Tom asks about carving with a hatchet.

I frequently refer to our tools as ‘sharp on a stick’ and axes are right up
there with sharp and nowt else - so all the control has to come from the user.
No mouth, no jig, no adjustment for depth of cut.

But
The bevel is where all the control comes from when doing delicate work.
Consider a chisel plane.  The edge is lined up against a bevel formed by the
sole of the plane.  That’s what gives control, so a long bevel can be used to
produce an accurate planing cut, much as you would if using a chisel.
If you have a single tool, an axe with a long bevel makes sense.  If you also
have to use it to do some serious roughing out before you can ‘chisel’ the finer
pars of the work, then a short bevel makes sense too, to add some strength to
the cutting edge.

Scott would say ‘takes ten minutes to re grind your axe’  and I’m sure he’ll
also say ‘and the rest of your life to become competent in it use’

(OK - if you’re 14, maybe not the rest of your life)

As for me - I ‘discovered’  more axe heads than I expected just this weekend, so
this thread is particularly fascinating, seeing a hewn chest coming up fast over
the projects horizon.

Richard Wilson
a Yorkshireman, in a raining Newcastle on Tyne, 
in Northumbria