Choosing a Kindling Axe

[@Michael-ji3gw]

I love your videos. I wish there were more.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Thanks Michael, there would be - but life and work keep getting in the way! I will try harder. Vince

[@TonyGee-ne2mn]

Interesting video, and no irritating muzak. 👍

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Thank you - yes no music as it is a distraction and I don't want any copyright issues! All best, Vince

[@pocket83squared]

That bronze axe is an incredible find. It's enviable that you have such a long local history there. What a piece.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

I have never found one or held one before, it was so perfectly cast with beautiful lines - sort of graceful. An honour to hold and yes real history - thanks, Vince

[@fynens]

When cutting kindling I hold the wood with a pair of metal tongs in my left hand and the axe in the right hand. Saves chopping fingers off.

[@kleptosepto1848]

That is a great idea. This past summer while cutting kindling for this winter, I cut my hand twice with my hatchet which resulted in hospital visits. Glad I read the comments.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

That is a great idea - and with splitting we are not needing to protect a razor sharp edge, so if the axe catches the tongs it doesn't matter.

[@Aco747lyte]

What a very interesting video, and I'm pleased you showed us a collection of yours because last summer I forged a carbon steel Viking hand axe which took me several weeks to get right. Weight, about 2.5 pounds. Perfect for me. Its blade head length is 6.5 inches, the blade's cutting edge a bit shorter at 5.5 inches and it is razor sharp only because I took a lot of time perfecting the edge using an oiled whetstone. My daughter was a blacksmith until she gave it up for an officer's job in the Royal Navy, where once I served 30 years. I'm only a hobbyist blacksmith, no way professional. For kindling I use my lovely old Boker Vox Rold. We have piles of old telegraph poles hewn from pitch pine, lovely straight grain wood that is perfect for tapers to small kindling for our old wood stove. Like baking on a rainy day, I also enjoy kindling just for the fun of it. Now winter will soon be upon us, all this kindling and logs are neatly piled up in our cottage. And not a spider to be seen because our dog eats them. 😂 ...Thank you so much. I love your videos so much that i Playlist them. Best wishes, Wendi 🌻

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Hi Wendi, The axe you made sounds amazing. When I was a student we still felled with axes and our felling axes (4 lb) were kept razor sharp - I took pride in being able to shave a hair three times on the edge of mine. My father was Fleet Air Arm, Royal Navy, my brother RAF and I did a bit with the Army once - nice the family served in all three services! Kindling is fun, a therapy, and I wanted to bring out that it is one of the few things that we share with all of our ancestors. All best, Vince

[@kleptosepto1848]

I'm glad you're uploading again. :)

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Thank you - I really enjoy everything to do with wood fires and their history.

[@unitytira4954]

Thank you so much for sharing this video and your honest thoughts. It helped me to have right perspective, blessings.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

You are very welcome - a lovely, peaceful, timeless job making kindling. Best wishes, Vince

[@unitytira4954]

Sharing the early history and development of ax is enlightening. It encourages me respect and appreciate my ax tool. Thank you so much for your kind words Vince, I too is doing kindling, for my family, and to prepare our fireplace to keep us warm in a cold Region in the Philippines. Blessings.

[@judyofthewoods]

Now, I learned something new about kindling cutting - a sissi stick. I tend to do the slow method to save my fingers, but will try it fast now with the additional tool. I just love the look of Ben's favorite axe, and it is beautiful enough to display in your house between use. Looks like the kind Granfors make.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Yes Ben had an amazing set of woodworking tools and was a real craftsman, much missed now.

[@christopherlehrach2844]

Great little video. BTW, bought your book. Thank you. Look forward to reading it over Christmas

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Thank you - I hope you have a great Christmas, and enjoy the book! Vince

[@metrodraft]

Great video, as usual. Thank you

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Thank you - you are very welcome - glad no customers showed up!

[@pocket83squared]

Nice to compare methods. Thanks. As much as I fight against intuition, because it's so often shortsighted enough to lead us down the wrong path, I think it's important to stay organic with kindling-splitting. What I mean is that I'm simply not doing it in any of the conventional styles, and so I've just sort of evolved my own method. Respect to anybody else's own, but here's how I do mine. Sitting by a knee-high log, just like you, I split. But with a few differences. My log has a center hole taking up about ¼ of its diameter. The hole only goes down into it about ½ the length of a piece of firewood. I split kindling from a full piece of firewood, and not from something separate. To do this, it's often nice to place a long, narrow piece inside of the cavity, where it gets held in place. No sissy stick necessary. Only straight-grained pieces are chosen. Because of run-out (which is the tendency for wood to split into a wedge shape whenever it is split away from its center), I only split pieces into halves. Once they are small enough, I hold them flat against the stump with one hand, and striking them in the flat grain with the other, I split them into long, tiny fragments. Because of that 'staying organic' thing, the shape of the hatchet has to reflect the method that's being used; to this end, my ideal axe head is short from bit to butt for accuracy, and slightly fat behind the eye so that it wedges quickly. I've also grown to like a straight, short, simple handle, maybe with a little bit of palm thickness at the bottom.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

I like that you have developed your own system that is safe, suits you and produces good kindling - very nice.

[@paulchambers3d]

Just finished reading your book Vince, and have to thank you for a day spent yesterday rearranging my woodshed. Ha. Keep the videos coming.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Woodsheds are a joy - you'll feel good about that for weeks!

