Who else uses a scythe?

Will do! I've seen the blades before at local shops (at outrageous prices) and the edges look like factory machete edges. If you've seen the stock edge on an Ontario machete it's pretty much like that. Obtuse, uneven, and coarse. But at least it's thin so it doesn't take long to fix up. :)

Once I'm selling 'em I'll be sharpening the blades properly so they're ready to go. I think the crummy factory edge contributes to furthering the negative stereotype of the American pattern because most folks aren't familiar enough with sharpening to get the edge where it needs to be. I actually had to do some more buttercup mowing this weekend so I've got plenty of scythe-fodder available! :D
 
Here are some sketches of various types of cradle scythes.

Cradle_Scythe_1.jpg

Cradle_Scythe_2.jpg
 
Oh hells yeah--that's perfect! Thanks for digging those up! Have a link to the source?
 
Oh--very good. I actually have read the book in text-only format but that was quite some time ago.
 
Wow--just got the blade and snath and it looks like the snath was assembled by a a half-drunk blind man with the shakes. The actual shaft of the snath itself is totally fine, and I'm actually very pleased with it. The mounting collar was mounted incredibly crooked, with a huge gap between it and the shoulder. The nibs were cranked on so hard that I could barely loosen the lower one and could not move the upper one in spite of using all my strength. It was put on so tight that the wood flared out at the bottom! :eek: I contacted Seymour and while the lady on the phone asked me to send along the info in an email so it could be sent to their engineering department, no offer was made to fix my ganked up snath which is kind of disappointing. I'm going to check with the regional sales rep to see if I can get all of the components separately and just build 'em myself. The sum of the whole right now is less than its parts. :o The blade isn't too shabby though. Photos of that later. For now, here's the grossness. I contacted the seller to see about an exchange.

Edit: The seller is exchanging it and covering shipping costs. :) Now I'll just have to wait. :(

Photo on 2012-06-15 at 16.53.jpgPhoto on 2012-06-15 at 16.53 #3.jpgPhoto on 2012-06-15 at 16.53 #4.jpgPhoto on 2012-06-15 at 16.54.jpg
 
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My old Seymour has the same gap with the mounting collar. The crookedness (also on mine) I believe is intentional so as to put the blade in closer plane to the ground.
 
I would be fine with the gap if that was all there was, but the stuck nib is a killer. I don't believe it's intentional, as the piece would have aligned properly with the drilled holes if it were, and they were off-center. Also, they used to sell some snaths with a ramp built into the plate like some other manufacturers did. I'm actually going to see if when I carry the scythes if I can buy all of the snath components unassembled and just do it myself.
 
Here's a (crappy) pic of the edge. It has about a 1/4" primary grind and an obtuse microbevel. It won't take much work to clean it up. The marking under the berry tree on mine is 30, which corresponds with it being a 30" blade. No other numeric stamping on it.
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Just took the new grass blade for a spin on my vintage snath to see how it would fare. My overall impressions below are comparing a modern economy blade to fine vintage examples, so bear that in mind if I sound a bit negative. This is a natural consequence of the stretch of comparison.

It's very lightweight (even lighter than my Rixford) and pleasing in that regard. The tang is square set to the blade, and the blade seems a hair softer than my Rixford and rapidly raised a bur on the coarser belts of the sander, but polished up well enough on the finest belt. I consider the hardness adequate, though I would prefer it 1-3 points harder. The length seems to be measured from the tip to the back corner of the turn of the tang, rather than the length of the blade region alone. Thus, the effective cutting length is really more like 27.5" rather than a true 30" The beard of the blade is formed about 1/4" too far out from the turn of the tang. This increases the tendency for grass to become caught in this region, and it would benefit from a hole at the base of the blade for the formation of a grass nail to prevent this. The tang length is about 1/2" too short (at least for my vintage snath's mounting collar) to make bending the tang an easy feat, as it would have be a twist at the shank rather than a straight bend at the top of the tang before the turn.

