The right handle for a poll-less axe.

FortyTwoBlades

FortyTwoBlades

Baryonyx walkeri
Dealer / Materials Provider
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Mar 8, 2008
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With this new handle it holds dead horizontal when held with open palms along the main length--I can even hold it with just one finger of each hand. And it's holding up just fine in chopping. Good vertical continuous grain end to end, and great elasticity to the wood so I feel confident levering on the handle when need be. The blanks I received from House were 36" instead of the 38" I was told they'd be, and there was some end cross-grain checking so I was taking a bit of a chance doing a full 36" with it. When driving the handle into the eye one of the checks wanted to start opening up a little so to help keep it from worsening down the road I drove a corrugated fastener across it to hold the end together. I'll keep using this one until/IF it busts, but I don't think that's gonna' happen anytime soon.
 
Hm...Frankly,looks somewhat odd...(not that the looks is what it's about....)...What is/was the purpose of this axe,originally,if i may ask?....(it looks like a Scandinavian hewing/shipbuilding axe,i'm surprised to see it used for cross-cutting,with that fine of a section...).
 
It's a North Italian style of felling and pruning axe. Very knife-like bit. I have a video processing right now. It's only on a 5"-ish pine 'cause that's all I have readily available as a target right now, but it shows it off well.
 
Thank you for the answer,that's very interesting...It Is rather knife-like,so one immediately wonders if it'd throw a chip at all,or wedge firmly,Estwing-like...
(that same thinness,combined with the radius of the edge,would make it a superlative tool for light,sheering,hewing cuts....just guessing though)
 
It uses the wide bit to prevent over-penetration and you just need to take "deck of cards" chips rather than "dinner plates". Don't need so many blows across a face to make a full connection. You can also give a little sideways twist to create a wedging effect to pop a chip, which you'll see in the video once it uploads. :)
 
Hey,thanks again.It sounds eminently sensible,and will look forward to watching the video(if the band-width allows).
 
Here we go.

[video=youtube;k4nTgRPEm8o]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4nTgRPEm8o&feature=youtu.be[/video]
 
Thanks yet again,great video.Yes,just like i thought,the axe penetrates WAY past it's capacity to part and throw the chip...Which only means that i,personally,would not choose it for bucking,or the like.
However,everyone has their own preferences,and i can think of a number of applications where this axe would come in very handy indeed...Maybe someplace where steep end-grain work is in order,and the cleanliness of cut is critical,like trimming the ends of logs in a classier type of log-work...(hafted differently,of course,but again,everyone has their own preferred working methods).
Excellent tool,by all appearances,i've really liked all the Rinaldi axes i've seen(couple-three different types),thanks for this review.
 
jake pogg said:
Thanks yet again,great video.Yes,just like i thought,the axe penetrates WAY past it's capacity to part and throw the chip...Which only means that i,personally,would not choose it for bucking,or the like.
However,everyone has their own preferences,and i can think of a number of applications where this axe would come in very handy indeed...Maybe someplace where steep end-grain work is in order,and the cleanliness of cut is critical,like trimming the ends of logs in a classier type of log-work...(hafted differently,of course,but again,everyone has their own preferred working methods).
Excellent tool,by all appearances,i've really liked all the Rinaldi axes i've seen(couple-three different types),thanks for this review.
Click to expand...

Oh, it can throw a chip, just a narrower one. Those repeated blows before I lever like 3/4 of the log off were done specifically because I could see after the first blow that a couple more swings there would pop the whole side off without having to swing from the other side. What you do in more difficult situations is just walk your cuts from one side to the other, paring off deep-but-narrow chips rather than shallow-but-wide ones. Sort of a 90° rotation of the more familiar approach almost.
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
Oh, it can throw a chip, just a narrower one. Those repeated blows before I lever like 3/4 of the log off were done specifically because I could see after the first blow that a couple more swings there would pop the whole side off without having to swing from the other side. What you do in more difficult situations is just walk your cuts from one side to the other, paring off deep-but-narrow chips rather than shallow-but-wide ones. Sort of a 90° rotation of the more familiar approach almost.
Click to expand...

It didn't.
 
I'll be putting a wedged handle on my Italian racing axe. It, in contrast to the Trento, has much more cheek to it and so pops chips in the conventional manner. While there's a small poll on it, the PoB is still in front of the eye--just ahead of the little "notch" on the beard.

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FortyTwoBlades said:
If you say so... Guess I don't know how my own axe works. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Excuse me? I said it did not. I made no comment one way or another on what you claim it can or can not do. Other than to point out what actually happened on video. Perhaps you should reflect on what I said before responding.:rolleyes:
 
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Nice Fortytwo, good demonstration of how handle shape enfluences axe balance. Rarely mentioned and probably not understood by many.
That head rings like a bell or a loose head. Maybe not a problem with those?
 
garry3 said:
Nice Fortytwo, good demonstration of how handle shape enfluences axe balance. Rarely mentioned and probably not understood by many.
That head rings like a bell or a loose head. Maybe not a problem with those?
Click to expand...

It's on account of the bit being both thin and hard (58 RC!) The fun thing with slip fits is that if the taper is shaped right where it mates with the eye, it'll actually tighten with use rather than loosen. Ugalde has a good video on that, actually.

[video=youtube;ImBQCe1snO4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImBQCe1snO4[/video]
 
Thanks! To establish the right angles for the alignment I used the same methods I outline in my blog post on axe balance. I photographed the axe, digitally traced it in Inkscape (an open source vector drawing program), placed a dot where the center of gravity was, then manipulated the handle digitally to bring the main length of it along a single axis directed towards the center of gravity. Then I resized the tracing to 1:1 scale and ran it through PosteRazor (also open source) which creates PDF documents of large images so that they print on standard copy paper in a way that neatly overlaps. I taped the sheets together, cut out the image, and then traced it right onto the board. Voila: perfect balance.

15391077_10211285506441878_9097776171887330368_n.jpg
 
Made some progress. It was my first time wedging a slip-fit eye but it seems to have gone well. I used a "‡" kerf and it was able to take up the fairly significant amount of space at the top of the eye without issue.

15697882_10211406221259673_5679396730333148422_n.jpg
 
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