I just finished my timber strap wrench and a beetle.
I started by making two handles from 1.5" square Hickory. I then cut the corners, turning them into an octagon leaving about 10 inches square on the end of the wrench handle, and 4 inches on the end of the Beetle handle. I transitioned the octagon to the square part by chamfering the corners at about 30 degrees with my chisel. Finally I used an orbital sander to smooth all the sharp edges out.
The timber strap wrench consists of the handle and a 4ftX2inch wide strap with eyelets on each end. A drawing shows how the strap is adjusted.
On the beetle, I made the head 8"X8"X14", from an old white pine barn timber. I bored a 1.5" diameter hole for the handle and rounded all the edges over with a 1/2" roundover bit in my router. Finally, to fit the handle I had to sand the handle corners with my orbital sander and 80 grit until I got a good slip fit, which took quite a bit of sanding, so much so that the handle is now nearly completely round instead of octagon. The handle wedges in the head via the chamfered transition to the square portion. Lastly, I cut off the excess square portion and chamfered the edges to a diamond like pattern and sanded the edges. The handle comes out by taping it on the concrete, or by striking the grip end with a mallet. Here are some pics:
[img]http://www.forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16191/Brads_Beetle1b.jpg [/img]
[img]http://www.forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16191/Brads_Beetle2.jpg [/img]
[img]http://www.forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16191/Brads_Beetle3.jpg [/img]
[img]http://www.forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16191/Craig_solution.jpg [/img]
[img]http://www.forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16191/Timber_lever1b.jpg [/img]

Oops! Here are the pics. Not sure why they didn't work in post?

It looks like you have a space before the last IMG tag. Leeching from the FF is verboten, BTW.

Why?, they're hosting my pics. If it's hosted somewhere, doesn't cost anything to link to it. Am I supposed to host my pics in more than one place? That's a lot of uploading time for a dial up connection. I had to look up "verboten", new word on me.
If FF won't let me post a pic from my hosting site that I pay for, thus forcing me to host on their site, then I'm supposed to do double the work of uploading, and then have to fetch back and forth for the link addresses. Sometimes I don't have that kind of time for the darn dial up (only option beside costly sattelite where I live). Kinda goofy if you ask me.

that looks like blood on that timber. I've done that before: flip before looking behind you.

do you not like the wrench Brad? it seems like that when the center of gravity flips with you set-up you are going to have it fall to the stick. seems like less control for the flip.

I just prefer to put my shoulders into it and push. The brothers Holder showed me that technique. No use in using your arms when you can use your legs.

As far as wrenches: this fellow Paul made the best one I have seen. He had it at the Goshen Pass Shelter. adjustable and strong. You out there Paul?

Using another forum to host your pictures costs them bandwidth, and money. I host my pics on photobucket, and if I resize them to around 35k, it doesn't take long to load on dialup.

Mo, That's funny that you noticed something like that. I had to laugh. I think it's probably paint. Some of my timbers have some old paint on them from the warehouse they came from. It's all falking so it will all scrape off easily when I go to clean them up.
The picture is just to give an idea of how the strap wrench is used. I don't imagine it being used with the timber so low to the ground. I figure to use it when the timbers are on horses, when cutting joinery and having to roll them. I think the strap wrench will save some wear and tear on the body. After Craig roost hit me upside the head on how to adjust the strap, I think it will work well.

Dave, again, I'm not using FF to host photos I'm using exclusively elsewhere. I had already posted/used those photos on FF, so since I wanted to post them here too, link. I wouldn't use FF to host pics for stuff to sell on ebay. That would be wrong to occupy their bandwith for a non FF purpose. So enough with the finger wagging please.

I was only answering your question in my last post. I had not meant to start a battle.

These are a few similar tools I've made over the years. The basic design could probably be modified to roll timbers. When we lag milled D logs together in a wall they need to be aligned in and out at each connection. We used these to slide the upper log in relation to the fixed logs below as we ran the lags home. I don't know why but we always called them log rollers.

Just for the record, my connection uploads pictures at 3kbps, I doubt anyone is slower than that. I have always found the time to move pics over to photobucket before reposting on another forum.