Hammers & Mallets

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[@robertsmith7130]

Just a quick note to say great job on your channel. I’m 72 been woodworking for many years but now recovering from heart attack. You have helped keep me motivated to get back in the shop, remember things I have forgotten and most importantly taught me things too! My heart fell thanks.

[@tomservojr]

Lots of fun watching you suppress giggles every time you say "whacking," Mike.

[@bigoldgrizzly]

I have a big round mallet, rough turned from a dried out holly log absolutely full of knots. It weighs about 5 pounds, though it has shed weight over five or six years of pretty heavy usage. In the UK these one piece mallets are called 'Beetles'. If it is made from two pieces, i.e head and handle, it is a called a mallet

[@hymieoblimey2253]

Because claws are rarely used actually prying nails, the weight distribution of a Warrington hammer is nicer for chisel bashing. The slim back is nice for targeting the iron for adjusting too. It's worth mentioning Japanese hammers, they have a flat face for hitting chisels and adjusting planes and a domed surface for compressing wood before assembling tight joints.

[@georgenewlands9760]

The cross pein of a Warrington pattern hammer is also great for removing moulding plane wedges (quite possibly what the cross pein was designed for and why the wedges of those planes are the shape that they are). A Warrington is certainly my “weapon of choice” for wooden plane adjustment.

[@dpmeyer4867]

Thanks

[@timberdoodles4647]

Bill Coperthwaite was alway enthralled with hammer design, not out of the normal to visit and have him show a new hammer design he found. I like the little nail grasp thing, on the head to hold a single nail to reach out of reach to set the nail, hands free. I find some nice spruce commanders where the branch is the handle and the trunk is the head, easy to make and the handle will never come loose. Take them out of the top of the tree for various sizes and handle length. big lunkers to small hammers. We often see mushroomed heads on axes. Speaking of proper tool use, the old adze with a spike on the end is often said the purpose of the spike was to set nails in a ships deck or to set wooden pins, I find that premise to be faulty, the pole spike on the adzes I have are way to soft for that purpose and will mushroom easily. it would have been hardened if that was the need, and they are to pointy to drive a wooden pin, it will just stick into the wood end grain of the pin. What is your thoughts on the use of the pole pin on and adze?

[@PasiMoilanen]

Great tips, thank you! I noticed you had wooden(?) sheaths for axes, do you have any blog post or video about them? I have couple axes without proper sheath and I’m lousy with leathercraft. The ones you have look like perfect solution.

[@jackwheatley8]

Thanks dudes

[@MCsCreations]

Awesome tips, dude! Thanks! 😊 Stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊

[@MadMulberry]

I started off, about 5 years ago, with one claw hammer. I now have three claw hammers, two ball pein, two cross pein, one planishing hammer, one sledgehammer, three brass and wood mallets, two carver's mallets, a rubber/nylon faced mallet, three axes with handles and another two axe heads. Do I have a problem? 🤔

[@CleaveMountaineering]

No, you're just getting started!

[@tangle70]

Yes, you do not have enough! I always tell my wife, so many handsaws so little money.

[@bigoldgrizzly]

you know you might have a problem when you fill up a trailer with hammers and head off to the public weighbridge to 'measure' your collection ;

[@robbiejaeger5441]

I'm guessing the claw hammer will leave dents on the top of the plane body. Do you care about this? Will the wood eventually compress such that the claw hammer doesn't dent further?

[@CleaveMountaineering]

Great overview. My elm club keeps getting lighter and lighter.

[@tangle70]

I was surprised that you did not have a joiner's mallet considering you are standing in front of a Nicholson Bench.