Walking Sticks

This is one I like to use. The stick the tip and the bottom.
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Bryan
 
Thanks for all the great pics & the great feedback everyone!
I'm sending some pics over for Cando to post of a few that I made in the last couple of years.

Mostly Oak/Ash/Hickory. It's amazing what some Sandpaper, Dremel, Gunstock finish and some 2 ton epoxy can do.

Some of them have copper inlays as well as carvings, that you can't see from the pics.
At the base of each staff, there is wrapped leather ( I forgot what the pull knot is called so you can't see where it begins/ends) coupled with some epoxy for about a foot up the staff, and each have about 15 coats of Tru Oil gunstock finish so I won't fret about beating the bushes (snakes) back :D

All of them get a "Stress Test" before I really work on them - meaning that once they are cured / peeled, I lean them on their side - and push with all my strength (I'm about 220) against the middle of the staff several times to see if it begins to crack, or flex to much - if it does, it goes to the wood pile.

If it passes the test, I do my work, and then before I do the final sanding etc, they are Fire hardened, and if any surface splitting ocurs, it is all filled in flush wiht Epoxy.

sp
 
I use 5' x 1.25" thick oak dowels for some of my beating (i mean walking) sticks.

After i round the top, drill a lanyard hole (with countersunk rounded edges) and slightly taper the bottom, i epoxy on a copper pipe plumbing end cap (this will be covered later by a rubber cane tip).

next i place the staff into a 2" pipe that has one end capped and welded (sealed). I fill it with danish tung oil and then thread a metal end cap on that has a vacumn fitting attached. I use a vacumn pump to evacuate all the air. The staf stays in there for a week until all the oxygen is extracted from the wood structure. Then i release the vacumn and let the tung oil soak into the wood. Wehn i first started doing this i was able to get the tung oil to soak right THRU the entire oak dowel, rendering it completely water resistant.

once the wood has soaked for a bit, i remove it from the soaking pipe and wipe off the excess tung oil. Then i hand buff it with steel wool, down to 0000 steel wool. The result is a glowy rich wood colored staff, that is impervious to water. Add a lanyard and the rubber end cap and off i go!

i'll try to find a camera to post one of my sticks.

:thumbup:

I also have the Cold Steel African Stick. It is my favorite stick of all for the city and ais deadly when using traditional irish stick fighting skills.
 
When I lived in the Sonoran I'd use a saguaro spine sometimes. They are incredibly strong and light. Next time I'm down that way I'll pick one up.
 
reconranger said:
For me, I am always hiking light and fast, and poles of any kind just get in my way. I do use poles when showshoeing, but I have to say that I think trekking poles are just sissy foo foo (but well suited to the yuppie Sierra Club types that you run into around here!).
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Well I'd have to say that with a pair of poles I move much faster. Especially uphill. I use them to vault myself over small streams and walk across down trees. I don't know how many times poles have saved me from a slip or fall. They are especially nice when your descending a nasty leg eating talus field.

Maybe if your hiking flat trails they get in the way, but for mountains they are crucial.
 
MVF said:
This is cool- I've been waiting for a good "stick" thread! I'm hoping someone can answer a couple questions for me-

I have a rather large (@5" diameter) stick that I've had for a couple of years, so I know it's dry, but I don't know what kind of wood it is. My question is can I split it up the middle and make 2 or 3 sticks out of it, or do you have to keep the core intact?

Would the hardwood dowels you can get at the hardware store work?

I appreciate any help or advice- not much suitable where I live and definitely not where I hike, I brought the stick from my old house.
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I think it depends on how much hart wood your stick has and how much flexibility you want. A stick that is all sap wood will be a little more flexible and it will bend before it breaks. The more hart wood it has the more stiff it will be. I think that it would also be more brittle. This is why you don't see bent canes with hartwood. At 5" diameter I doubt yours has all that much hartwood anyway.

The biggest issue is that if u split it in half you can't control the split because it follows the grain. It may not just split in half. You could cut it in half but it won't be as strong because you cut the grain.

I believe all of this to be true but 90% of the time I think the difference is probably negligible.

Hardwood dowels will work as will a good rake handle but the stick you already have probably has more potential as long as it is a good hard wood.
 
As per usual on this forum... someone posted neat stuff and I had to go buy it. I got one of those Cabela Alaskan Guide staffs on it's way to my door :) What can I say, I'm a sucker for secret compartments!
 
Where's Jackknife? He's got some good ones!

Since I don't have any Hornbeam or other hardwoods around here, I use a hardwood dowel from Home Depot, with the rubber furniture thingies on the end. It works really well, and is good for keeping critters away. I tried using ski poles for a while, they were too much of a hassle for me, but certainly better than nothing. YMMV.
 
AKENNEDY 73 - "Fiddle River, Jasper National Park in Alberta Canada."


Thanks, AKennedy 73. Gorgeous, stunning country. I've only been there once many years ago. Hope to make it back there someday.

L.W.
 
Noshtero said:
As per usual on this forum... someone posted neat stuff and I had to go buy it. I got one of those Cabela Alaskan Guide staffs on it's way to my door :) What can I say, I'm a sucker for secret compartments!
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I might do that too as I am also intrigued by the hidden compartment. I wish my wooden stick could do that :).
 
This thread made me finally take a pic of the Survival Staff. Here it is:
SurvivalStaffWheelchair.jpg

It is amazing what an extra 2.5' can do for a person. I also have 2 extra 3' poles for it so I can go from 2.5' to 6' if I need. I love this thing. Also this entire thing is a hidden compartment (right now it has a PCB straw and empty spy capsule in it- I am going to add ferro rod and some wire/fishline sometime).
 
I've got a hickory pole to which I've attached a bayonet lug from Cheaper Than Dirt. It's a prototype...a lot of bugs to work out; but the idea is that you can use your walking stick as a polearm. I've got both the new Marine bayonet and the new bayonet (I think it's Camillus) that was originally designed for the XM-8 rifle...I think those are both nice knives in their own right. My biggest concern is strength of the stick at the point where the lug is attached...since it's designed for an AR barrel, it's not a large diameter; so I screwed it into the wood rather than wrapped it around (didn't want to remove a lot of wood). Right now, I'm debating whether or not to reinforce the wood with a metal strap of some kind...probably not a bad idea. I'm just using wrapped copper pipe for the end; bayonet ring fits right around it.

Crude, but it works. The question, of course, is, "how strong is it?"!
 
Noshtero said:
As per usual on this forum... someone posted neat stuff and I had to go buy it. I got one of those Cabela Alaskan Guide staffs on it's way to my door :) What can I say, I'm a sucker for secret compartments!
Click to expand...

I know how that goes, I did the same thing myself. :D

Tom
 
IlBruche "I use them to vault myself over small streams and walk across down trees. I don't know how many times poles have saved me from a slip or fall."

Bingo
 
Cuts like a kris,did you have any trouble getting your staff through customs and where'd you get it from?
 
Thanks CanDo!!!!!!

Sure appreciate the kind remark Bigox!

I put them all together in the Pic, so it appears they are all the same height, but in actuality they vary in length.

The Thumbstick 4th from the left, and the Cane on the far right for example are standard height for me (5'11'), whereas the Staffs vary from Chest to Shoulder heighth as some may be used when Wade fishing, and have Water markers in 1 ft increments up some of them as well.

sp
 
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