In use I found the lack of a angled tang made the work more difficult, as is to be expected. The blade also had the tendency to chatter, and this is for a couple of reasons. The thinness of the blade makes it more susceptible, for starters, but just means that the following design elements more noticeable in their effect. The rib and the bead of the web are not as deeply set as they could be. They are adequate, and actually deeper than I expected, but a deeper bead and rib would increase rigidity and minimize chatter--however this is an understandable sacrifice in the design to help keep the cost low as the market for scythes is not what it used to be. The biggest issue is that the blade is not curved enough, which minimizes the slicing action through the cut and "tugs" the point. The point of the blade should be dropped at least 1 & 1/2" to allow it to neatly enter the grass. I had the blade in a closed set during this experiment and still suffered tugging because of the overly straight blade.

Overall, the piece is nice and light, and it gets the job done. However, there are a few elements that prevent it from performing like it could. I'll be passing my findings along to Seymour and we'll see if/how they respond.
 
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Awesome thread, makes me want to pick one up. Never used one before, growing up in tropical area we mostly used sickles and machetes for brush/grass clearing.
 
Sickles and machetes get the job done if it's what you've got, but boy is it a lot of extra work! In Central and South America they have scythes that seem to be based off of the European style, but the blades are a bit heavier in build. Truper actually makes some.
 
So it does! I wonder if they contract those through Falci??? But then it wouldn't jive with the quality that I've heard about with those unless they're deliberately cutting quality to hit a price point, OR what I had heard was just plain wrong. :p
 
"Before manufactured stones ...the scytheman ... used a wooden straik ... smeared with sand and mutton fat. ... Soft sand was used for hay, sharp [sand] for corn, & small pebbles for furze." From Old Farms an illustrated guide by John Vince.

(He's English, so corn probably means any kind of grain.)
But maybe crops responded to a rough toothy edge so scythe blades were made rather softer than we'd like nowadays, and maybe you used them up in not many seasons per blade and bought a new one for not too much. I was just looking at a blade I bought a few years ago that has a label telling me to hone both sides because the steel is sandwiched in the middle rather than welded to the top or bottom.
 
scrteened porch said:
"Before manufactured stones ...the scytheman ... used a wooden straik ... smeared with sand and mutton fat. ... Soft sand was used for hay, sharp [sand] for corn, & small pebbles for furze." From Old Farms an illustrated guide by John Vince.

(He's English, so corn probably means any kind of grain.)
But maybe crops responded to a rough toothy edge so scythe blades were made rather softer than we'd like nowadays, and maybe you used them up in not many seasons per blade and bought a new one for not too much. I was just looking at a blade I bought a few years ago that has a label telling me to hone both sides because the steel is sandwiched in the middle rather than welded to the top or bottom.
Click to expand...

With American blades, regardless of if they were laminated or not, it is typical to hone both sides of the edge. :) With regard to the strickle or "straik" as described in the above excerpt, I think it had to do more with how rapidly the cutting medium would dull the edge. Therefore the coarser material was needed for more rapidly restoring an edge that was aggressively dulled. The heavier stalks would still be cut by a less acute edge because they would be less prone towards bending out of the way.
 
Got my replacement snath today. BOTH nibs are frozen this time, so it's going back for a refund (the retailer doesn't want to take the time to actually check a snath for me and isn't going to risk sending another dud) but I was able to confirm that the mounting collar on the first one being crooked wasn't intentional. It was nice and cleanly assembled in that regard on this example. A shame I wasn't able to get the nibs to turn. I think they use a power tool to tighten them on and then grind off the top of the thread flush with the nut...inadvertently "smearing" the steel of the threaded rod over the nut a little, creating a rivet-like effect.

I've written my Seymour rep to see if I can buy the components separately and get a li'l DIY action going. All the components are nice--I just wish they wouldn't give them to 5-ton gorilla to assemble! :D
 
Scythe? Is this cheating?

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Mowing_the_field.JPG


Scythes are fun but with 7 acres to mow this was more practical.
 
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