Plumb screw-wedged axes and hatchets

G

gben

Joined
Nov 26, 2014
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501
When I first looked at the top of this hatchet I thought "great, here is another hatchet someone tried to tighten up with a load of screws and nails". So I proceeded to take all the metal junk out and get the handle off so I could set it with a new wedge. Then in trying to research the thing I saw that Plumb actually used these wedge screws for a while, so I made sure to put it back in.

This hatchet looks all original with black paint and it's original handle with a Plumb script "tested PLUMB Hickory" stamped in. Must have had a pretty easy life.....One photo shows the junk someone drove in the top along with some old wood wedge pieces which I took out and replaced with pieces of oak wedge. Looks like it had the screw and some wood wedge originally.

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That is a good-looking example. It's great to see it with original hardware.

Nice especially with that handle.
 
Anyone care to take a guess as to the age of this hatchet? I know that with no Permabond it is before 1955. The handle does not look really red to me, but then I am a bit colorblind. If the handle is red stained, then does that mean it is from between 1922 and 1955? Quite a spread of years, maybe someone can narrow down it's date of manufacture a bit more.....
 
Back in July I pulled a cone shaped screw just like that out of a little Plumb U.S.A. hatchet. I found it very odd and was going to put a picture of it in the things you have found in the eye of an axe thread so I kept the screw. Now I think I will save it and thread the screw wedge back into the eye when I re-haft this little guy.



Thanks for posting this thread.
 
The handle does look red to me, but they tend to do that naturally so I guess it's hard to say with certainty.
 
Cedar that little screw-wedge was hard to get in even though I had the original hole to put it back into.

The head of this hatchet had settled down onto the handle an extra eighth of an inch and I trimmed that much off the top so the hole was more shallow than it had been. The oak wedge interfered with the hole too.

I took a very small Buck Brothers gouge and got the new oak out of most of the hole preserving it's original taper, then I drilled down a quarter-inch with a small bit that was just the diameter of the small end of the screw-wedge. I put some grease on the screw wedge and it was still very hard to turn it in far enough to get it flush with the top. Moving Hickory and Oak is tough!

I had cleaned the screw up on a wire wheel and it looked pretty good. I was a little nervous when I was working on this because I knew it was rare to find a hatchet this old with the original handle in such good shape, and if I made one bad move I could ruin it all. It was a relief when it was all back together and seemed solid.

The only thing I don't like about the hatchet is it seems like someone has sharpened it's cutting edge so it is no longer parallel to the handle. I don't know if it bothers me enough to do anything about it, maybe someday I will grind it straight but for now it is just hanging in the garage as it has been for many decades.
 
On another post Steve Tall mentioned screw wedging by Plumb was advertised at least until 1942. The Permabond era seems have fully in effect by 1956. So it looks as if the 'window' you're looking at on the age of the hatchet is about a ten year period (between 1945 and 1955). Dating tools that close is usually a lot more difficult!
 
300Six said:
On another post Steve Tall mentioned screw wedging by Plumb was advertised at least until 1942. The Permabond era seems have fully in effect by 1956. So it looks as if the 'window' you're looking at on the age of the hatchet is about a ten year period (between 1945 and 1955). Dating tools that close is usually a lot more difficult!
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Does that mean that screw wedges were not used after roughly 1942?
 
gben said:
Does that mean that screw wedges were not used after roughly 1942?
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Start dates and end dates of unique methods of hanging tool handles are more often conjecture based on dates from factory lists, hardware store catalogues and magazine entries. I presume that axe historian guru Steve Tall has not found any mention of Plumb products expounding on their proprietary cone screw wedges after 1942.
 
300Six said:
Start dates and end dates of unique methods of hanging tool handles are more often conjecture based on dates from factory lists, hardware store catalogues and magazine entries. I presume that axe historian guru Steve Tall has not found any mention of Plumb products expounding on their proprietary cone screw wedges after 1942.
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No axe historian guru here, I might have some searching skills, but I'm learning like the rest of y'all.

The Plumb Take-up Wedge was patented in 1922, and were mentioned in ads for Scout Axes up to 1942 (as far as I could tell), but there were some later ads with it being used in Plumb hammers (1948, 1953?), and a mention in a 1948 logging article about them being used in Plumb axes.

