[Cosmoline]

I've been doing quite a bit of work on the old compound with a variety of Swedish axes. Mainly because they're about the only things that still function below zero in the deep snow. I've gotten pretty handy with them, particularly my favorite Gransfors-Bruks felling axe. It's a real beast. If I had to choose a non-firearm weapon, it would be the felling axe. WHile it is somewhat slow to get moving, it hits with such astonishing power I can't imagine even a large sword would be able to stop it. The sharp side will cut through just about anything, while the flat side acts as a great hammer. Give me that and a Turkish bayonet and I'll feel pretty well defended. You can keep your mil-spec knives and ninja nonsense
:D

[The Tourist]

From the way it sounds, you must live in a rural area, or at least spend time outside. If that is where you spend most of your time, then it's the perfect non-firing weapon. I share your distain for the 'tactical' hoopla.

The problem is that I live and work in a city. In another forum I corresponded with a guy who carried a Bowie in a shoulder holster. My advice was to never wear it in my neighborhood.

First of all, it would be like asking to be arrested. You could probably talk your way out of having a jackknife clipped to your pants, but a concealed Bowie, definitely not.

Another issue is just practicality. Are you sure you want to be a 'shrapnel magnet'? I mean, if a guy whipped out a big Bowie locally, a whole bunch of guys, including my wife, would punch more holes into him than a Russian promise.

Having said that. if there were no firearms, I'd buy the Cold Steel Mace. Axes I got, but I think the mace would smash them.

[R127]

deleted

[Smoke]

Hmmm...

An axe takes a lot of effort to get going. And even more to stop and reverse. If your initial swing were to miss; how fast could you reverse the direction for another pass?

I spend a lot of time with an old double bit cutting cedar trees. It doesn't take long to wear yourself out with an axe. Great exercise though. The whole body gets in on the deal.

Smoke

[El Tejon]

Underrated???:confused: By whom? Certainly not the Vikings!:D

Have seen a few axe wounds in my line of work. Very telling.:eek:

Like anything else, pros and cons, depends on what you are most comfortable with.

[Jim March]

The thing to remember about the axe or any heavy-swinging weapon is that you MUST stay in motion all the time while using it or you'll get creamed. Every single swing must be accompanied by footwork.

Example: dude with a shortsword of some type is up against a full battleaxe, so he's outmatched in both range and "blow impact" but he's got speed on his size...and at very close range, the axe is next to useless.

So the swordsman has to get inside the axe's range.

Axe-man is advancing, and swings, swordsman ducks back out of the way and now needs to move IN fast.

Axe backsteps while swinging again.

Result: he stays out of the sword's range, the swordsman's range-to-target is shifting so lining up a wrist-shot is far trickier, and by moving backwards while chopping overhand, the axe SPEEDS UP...not by a lot, but enough to throw the swordsman's calculations off.

Try this: stand with your feet diagonally apart some, knees bent, holding something heavy straight overhead...baseball bat or heavier. Now step back, FAST while dropping your weight a bit. What happens? The item overhead tends to stay still while you move back, and gets "whipped" down and forward because your arms don't stretch. Basically, with no additional ARM muscle work, you've put in an additional downwards swing into the axe head or whatever it is you're swinging via your LEGS and torso (remember the slight drop in body weight?).

While making "range to target calcs" far more complex.

[hillbilly]

I love my HB Forge tomahawk....smaller version of an axe.

Axes are nasty, but have their drawbacks.

There is no such thing as the "perfect" weapon. It all depends on the person swinging or thrusting or slashing with it.

hillbilly

[R127]

deleted

[pwrtool45]

Accept no substitute if your opponent is wearing plate (or mail, I guess). :D

[Jim March]

You know, I never understood that whole thing about "plate mail".

I mean, most dinner china I've ever seen isn't very robust. And you'd look damned silly with a bunch of it strapped all over you...





































:neener:

[Baba Louie]

You can keep your mil-spec knives and ninja nonsense But what about your basic California Banned Poulan? http://www.poulan.com/products/chainsaws/gas/prod_1900.asp
:D

[Wanderer]

My VT tomahawk from ATC would be a great weapon, should the need arise.

[mete]

That reminds me of an incident years back. Some kids were driving in a car having a great time , not paying too much attention to driving. There was a car stopped at a red light .The kids couildn't stop in time and there was a fender bender. An old guy steps out of the car and says 'car too long for you ? I'll take care of that " and proceed s to hack away the first 12" of the kids car !! Yes axes have their uses. Now that I'm and old guy I appreciate that incident much more .

