Axe Me About My New Axe

[rtrsam]

I'll try to get some pictures sometime. At work where I might have to maintain a "fleet" of axes, pulaskis, mauls, etc, I fashioned a holder for the heads cut out of steel so the head with the broken handle (have to cut the handle off flush with the head) is cradled in it with free access to the eye. Mount the holder onto a stump, and use a chainsaw to carve out a notch so the old handle has a place to fall into. Then I made an "axe drift", ground a piece of steel so it barely fits into the eye of whatever tool I'm trying to re-handle. Leave it about six inches long, so I can wail on it with a 4 pound hammer, and you can pop out dozens of handles in no time at all, even handles that were epoxied in place.

Doing the fine fitment work to install new handles is another story. Seems I'm always replacing handles in the winter when the humdity is high, then the handles shrink in the summer. Leaveing new handles inside close to the wood stove for a few days helps. but the handles still shring some. Oh well.

 

[trailmaker]

I'd love to see some pictures of that contraption, it sounds really useful.

 

[zogger]

I'll try to get some pictures sometime. At work where I might have to maintain a "fleet" of axes, pulaskis, mauls, etc, I fashioned a holder for the heads cut out of steel so the head with the broken handle (have to cut the handle off flush with the head) is cradled in it with free access to the eye. Mount the holder onto a stump, and use a chainsaw to carve out a notch so the old handle has a place to fall into. Then I made an "axe drift", ground a piece of steel so it barely fits into the eye of whatever tool I'm trying to re-handle. Leave it about six inches long, so I can wail on it with a 4 pound hammer, and you can pop out dozens of handles in no time at all, even handles that were epoxied in place.

Doing the fine fitment work to install new handles is another story. Seems I'm always replacing handles in the winter when the humdity is high, then the handles shrink in the summer. Leaveing new handles inside close to the wood stove for a few days helps. but the handles still shring some. Oh well.

---could you shape the head part of the handle exactly and proportionally oversize, then have some sort of mini kiln, dry them out good, and fit them right away hot? I was thinking an insulated box (old junk fridge??)(old cast iron water heater??), with an electric heater in it.

 

[7sleeper]

It's actually pretty hard to get steel hot enough to change its properties with a wood fire, especially just sitting around the edge of a fireplace fire. At most it may anneal it a little bit. I found my favorite axe head in the woods behind the garage at my previous house maybe a dozen years ago. It's had the handle burned out of it at least 8 times since then and it still works great and holds an edge well.

Mmmmm, not so. Any amount of heat over 400°-600° will drastically pull temper from carbon and carbon alloy steels. If you're getting the head hot enough to char the remnants of the handle, you're probably getting up near 800°-1,000°. A cherry glow will approach 1,500°.

Glad it's worked for ya, but it is a crap shoot when it comes to the steel properties when you're done. Uneven heating will induce stresses, large grain growth, cracking, etc.

If I had to guess why you haven't had too much issue, is the head was most likely a low/medium carbon -- like 1045.

I'm not sure how the fahrenheit numbers are, but if you have red glowing coals the temperature is way over 800°C, which will easily draw the hardness of any steel.

7

 

[Metals406]

I'm not sure how the fahrenheit numbers are, but if you have red glowing coals the temperature is way over 800°C, which will easily draw the hardness of any steel.

7

Those aren't in Celsius.

 

[howellhandmade]

For putting heads on handles, I use Brownell's Acraglas Gel epoxy. Green package, not the red one. This epoxy is for glass bedding big game rifles with heavy recoil. It does not shrink and stays just a tiny bit flexible. Regular epoxy will turn to powder with the hammering.