OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

267824 Matthew Groves <grovesthegrey@g...> 2019‑02‑10 two-piece hickory hammer handles?
So at my local model railroading club, a feller pulls me aside and says….do you
need any oak lumber?

Reflexively I say, “YES!”, to give my brain time to think things over. I of
course do not need any oak lumber, but I have friends who may.

So after the meeting we head out to his van, where he has a sizeable pile of
lumber, all 2-6inches wide, all 15/16thick.

We transfer the considerable load from his minivan springs to my minivan
springs, and he says there is some ash in there as well.

I call two friends and load them up, they take about half of it.

So now I gotta store the rest….sheesh. I’m not much of a hyper-organizer, but I
DO start sorting this lumber.

Red oak pile, that’s easy.

THEN I gotta break out my 7x loup and Hoadley’s Understanding Wood.

Interesting, Ash.

Ash pile.

Then this mystery stuff.

I’m no expert, but the endgrain doesn’t lie. It’s in the hickory family.


So now I have ash and hickory. I sent the red oak with my son for their school
RUBE GOLDBERG project.

Ash and Hickory are good shock woods, so then I’m thinking tool handles, but
nothing thick enough.


SO


If you have to laminate two (or) three pieces to get the right thickness…..is it
still worth it? Are laminated hammer/blacksmith top tools/sledge handles doomed
to failure if not made from single pieces of wood?


Matthew Groves
Springfield, MO
267825 scott grandstaff <scottg@s...> 2019‑02‑10 Re: two-piece hickory hammer handles?
For a while I knew a guy named Jesse who was making really beautiful 
laminated tool handles.
Jesse had (has) a great eye for design, color and proportion.  So the 
handles were outright works of art.
   But I always thought of them as decorative more than practical.

When I am making handles a little extra trim piece or a scrap inside the 
eye or something I will glue on and trust.  Nothing critical.
    I wouldn't gamble the fate of my skin and bones to a full laminated 
main handle,
  in a hard work setting.
  Rake shovel nippers,......... who cares.   But tools that fly fast and 
hit hard I am cautious about.
     yours scott

-- 
*******************************
    Scott Grandstaff
    Box 409 Happy Camp, Ca  96039
    scottg@s...
    http://www.snowcrest.net/kitty/sgrandstaff/
    http://www.snowcrest.net/kitty/hpages/index.html
267826 Chuck Taylor 2019‑02‑10 Re: two-piece hickory hammer handles?
Matthew,

You wrote:
===snip===
I’m no expert, but the endgrain doesn’t lie. It’s in the hickory family.
===snip===

When my brother moved from western New York state to Washington state, he
brought some wood with him that had been harvested from his land in New York.
Some of it was pignut hickory. Some of that got used as window sills in his
house here. Gorgeous stuff. You might want to take a closer look at that hickory
before consigning it to use as handles.

Cheers,
Chuck Taylor
north of Seattle

Recent Bios FAQ