[Citadel99]

So........I'm still waiting for a picture of the Swedish axes.

Mark

[pwrtool45]

d'oh!

Wouldn't suggest that with the Misses good china...especially if you have an axe anywhere nearby. :D

[Cosmoline]

http://www.piragis.com/gransforsbruks/images/gransforsfelling.jpg

She doesn't look too scary--not like the big double sided axes--but man can she hit! I tried her out on an old junker car, and that blade will indeed cut through the sheet metal doors. That's some very, very good steel on that axe, and an excellent "prima hickory" handle.

[Dr.Rob]

Tomohawks are a lot of fun, and useful tools. And can be thrown pretty accurately.

[SapperLeader]

I ahve to agree cosmoline, axes are pretty sweet weapons and even better as tools. I recieved a gransford bruks hatchet from my siblings for a x-mas present, and I recently participated in a bladeforums passaround on a veitnam tactical tamahawk. Both are great little choppers, and swing like the dickens (always wanted to use that word :) ). I would like to get one of the full size axes like yours to throw in the truck when i go camping, and if I win the tomahawk, im going to look into taking some axe fighting classes.

[Wanderer]

Yeah, I'm working on getting James Keatings Tomahawk Tapes. They are good from what I hear. Tapes (http://www.jamesakeating.com/instructional8.html)

[MrMurphy]

Your typical Viking axe was a hand axe, basically a large tomahawk. And they had a shield and sword as well. They covered all their bases (most had a spear and/or dagger around too).

[M67]

MrMurphy, regarding viking weaponry.

Norwegian law at the time specified what weapons you had to own - an early example of weapons control of a slightly different kind than the one Ted Kennedy wants. :)

I don't remember exactly what these laws said, and it varied a bit between regions, but the basic minimum included a bow and a number of arrows (measured in dozens), a shield, a spear - and either sword or axe, according to individual taste.

They did use light hand axes, but this was not the type that was seen as a substitute for a sword. It was a tool that could also serve as a weapon. As far as knives are concerned, they were also just tools that could be used as weapons, they were never mentioned as "weapons", everyone, male and female, carried one all the time anyway.

The broad axe or battle axe was considerably larger and heavier than the hand axe. There were several styles. They probably discussed shape, weight and curvature of the edge just like later generations discuss 1911 vs Glock. :D

I just did some surfin'. It appears that a good broad axe around 1300 (after the viking age) cost as much as a cow. Axes, like swords, were sometimes given names, it was not uncommon to name them after the female giants of Norse mythology.

You know, I never understood that whole thing about "plate mail". You know, some of the vikings didn't either. They usually wore armour but all the sagas mention battles were someone threw their mail on the ground when things got hot and sweaty. Armour hampered movement. This is where the word "berserker" comes from. I think the first part of the word is the same root as the English "bare". "Serk" means "shirt". A berserker is someone who fought in "just his shirt", no armour.


Cosmoline, getting a Norwegian to say something nice about anything Swedish ain't easy. :) But that is a very nice axe, I have one of their small ones. We Scandinavians are pretty serious when it comes to the quality of things like knives and axes. A result of growing up surrounded by all those tress, I guess.

Excuse me for asking. No offence, old chap. But have you lost your marbles?
I tried her out on an old junker car, and that blade will indeed cut through the sheet metal doors. Reading that made my eyes hurt. Cutting sheet metal with a fine tool like that. :what:

If you ever want that axe to respect you again, you have to sit down and give her some love and care. Touching up her edge with a good Arkensas stone would be a start. :)

[dfariswheel]

Back during the Vietnam war, there was a young Army officer who tried to convince the Army that a tomahawk was a more effective weapon then the bayonet.

He gave the brass a demonstration of throwing and fighting techniques with one.

He took on a series of Army hand-to-hand combat experts, and spectacularly proved that a man with a bayonet, fighting knife, club, or hand-to-hand stood NO chance against this guy armed with his tomahawk.

The brass was impressed, but even though he showed how easy it would be to train recruits to be as effective, the brass decided to stay with the bayonet.

SOME people listened, since certain Marine Force Recon units are legendary for use of black "Vietnam Tomahawks".

What few stories I've heard indicate the 'hawks were deadly effective, AND quiet enough to use for silent killing.

