Which Cold Steel Hawk Is Your Favorite?

I have a rifleman, norse, and spike hawk.

For general use I would recommend the pipe hawk, or for light weight, the trail hawk.

The spike hawk for plain wickedness.

The rifleman is a heavy beast. Perfect for throwing! Heavy enough to really drive nails, and will chop wood too.

I have the spike hawk on the 34 inch handle. Fast and nasty. Only improvement for me would be to put the bit shape off my norse hawk on the spike hawk.
 
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Whats that little fella at the bottom?

scrteened porch said:
What do you mean by camp hatchet/hammer?
Is it like one of these, maybe the top right or lower left?

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Click to expand...
 
I have the trail, spike, and pipe hawks from CS.
They are all my faves. I cut off an inch and a half off the spike end of my spike hawk because it was just too tempting to get hit with it! However, I beveled the edge of the cut off end and smoothed it all out and I would say that getting hit with the "duller" end would still break some bones.
If I had to choose one, though, it would prolly be the Pipehawk.
This last summer I was camping with my sons and threw the trailhawk in the Yukon as an afterthought. Well the campsite forced me to remove some branches from a half dead juniper tree to get the tent in place. Wished I had a saw, but that little trailhawk cut those 3" dry dead branches just fine. After that trip, I will remember a saw, but I will always remember a tomahawk, too.
I have customized all three into more of a traditional native american look. I sanded down the handles and used real sinew for wraps under the heads and skinned all of that horrible black paint off and beveled out the inside handle hole and patina-ed them with vinegar. The handles got darker with dark walnut finishes and they look a whole lot better than when they got to me.
So glad CS made this line- you just cant beat it.
John
 
Liam Ryan said:
Whats that little fella at the bottom?
Click to expand...

I bought it at a flea market thinking it was a lathing hatchet that looked like a tomahawk. I now think it's a produce hatchet, which was probably for packing bunches of stuff into crates, and cutting the bunches to fit.
Anyway, it's a relative of all those hammer/prybar/nailclaw/ hatchet tools for crates. Because the hammer is well used and there's no prybar, I think it was for crating rather than for uncrating and inspecting. I can't actually find a definition of it anywhere.
 
Pretty sure. Seeing as how he also said he grinds down all his edges down to butter knife sharpness.
 
The Trail Hawk and Spike Hawk are my favorites.

But the Norse Hawk is getting more attention from me lately.
 
I own a pipe hawk and plan to get a spike hawk. I stripped the paint off the pipe hawk and plan to do some more work to it soon.
 
Which Cold Steel Hawk Is Your Favorite? None of them....made in China, corrected: made in Taiwan POS. A crudely made tool with a set screw added aid in holding it place.

Now for the those who can't except a different opinion or view..Let the name calling and flaming begin and display your lack of tolerance.

Just my .02, Double Ott
 
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Cold Steel hawks are made in Taiwan, not China. Taiwan is an island off the coast of China, with a democratic government and capitalist economy.

Also, the new Frontier hawk (now missing from the CS website) is a smidge lighter than the trail hawk. It's the one I own; I like it enough.
 
Double Ott said:
Which Cold Steel Hawk Is Your Favorite? None of them....made in China, corrected: made in Taiwan POS. A crudely made tool with a set screw added aid in holding it place.

Now for the those who can't except a different opinion or view..Let the name calling and flaming begin and display your lack of tolerance.

Just my .02, Double Ott
Click to expand...

They added the set screw because they got numerous complaints about the handles coming off. Now, a normal 'hawk user would accept this as an inevitability, but the average Cold Steel customer didn't get that. Fortunately, the set screw is easily removable as it is a screw.

If you can find me a hawk that is as good and readily available for the money I'll go with that as I am no fan of Cold Steel as a whole. I have yet to see such a company though.

Notice the distinct lack of name calling? I can accept a difference of opinion, but calling ot a "Chinese POS" shows your total ignorance of the product you have such a strong opinion about. Try one before you complain.
 
scouter27, Thank you for your thoughts. It was very helpful that you clarified that a set screw is a screw and screws can be removed.

I had one a while ago and honestly didn't remember were it was made. I guess I should have just said said, a crudely made off shore import. My apologies.

Please share with us any hawk, hatchet, axe or any other hand held edged tool that comes with a set screw in the head, of any price range.

I gave my CS hawk to my nephew, he thought it was "neat". His mom didn't think so...

Stating or implying that one is ignorant does fall under name calling and or flaming.

But we all have our opinions and they should be accepted for what they are, just that, an opinion.

Thanks for sharing your opinion, Tom
 
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Don't sugar coat it, Ott. Tell us how you really feel about import hawks.
lol.gif


Tuatahi racing axes are drilled for a set screw. I think they're required in competition.
 
Square_peg said:
Don't sugar coat it, Ott. Tell us how you really feel about import hawks.
lol.gif


Tuatahi racing axes are drilled for a set screw. I think they're required in competition.
Click to expand...

Thanks Peg, I'm sure you know how I feel about import hawks. I thought that Tuatahi heads were drilled for a cold rolled pin, not tapped for a screw. But I've been wrong before, and most likely not the last time.

EDIT: I just remembered that some of their models were drilled to accept and hold a sharpening jig for the axe.

Tom
 
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Double Ott said:
scouter27, Thank you for your thoughts. It was very helpful that you clarified that a set screw is a screw and screws can be removed.

I had one a while ago and honestly didn't remember were it was made. I guess I should have just said said, a crudely made off shore import. My apologies.

Please share with us any hawk, hatchet, axe or any other hand held edged tool that comes with a set screw in the head, of any price range.

I gave my CS hawk to my nephew, he thought it was "neat". His mom didn't think so...

Stating or implying that one is ignorant does fall under name calling and or flaming.

But we all have our opinions and they should be accepted for what they are, just that, an opinion.

Thanks for sharing your opinion, Tom
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I meant no insult, just a bit of sarcasm. Simply having a unique feature (the set screw) doesn't make them bad (nor good). Its simply an attempt to address an issue. I own 3 cold steel hawk heads, all on composite Equinox Coronado handles. None of them use set screws. Recently I've been contemplating getting a few more, but I would polish it up and remove the screw and fill in the hole. Its 2 to 3 hours of work, and worth it in my opinion.
 
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