Looking for a good felling axe

Looks to me like someone squished the top of the eye. If that's the case you will have to open it back up before you hang it.
 
Visually it looks like the top of the eye is a little larger than the bottom. But the top was beat on a bit and does look peened. I may need to grind out the inside top a bit to get a new handle in there correctly.
 
Droshi said:
Visually it looks like the top of the eye is a little larger than the bottom. But the top was beat on a bit and does look peened. I may need to grind out the inside top a bit to get a new handle in there correctly.
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Hopefully it's not.(munched) Just looks that way in the picture.
 
Woodcraft said:
Hopefully it's not.(munched) Just looks that way in the picture.
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Once the peened ridge is ground off, what should the dimensions be? If the top is larger than the bottom, would it be OK to just hang it and shave down the handle a bit?

Any suggestions on handles? I'm looking at something like this:
https://beaver-tooth.com/collection...-bit-axe-handle-american-hickory-item-1536x-1

I could just go locally, but I don't need it done today and would ideally like something of quality.
 
Peening looks to total about 1/16" and when taken off I think the width at the center should be 5/8"... based on the previous handle posted it seems correct. Here's to hoping!

Overall I'm pretty happy with the condition of this head. Most of the rust has come off with just WD40 and rubbing, but to get some of the stubborn spots I may use a nylon brush and a bit of vinegar, I don't think it needs a vinegar bath.
 
Thanks, I got the head off the handle, unfortunately it looks like the top of the eye is the same as the bottom :( I'll need to figure out a way to enlarge it a bit, I guess some kind of metal wedge is needed, unfortunately I don't have a big shop, but hopefully a local machine shop will help me out.
 
The reversible patterns have both sides just as big. As long as you leave a good portion of the handle proud, you will be good. I think I read here about driving the wedge deeper, in order to let the two sides of the kerf spread more and thus fixing the head better at the top.
 
Moonw said:
The reversible patterns have both sides just as big. As long as you leave a good portion of the handle proud, you will be good. I think I read here about driving the wedge deeper, in order to let the two sides of the kerf spread more and thus fixing the head better at the top.
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Great to hear! I'll look into this. The head was on there very tight, and the center has 3 grooves on each side which probably helped, but I would ideally like a taper as it just seems like a better idea to me.
 
Droshi said:
Great to hear! I'll look into this. The head was on there very tight, and the center has 3 grooves on each side which probably helped, but I would ideally like a taper as it just seems like a better idea to me.
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It's not a reversible pattern, It's a Michigan pattern. On a second look, I think the top of the eye is just mushroomed from where someone tried to drive the head into the handle- no big deal. Just take a file and clean the bur from the inside of the top of the eye, then measure again. It should be 3/4" wide.
 
Oh, what I meant is that if it worked for the reversibles, it should work for others as well. I was typing in a hurry, and the picture anyway doesn't load for me...
 
quinton said:
It's not a reversible pattern, It's a Michigan pattern. On a second look, I think the top of the eye is just mushroomed from where someone tried to drive the head into the handle- no big deal. Just take a file and clean the bur from the inside of the top of the eye, then measure again. It should be 3/4" wide.
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Yeah, that's what I did, it's 5/8" on both sides now after dremeling out that burr carefully.

Moonw said:
Oh, what I meant is that if it worked for the reversibles, it should work for others as well. I was typing in a hurry, and the picture anyway doesn't load for me...
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Thanks, that is what I was thinking you meant, if it works on another axe! Ideally it would be tapered, but I'm more worried about splitting the metal if I did have someone try to drive a metal wedge in there or something.
 
Sorry it's taken me a while to update this thread, but overall: great success!

https://imgur.com/a/eWWOT

The axe performs beautifully, I got it hung well on the Beaver Tooth handle. While you can see I need to do some cleanup, felling is just beautiful with this thing. Smaller trees can come down with 3 blows, it really bites deep into this red pine I have so much of.

I don't have a chainsaw yet, and I will be getting one for hardwoods and bucking the logs and such, but just for felling many of the small trees, I'm glad I went with an axe. In the future when I don't need to clear so much space for my garden/orchard, I may even exclusively use the axe.

I did also buy a giant Japanese pull-cut saw (Silky Katanaboy 650), and it works very well bucking (not so much for low cutting stumps)....but for felling I can get down 10 trees with the axe for the same energy output as the saw seems to take.
 
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