You don't hear much about this, since even for Marines, hacking somebody to death with an axe is considered VERY non-PC.

[Cosmoline]

Reading that made my eyes hurt. Cutting sheet metal with a fine tool like that.

:D Yes, I'm abusive. I also ran the axe over with my pickup and lost it in the snow more than once. I'm not nice to my tools, not nice at all. Neither, for that matter, is Alaska. So any tool that survives in my dubious care has got to be top-notch.

[4v50 Gary]

I'll take a tomahawk I can throw first. Then again, I've yet to learn how to hit anything. :p

[ChefJeff1]

Gransfors brucks aves are an awesome tool. Talk about well made. If you chop any amount of wood you should have one.

[Cosmoline]

Boy, that's an old thread! I still have that axe, too. Just got through cleaning her up and putting on a new coat of BLO.

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b52/Gussick/axegb.jpg

[FilJos]

I just took my wife camping for the first time. On our way to the trail we stopped at an outfitter that carried a whole range of Gransfors axes.

When she saw that they were made in Sweden (she is half swedish) she informed me that if she enjoyed camping with me that she wanted her own Gransfors hatchet, or more likely, the Swedish Carving Axe model, since I got to have my tomahawk.

[JShirley]

I like tomahawks. They're useful tools and weapons. I have a small hatchet I considered taking here to Afghanistan with me, in my Tec-Lok sheah made by our very own Tom Krein (he does GREAT work, btw).

That said, a decent spearman can take a good axeman. The spear has both distance and speed, and can be quite deadly with a very simple manual of arms.

I haven't heard it yet, so it MUST be said: With this axe, I RULE! :D

John

[Gordon]

Check this one out! These was an article in SWAT magazine this spring about his axes!:)


http://www.tacticalforums.com/cgi-bin/tacticalubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=7;t=001780

[Pax Jordana]

Speaking of 'manual of arms', can anybody point me to a good axe/tomahawk fighting resource? (that isn't by lynn thompson?)

[wheelgunslinger]

Pax,
I've been looking around and haven't been able to find much that isn't Cold Steel related.
I'm curious to see what anyone might come up with as well.

I've started taking my Tomahawk deer hunting and camping with me. Now that Mountain Hardwear is making packs with Ice Axe mounts, it's a piece of cake to keep it where I can get to it. And, the more I carry it, the more I'd like to get some education on how to use it well H2H.

[geim druth]

For a long-hafted axe you can't beat this:

http://www.the-exiles.org/Article%20Le%20Jue%20de%20la%20Hache%20Lesson.htm

You really need a haft that's at least 5 feet long, but some of the techniques work with shorter handles. The important thing is to remember that you can use the haft and the butt as well as the axe-head.

[Cosmoline]

Wow! I have to confess I've never seen a true combat grade pole axe of modern construction for sale, anywhere. They're said to be the ultimate weapon--the combination of battle axe, spear and war hammer. If you have room to operate one and know what you're doing I don't think anything but a bow could beat it. That sucker could cut a katana half in two.

[.45Guy]

It's not pretty, and certainly not tactical. Though I suppose it could ruin someone's day. However as a tool it is unsurpassed. I suppose I should mention that my "survival" supplies include a butt load of 16 penny nails and Hay-soos spikes.;)

http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g27/aguy123/Axe003.jpg

[Steve499]

This home made tomahawk has become my constant companion when I'm hunting. I got started carrying one, an earlier effort, years ago while bowhunting. It was useful for chopping misses out of tree trunks! The narrow, long thin blade will work just like a chisel on wood. And, after I used one a few times on deer to remove the head or cut the ribs from the backbone, there remained no mystery why they were so popular in days gone by. A backbone the size of a deer's doesn't even slow it down.

Steve

[.45Guy]

Steve, have you considered a limited production run for sale?

[Steve499]

I've made around 15 of them, no two alike. I use car springs, fold the eye on my forge and weld it closed, then make the handle from osage orange. I've never thought about selling any. I always thought the expectation for quality one would have if something cost money wouldn't be justified if they didn't cost anything. Not that they aren't very functional, but sometimes they end up kind of rough looking. All my friends and most of my nephews have one by now. The little guys will probably get one someday, too, if they are good to old uncle Steve!

[.45Guy]

The roughness is part of the allure. In fact they look like something I saw in an iron age display at the natural history museum. I'd certainly lay down the cash.