[you can do a google books search for
plumb "take-up" wedge
and limit the results to the year 1943 and later years.]

Steve Tall said:
The adjustable screw wedge is called the Plumb Take-up Wedge, and was patented on August 15, 1922, as mentioned in this 1922 ad for the Improved Plumb Scout Axe (hatchet).

The use of two of these screws in full-sized axes is mentioned in the 1929 Axe Manual of Peter McLaren. He advocates re-using the two screw wedges when re-hafting the axe (page 30).

It's not clear when exactly Plumb stopped using the screw wedges. It appears that Plumb's advertisements for scout axes stopped mentioning the screw wedges after 1942.
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I just aquired this same exact Plumb hatchet during last weekend's flea market rounds. I paid $8 for it; it was a no-name mass of thick orange rust and old caked dirt, so it was a pleasure to clean it up with the wire wheel and discover it was a Plumb, and in good condition.

These are handsome and substantial feeling hatchets. Mine has the 'Plumb Victory' stamp, which dates it to the WW2 years and the postwar period.

Does anyone know exactly in what years Plumb began, and ended, the 'Victory' stamping?

Mine also has the same reddish tinge to the handle, which looks to me like a stain, not a paint (which would have been oil based in those days).

Mine also has the same handle stamp 'Tested PLUMB Hickory', and on the line below, 'U.S.A.'. The handle appears original.

There is no adjustment screw on mine. And there is no indication that there ever was any screw. Just a standard hardwood wedge.

Hope this is helpful. Can't post any pictures now but will be glad to try posting some later if there is any interest.

My head and handle are both identical to the OP's photos, all but that wedge screw.

Hope this is helpful in dating the wedge screw. It definitely is not present on this wartime 'Victory' model.
 
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Tallahassee said:
I just aquired this same exact Plumb hatchet during last weekend's flea market rounds.

Mine has the 'Plumb Victory' stamp, which dates it to the WW2 years and the postwar period.

Does anyone know exactly when Plumb began, and ended, the 'Victory' stamping?

Mine also has a reddish tinge to the handle, which looks to me like a stain, not a paint (which would have been oil based in those days).

Mine also has the same handle stamp 'Tested PLUMB Hickory', and on the line below, 'U.S.A.'. The handle appears original.

There is no adjustment screw on mine. And there is no indication that there ever was any screw. Just a standard hardwood wedge.
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We need steel trap memories in order to comprehend incoming new information. Here's what I figure: from what I understand "Victory" stamps (on Plumbs) are post WWII (but for how long after?), Permabond hangs came fully into effect by 1956 and 'take-up screw' wedges were last advertised in about 1942. And here we have an example of a Victory with an original wine-coloured (patented in 1922) and Plumb-stamped haft with a conventional wedge. This suggests (to me) that your axe was made after 1942, and before 1956, and very likely was manufactured sometime after mid August of 1945. Steve Tall has an entire thread devoted to the history of Lafayette Plumb and a summary of what you manage to uncover here is worthy of adding (along with pictures) to that thread.
 
300Six said:
We need steel trap memories in order to comprehend incoming new information. Here's what I figure: from what I understand "Victory" stamps (on Plumbs) are post WWII (but for how long after?), Permabond hangs came fully into effect by 1956 and 'take-up screw' wedges were last advertised in about 1942. And here we have an example of a Victory with an original wine-coloured (patented in 1922) and Plumb-stamped haft with a conventional wedge. This suggests (to me) that your axe was made after 1942, and before 1956, and very likely was manufactured sometime after mid August of 1945. Steve Tall has an entire thread devoted to the history of Lafayette Plumb and a summary of what you manage to uncover here is worthy of adding (along with pictures) to that thread.
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I think you've nailed it, 300Six.
 
Thanks Steve. I thought there might be another thread, I did see that one. I posted photos of this big Plumb hatchet with an anchor logo on it at the end of it asking for info but it did not get much interest:

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This Plumb hatchet is a gem because it has a more unusual logo and it's original handle has never been replaced or re-set. A good opportunity to see the unusual wedging system of two crossed wooden wedges with a cone-shaped screw-wedge in the middle. Can anyone date the logo which has the word Plumb made up of horizontal lines?


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