At least one of those handles is being replaced as soon as I find the wood to do so. My plan is to build a shave horse and it will be a lot easier to finish items like handles once I have built that.

A simple shaving horse can be built in about 1/2 an hour. It is compact, simple to build, transportable, built with material at hand and functions great. With a chop saw it could be built in 15 minutes.

Today I started making my shaving horse.

Started with a 12" log of blackwood spilt in half and then spilt off a 3" slab.

http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd481/Weaverofduart/2012-05-16161706.jpg

I then started using the rest of the log to make the legs, riser and ramp.

http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd481/Weaverofduart/2012-05-17170957.jpg

Tomorrow I'll start on the dumbhead and putting it together. That is unless the new baby comes.

http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd481/Weaverofduart/2012-05-17171326.jpg

Oh and it has taken me a lot longer the half an hour.

Shaving horses and making babies.... 'bout half and hour.

The making perhaps but not the waiting for them to arrive.

Hello,

The spitting image.


Well, nearly, considering the difference in hemispheres.

Would it be bad forum etiquette to just mention on this page that I thought that wood you showed on the other page was really nice. I wonder how it will season. Do you mean to tell us that such wood is lying around the bush for the plucking there?

Greetings,

Don Wagstaff

It was on the road side and you are not allowed to take wood from the roadside without the authority's in question permission. In this case it was VicRoads and they never give permission. If they catch you the can issue a fine and confiscate tools.

However, it is the responsibility of land owners to maintain the roads side outside the front of their properties. So I went and asked the couple where the tree was if they could ask me to remove said tree because they didn't have the tools to do so. They said yes I got tree

I was given an old Japanese broad axe that was used by my landlord`s father (my landlord is 85,so I estimate the axe to be at least 100 years old).I cleaned the rust using boiling green tea and used it a little,but then the (equally old) handle snapped.I couldn`t remove the wood from the slot of the axe head,so stupidly I put the whole thing in a fire,to burn away the remains of the handle.I have basically annealled the head now (which had been in quite good condition,after having the rust cleaned off it).I`d appreciate any suggestions as to how to harden/temper the head again.
As to whether it would have been worth buying the axe,I don`t know (except for its beauty of course).

my suggestion is, don't try this yourself.
Take or send it to someone who knows what they are doing.
The reason I say this is because the tempering process is tricky, and subjects the metal to a lot of stress. If done improperly, you will warp the steel or even worse crack it. And I imagine this is even more so on an old tool than a new piece of steel.

This is aggravated by having a sharp edge -often you won't grind it down to its edge until everything else is done.

Well I'm not very happy with it but it has already made things a lot easier:

http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd481/Weaverofduart/2012-05-31080347.jpg

A much smoother handle:
http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd481/Weaverofduart/2012-05-31080534.jpg