[SeanSw]

I think the hawk looks good too. I'd be interested in one of the rougher models :D

*edit*

Reminds me of the axe seen here. Sorry for the bad picture but photographs weren't allowed.

http://www.uploadfile.info/uploads/b4d6a38609.jpg (http://www.uploadfile.info)

[hso]

Steve,

Looks like a good hawk.

I just attended a seminar by Alan Longmeyer where he demonstrated making a frontier hawk head. He used a blacksmith's drift for the final forming of the eye. Do you insert a piece into the center to weld in place or just weld the halves together to form the blade?

[Silvanus]

My Gränsfors Bruks double bladed axe and hunting hatchet, I love them!

Believe it or not, they are both sharper than any of my knives:eek:

[Silvanus]

Some more and a sword:D

[Steve499]

Thanks for the compliment, hso. I have been meaning to make a drift to even up the eye after I weld it closed but just haven't ever got around to it. I just thin the strip of steel some along the end I'm going to form the eye from and bend it around. I cheat big-time on the weld too. Wire welder! I have burned up a lot of tool steel trying to forge weld it so I pretty much gave that up as a bad idea. The eyes are tear drop shaped, often with a little curl toward the point but since I make each handle to fit the eye, it hasn't mattered a whole lot.

I think the REAL blacksmiths used to fold a strip of wrought iron over on itself leaving the eye open and then forge welding a smaller piece of higher carbon steel between the ends of the lap for a cutting edge. Since I'm making the whole thing from high carbon spring steel I just go with easy! I'd love to get to go to a seminar like that sometime. It's pretty amazing what can be done if you just know how!

Steve

[Vairochana]

I was involved in medieval reenactment and martial arts for a long time, using metal weapons, not SCA.
I have sparred using axes with 'opponents' using a variety of combinations and found them to be very effective. An axe blade on a 4' shaft is fast, on a 6' shaft it is amazing how fast you can move it, anyone who has used a quaterstaff or naginata will know what I mean. Typically though your Viking or Anglo Saxon axe is lighter with a longer cutting edge than your wood axe.

[Silvanus]

Sounds very interesting, Vairochana. I've only used swords (one- and two-handed) so far...I might have to get a new (blunt) axe now;)

[carebear]

Many war axes I've seen have "beaks" or spikes on them so they can be used to thrust as well. Adds a whole nother dimension of attack and defense.

Speaking of 'manual of arms', can anybody point me to a good axe/tomahawk fighting resource? (that isn't by lynn thompson?)

Other than ARMA (http://www.thearma.org/)the only other resource I know was already mentioned.

Yeah, I'm working on getting James Keatings Tomahawk Tapes. They are good from what I hear. http://www.jamesakeating.com/instructional8.html

[Third_Rail]

Walking along the road a few days ago, I found a "Collins" axe... looks to be about a 3lb head on it, chipped paint finish, the head itself was loose, handle needed refinishing, etc.

I just finished the last coat of "old style" stock finish (don't remember the recipe), already painted and restaked the head, sharpened it, and there it is, ready to go.

Does anyone know if these axes are worth using, or did I pretty up a junky WalMart axe?

[MD_Willington]

Being from an area of the world where there are plenty of large trees to test the "Theory of Gravity" with, the Gränsfors Bruks is a tool I'm familair with though I've never owned one. I've seen some "shakers" with the Gränsfors Bruks Carpenter's Axes and Froes.

They are very nice tools.

[logdogsmith]

It is difficult to describe the feeling one has when teaching Cub and Boy Scouts to throw a tomahawk. And the look on their faces when they not only hit the target, but the hawk sticks.

Note: We would use rings cut from palm trees for targets. Amazingly like a boars hair dart board.

[Stickjockey]

Third Raill-

Collins made the axes that went on military vehicles like the MB/GPW in WW2. It should be decent, at least.

[Third_Rail]

Good to hear!

[Stickjockey]

Look like this?
http://jeepdraw.com/images/jeepdraw/John_Barton1_Shovels/JB23.jpg

[Third_Rail]

Pretty much, but it had a few decals (cars, etc) and it was painted hideously blue/orange.

[hso]

Steve499,

You can order drifts for just a few bucks. As to seminars, just come out to Knoxville in October and attend Bowie's Hammer-In and Alan would be happy to show you. He's probably going to present at Harley's Hammer-In in the spring.

Not a thing in the world wrong using modern equipment to do the job.