft= with the = symbols at either end looks suspiciously like the Craftsman brand, as do many of their mechanic's wrenches, sockets and ratchets .
If I recall either you or someone else on here regularly shows a page from a StroBro catalogue that lists a Swede hardened poll axe.
Square_peg
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Thanks.
I guess what I really meant is that I hadn't seen any 'Made in China' rafting axes. Can't say they're not out there - just that I haven't seen them.
I guess what I really meant is that I hadn't seen any 'Made in China' rafting axes. Can't say they're not out there - just that I haven't seen them.
What amazes me is that boutique axe makers haven't caught on to this. Then all of a sudden I might even be interested. The recently introduced Wetterlings improved version of Hudson Bays comes to mind.
Square_peg
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A rafting axe is a work axe. The market right now is for bushcraft/survival type axes. The makers have to follow the money.
That part I understand. I have no use for a 5-6 lb axe anymore either unless it's dedicated to splitting firewood, which some of your classic ones definitely are, but there is no reason a large hatchet or boy's axe-sized head couldn't be 'toughened up' so it wasn't just pretty. Hudson Bays for instance have a high poll that lends itself to being used for persuading soft and harder objects to 'get a move on'.
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Yup. A 3.5lb rafting pattern would be quite a seller I think.
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I don't usually think of buying new axes but I would try out something like that.
In early catalogues rafting axes cost about 50% more than a ordinary axe. Presumably the makers took into account the possibility of eye deformation and engineered somewhat more than the shape and hardening of the poll into the overall equation.