What have I got? 600 grams of treasure or trash??

In fact, 42, I think you made a good call in the possible identification of this handle wood given the skimpy information provided.
Whatever we may think of this feature, (the rays), their function within the composition of the wood is added strength. Think of it as something like the addition of straw to your clay plaster mix.
 
Here are the photos of the logo after I removed the paint and the haft after I scraped away some of the finish:
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Sorry it took me so long: I was out of town for the holidays. I'm anxious to know if the mark might be a partial logo stamping or just a flaw in the metal. The location seems right for a maker's mark. Regarding the wood grain, I would guess oak, but I am far from being an expert. I have experience with only a limited selection of woods that grow in my timber. I am amazed and appreciative regarding all the time, effort, research and interest that has been invested in this thread. I'm learning a lot. Thanks to everyone who has contributed. T-A
 
the-accumulator said:
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That's exactly the sort of wood I was talking about. See the very large, coarse flecks in it? Not sure what those are actually called in wood terminology, but they're EXTRA prominent on that wood, and I've seen it used on Chinese hammer handles and other swung tools. Seems tough enough, all told, but it's definitely an indicator to me.
 
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FortyTwoBlades said:
I'm glad you're so confident, but how you think that wood in any way resembles ash is beyond me. I know what European beech looks like, and that wood certainly doesn't look typical of the European beech I see on axe handles from actual European producers. It may not actually be oak, but a lot of Chinese tool handles I see have a look very similar to oak, and my statement was that this looks like that. My opinion is that it's likely a Chinese import. But I fully reserve the right to be wrong. :)
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I don't know what it is. But I do know that it isn't ash.
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
Not sure what those are actually called
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Medullary Rays: not necessarily wood terminology just how the phenomenon is called.
These occur in wood practically all the time and are visually prominent to a greater or lesser degree depending on species.
We can be sure the wood in question is one of the many hundreds of varieties of oak. A good shot of the end-grain is the best way to quell any dispute though.
 
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In binomial nomenclature genera are always capitalized and species are always lower case. So it's Fagus sylvatica, Quercus alba, etc. For short reference the genus can be abbreviated as the first one (or two if needed to differentiate) letter capitalized filled with a period, as in Q. alba or F. slyvatica. This is universally the case, be it trees, mammals, insects, bacteria, etc.

At any rate, trying to ID a piece of wood with pictures like this and not even regional information is probably a fool's errand.
 
That first part is helpful about the upper/lower case so thanks Fmont.
Do you really think there is so much room for dispute in the case of this particular wood, anyway in terms of at least narrowing it to AN oak variety? (And let's just keep up the assumption of it coming from China for the fun of it). To get more specific than that would be nonsense though, it's true. Still we can be reasonable, or anyway offer reasonable conclusions. I would anyway, and not feel too bad about it.
 
I don't know. If you handed me a piece of wood that looked like oak and told me it could be from anywhere in the northern hemisphere, I'd say yeah it could be an oak. But I wouldn't say yes it is an oak, because to say so you need to be able to rule out similar woods. I have no idea what they'd be using for tool handles in a manufacturing town in Wherever China. It could look like oak and not be, I would imagine. I think the head itself is overwhelmingly the more useful forensic evidence.
 
Ha ha ha, fair enough, but this says more about you than the wood: BladeForum, Gold Member... a knife maker and/or metal worker, or not?
 
Ernest DuBois said:
That first part is helpful about the upper/lower case so thanks Fmont.
Do you really think there is so much room for dispute in the case of this particular wood, anyway in terms of at least narrowing it to AN oak variety? (And let's just keep up the assumption of it coming from China for the fun of it). To get more specific than that would be nonsense though, it's true. Still we can be reasonable, or anyway offer reasonable conclusions. I would anyway, and not feel too bad about it.
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Wood can be difficult to categorize sometimes you're certain a wood is cocobolo(large variety of shades from red to white) and later find out its actually some kind of rosewood,or varieties of ebony from black to very light with black streaks,we have a exotic wood supply store in Denver and it has probably 50 different varieties of wood to purchase I could easily spend a couple of hours in that place,it will definitely challenge your wood ID skills????
 
Here are the photos of the head after I wire-brushed the paint off. The arrows, from top to bottom, point to the weight stamp, a linear flaw in the metal, the possible makers mark (or another flaw), the border between two different colors of the steel, and the border where the painted area met the unpainted area.
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I'm having trouble believing that the mark that I thought might be a maker's mark is anything more than a flaw in the metal. What puzzles me is the difference in the color of the steel. Wire-brushing the paint away did not remove all the paint; it's easy to see where the painted area was. But then there is that other boundary between two different colors of the steel. Is that a temper line? Is that a junction between a steel bit and a softer frame? I'd guess that it is either a temper line or none of the above. As soon as I think I have an answer to one of my questions, I come up with two more!! Thanks for all the interest and commentary on my Chinese economy hatchet. T-A
 
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I would guess that the second arrow from the bottom is at a temper line. I'm betting it's some junky recycled Chinese steel. The flaw in the eye could be metals that weren't properly joined during recycling. The divot could be some inclusion in the recycled material that popped out after forging. I've seen some weird things with recycled steel.
 
It's the temper line. As far as the marks, it's almost certainly just from forge marks that weren't fully ground out, as far as I can tell. 86% of all steel, according to 2014 figures, was from recycled sources. Steel being recycled is not a bad thing. It's more a matter of if it was done properly or not, which can also be said of the smelting process with virgin steel. If the steel itself is poor it's not because of it being recycled, but more because it was incorrectly or poorly processed. Much more likely is a cosmetic blemish from the manufacturing process that wasn't fully ground out due to its depth and the low QC standard that was set for the final product. It's one of the reasons why paint is/was used on most heads--it makes it so such cosmetic flaws are hidden.
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
If the steel itself is poor it's not because of it being recycled, but more because it was incorrectly or poorly processed.
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Absolutely. There's nothing inherently wrong with recycled steel so long as it's done well. But I've seen Chinese rebar so poorly made that you could still see the nuts and bolts in it which had been 'recycled'. If it's not properly heated and homogenized you can get pretty crappy stuff. I sharpened a buddy's Chinese axe and it had obvious hard and soft areas in the bit that you could easily feel with the file.
 
Square_peg said:
Absolutely. There's nothing inherently wrong with recycled steel so long as it's done well. But I've seen Chinese rebar so poorly made that you could still see the nuts and bolts in it which had been 'recycled'. If it's not properly heated and homogenized you can get pretty crappy stuff. I sharpened a buddy's Chinese axe and it had obvious hard and soft areas in the bit that you could easily feel with the file.
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That could easily be due to a poor quenching process, too, but I know what you mean. I'm just clarifying because those not already familiar with how the steel recycling thing works might read the post as indicating that the steel being recycled was what made it bad, rather than the steel simply having been poorly processed. :)
 
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