I've used this axe for years and just now found out it should have broken immediately

Macchina

Macchina

Joined
Apr 7, 2006
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5,215
I bought this Gransfors Bruks axe 4 years ago and have used it quite a bit since then. This axe has my companion on many hiking trips.
While rubbing the handle down with Linseed Oil tonight, I looked at the grain on the end of the handle for the first time ever and noticed it's almost completely horizontal! I have used this axe as hard as one should and it has never shown a hint of failure. Had I noticed this grain when I first bought the axe, I would have returned it in a heartbeat. It's been more than strong enough for my needs, I plan on keeping it and hopefully passing it on to my children with the same handle in place.

Would you be concerned with this grain:

IMG_20140223_2009190041_zpsd9017421.jpg
 
Im usually fairly trusting of a handle if the grain is at least halfway vertical... yours is pretty close to in the middle still.
 
Is it the small forest axe? Really, prime grain becomes important with the longer handled, heavier impact tools, like large felling and splitting axes, along with sledges. The shorter handle combined with a lighter head would mean less than perfect grain might not lead to a failure in a smaller axe.

Another thought: what's more dangerous and likely to cause failures is grain run-out, where a significant portion of the grain of the axe handle does not span the full length of the handle. The only time a handle has broken on me, it was because of this.

Sap wood hickory is tough stuff, I wouldn't worry about it on a smaller axe like this one.

John
 
I have a handle I'll post a pic of later that shows what might happen with that kind of grain. Having poor grain alignment does not mean it'll break immediately, but it is much more likely to split down its length after hard use. The last axe I bought and had shipped had bad grain, so rather then wait for it to split at an inconvenient time I cut it off and replaced it and the bad grain one became that handle to my shed door.
 
If the grain runs out - crosses through the handle - then it's going to fail. Just a matter of time. But if it's continuous from the swell to the eye then it can last a long time. You'd still prefer a vertical grain. But a continuous grain is good enough. Watch the overstrikes.
 
I've seen a number of old axes that looked like they'd taken a beating over the years yet still had what appeared to be the original, iffy grained handles. In those cases though, there didn't appear to be any grain run-out. I think run-out and porosity in the grain are what cause most breaks. I mean yes - optimally you want grain that runs in line with the direction of the bit, but it's probably not as big an issue as people make it out to be.

As jpeeler mentioned, it's even less of a concern with non-full sized heads. So unless that's one of GB's American Felling axes and you don't see any run-out, the handle probably won't see enough stress to give out on you (save for a hard over-swing or some other mishap). Personally, I own 4 GBs (scandi, small forest, wildlife and mini) and all have practically perfect grain. The only one I received that didn't was the wildlife which had grain very similar to yours (45 towards the front and almost horizontal at the back). Did I think it would have any impact on performance or the overall strength of the tool? Nope. Did I send it back anyways? Damned right! I kept it for about a week but every time I picked it up and saw the grain, it made me frown. When you're paying that much of a premium for an axe made of simple 1055, I think expecting a handle with proper grain orientation isn't too much to ask...
 
As previous posts have suggested there is no need for alarm if it isn't a full-sized handle and/or grain run-out is not involved. Heaven knows some of the 2nd and 3rd rate handles I've inadvertently used over the years stood up much longer than expected. But at least now you know what you're looking for, and at, so that when a perfect handle does show up you'll snap it up as a spare.
 
So long as I don't have runout on a handle I could care less and consider perfect grain alignment to be a bonus more than anything else. The only handles I've ever broken had runout, and I've beaten the snot out of plenty of axes with horizontal grain.

That being said, I know it matters to a lot of folks, so I consider horizontal grain a "Grade B" flaw when inspecting items for the shop.
 
Yikes! Curious, did the handle fracture with just a regular strike of the head into wood, or did the handle hit something?
 
It was just a regular strike into the wood. I was chopping through a 24 inch hard maple, and was about 3/4 of the way through when this happened.
 
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