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Will do - thank you

[@wayneberry8703]

Hi Vince, that was a great review on all of those Axes, old and new. I have my favourite which is very similar to yours but with a bit smaller handle (Spear & Jackson) sold at our local hardware. I have actually started splitting a bit extra and hoping to sell some come this winter, plus a bit of extra firewood that I have cut, split and stacked so as to season. Thanks so much for another great video, mate, absolutely loved it and cheers.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Hi Wayne, bags of kindling cost a fortune in the UK - so I hope you do well! I never got to Tasmania but a great guy Richard from Taz has prospected and dived for treasure with me - I have lost touch with him now . . . his brother is Cliff! All best. Vince

[@iamrichrocker]

i had to rewind your video to tune in to what you said about the age of the axes..300K TO POSSIBLY 400k YEARS old..and that was stunning that they were recovered, but how good the condition they are in..

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

I know! What I find really interesting is that early Hominins had stone hand axes from over 1.5 million years, but only thought to fit a handle in some way fairly recently. In the UK the best site for these beautiful stone axes is at Boxgrove - that I think is about 500,000 years old. We are a part of a vast history when using an axe - it's just amazing. Vince

[@katieosmond6796]

Thanks for this video! Saw your name pop on a doco and heard the name Thurkettle! I haven't seen that name anywhere except for my Grandmothers maiden name! Im an Aussie, but her Grandparents are from Suffolk.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Katie, thanks for your comments - really interesting! We will be related as all Thurkettles are I think, albeit four generations back! I think we all come from Suffolk, England and I do know a bit of history about how we arrived in England. I live in Norfolk now but in 1806 my distant relative John Thurkettle left Suffolk to find work in London. The Thurkettle name may have arrived in England as part of a Viking army in 1010, as the Anglo-Saxon chronicles record a Thurkettle helping out at the battle of Ringmere in that year. And King Canute had a chap with a phonetically similar name helping him a bit later. Do you know how your Grandmother got to Australia - to look for gold maybe!? All best, Vince

[@ethicalaxe]

I made myself what I call a house maul. I quite like the 18 inch handle and a heavier head for kindling. 6lbs and completely dull, so I haven't worried about my fingers. Because it's so heavy it bounces without slipping. I also mad a kindling table. Which is a round with legs and a notch. It's very fun to put full, comfortable swings into firewood splits. When not using the notch or swinging with two hands the raised table helps with not bending as much during prolonged splitting. I suppose there's also something to sitting and doing this kind of work but I'm not quite that old yet.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

The key is to be comfortable! You don't have to be old to sit making kindling! You sound like you have got a good system going - thanks for your thoughts. All best. Vince

[@JesúsDíazFernández-k2h]

Hola, me encantan sus videos. Soy español. Vivo en España (Asturias) y he visto varias veces todos tus videos. También estoy buscando una versión en español de su libro pero no consigo encontrarla. Un saludo y mi enhorabuena por sus grandes videos. Realmente encantadores.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Hola Jesus, Muchas gracias. El libro fue traducido al Frances y al Sueco, ipero no al Espanol! Lo siento mucho. Y he estado buscando oro en Asturius, un lugar muy bonito. Buena suerte y una buena Navidad. Mis mejores deseos. Vincent

[@brassmonkey01]

I love Bens favorite axe, it just looks "right" somehow, I can't quite put my finger on it. I have a good selection of axes of various sizes and brummocks, I think I might dig them all out and see if one stands out as the better tool for kindling, I have two that are my go-to ones but I do have a big old full length axe that I never use that might be ideal with a shortened handle for slow chopping.

[@TheRealMozes]

For me that big axe seems to be much more accurate, easy and safe, even better for beginners. I use a fiskars x7 or something. I dont cut planks as i dont have any. I just break down straight grain poplar.

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

I agree, the heavy axe is safer . . . sort of counter-intuitive really! I want to do a similar video on splitting axes sometime - I use a Fiskars x27, might be the same as yours? All best. Vince

[@TheRealMozes]

@@WoodFiresWithVince oh that would be nice. Looking forward to it. The x7 is a small hatchet. It doesn't have the wedge shape that much. It's more of an axe than a splitting axe.

[@shermanhofacker4428]

One can always choke up on a longer haft, but no way to get a longer grip on a shorter one!

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Fair point - I might leave it as it is! Also, there is something very subtle about the excess handle acting as a counter-balance. Thanks, Vince

[@patcamo]

Hi Vince, could you please advise me re burning pine logs, I read the sap has resin in it which can be dangerous. Can this resin be dried out of the logs. To make it safe to burn. I recently got a stove, and subscribed to your channel. Thanks Niall

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

Hi, this is actually quite a difficult question. Yes pines, and all other conifers have resin within the wood. If this resinous wood does not burn hot and clean there will be black smoke, tar, creosote and soot going up the chimney - and this may lead to a chimney fire. These conifer logs seem to take longer to dry than more open celled hardwoods - leading many people to burn them still a bit green and this makes the problem worse. If I get pine, spruce, fir, cedar, larch I follow the advice of a friend in Wales who gets mostly spruce to burn. Split the logs to about 4 inches diameter and then give them at least one full summer to dry and burn them in mixture with hardwoods with plenty of air above the fire - secondary air. When he needs to burn spruce or pine only, he lets the split logs dry another year - sometimes even three years. His preferred option is to collect old conifer logs, left over from a harvesting operation, where the bark is falling off and the wood already fairly dry. I hope this is of some help. All best, Vince

[@erikisbister363]

Any more video

[@WoodFiresWithVince]

I will when there is time, I enjoy making the videos but work often takes all my time. All best, Vince