Best local timbers for handling hammers?

[Bushmiller]

Ahem! I have to declare an unreasonable bias towards Spotted Gum. Despite being an innocuous sounding specimen of a plant, it holds a dear place in my heart. For a while it afforded me part of my living, although I would have to acknowledge not a very good one, but beyond that it is a timber for which I have tremendous respect.

That does fly in the face of experience by other forum members, which until recently I couldn't really understand. However, I called in at IanW's place and saw the Spotted Gum that had provoked his disenchantment. In short it was nothing like the Spotted Gum I had.

In fact SG can be used for many other purposesother than tool handles. Almost all of my SG has a very subtle, but quite discrete grain to it, although I acknowledge it does "pick up" at almost no provocation. I, in a moment of madness or it may have been drunkeness as I don't exactly recall, recently agreed to make up some kitchen knives for my SIL's 60th birthday. Well in addition to the knives (I only had to make the handles for a kit) I felt obliged to drum up something to keep them safe too.

The budget was tight so I used what was lying around. It happened to be a plank of Spotty. The corners match the Bull Oak of the knife handles.

Jillys Knives 011.jpgJillys Knives 002.jpgJillys Knives 003.jpgJillys Knives 009.jpg

The second picture is bare wood and the others have all had one coat of oil only (two more to go). It is interesting the extent that the grain is heightened by simply adding oil.

Getting back to handles, they are Bull oak as I mentioned and I will have to give instruction not to hit them as they are totally unsuited to such treatment.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

In a blatant display of advertising for Spotty and an unashamed effort to get a little more exposure to the Japanese hand tool section, have a gander at this .

https://www.woodworkforums.com/f111/japanese-kitchen-knife-set-188416

Regards
Paul

[Poppa]

Love the knife block Paul (and the knives).

I have a timber that seems to make excellent chisel handles - and I want to ask if it would also make good handles for striking tools (axes, hammers).

Grey Gum. Eucalyptus punctata. According to Wikipedia it is very hard and used for railway sleepers. Any good for longer handles?

[Bushmiller]

Love the knife block Paul (and the knives).

I have a timber that seems to make excellent chisel handles - and I want to ask if it would also make good handles for striking tools (axes, hammers).

Grey Gum. Eucalyptus punctata. According to Wikipedia it is very hard and used for railway sleepers. Any good for longer handles?

Bob

Grey gum, the timber, is quite like Ironbark at first glance, but I think it would be preferable as it is not an easy splitting timber and the grain tends to be interlocked. I don't have my Bootle book with me at the moment, but I will check later if nobody has posted additional information.

regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Bob

Some figures fro Keith Bootle's "Wood in Australia."

Species	Dry Density (Kg/m3)	Modulus of Rupture (MPa)	Modulus of Elasticity (GPa)	Crushing Strength (MPa)	Impact Value (Izod)	Hardness (Janka)
Hickory	750*	139	15	64	23*
Spotted Gum	950	150	23	75	24	11
Grey Gum	1080	140	18	72	21	14

Grey Ironbark	1120	181	24	95	27	14
Hickory wattle	800	135	15	70	39	8.3

* Figures obtained from a separate American site.

Sorry the tables don't quite line up. I did it in two hits . As you can see, on paper Grey Gum is a good performer, but I have to qualify that also by saying that if you purely went on the stats Hickory would come last!

Where I used to live we had Grey Gum growing alongside the Spotted Gum and I have always been impressed by it. I would certainly give the Grey Gum a go.

Regards
Paul

[Berlin]

Grey gum is hell on your tools though, by all reports - loaded with silica or something. I can't talk from experience though as I haven't knowingly worked with it. I do have a few logs though, Paul, that'd do an axe or pick handle or ten if you'd like to find out...

[eskimo]

Spotted Gum makes pretty good axe and hammer handles.

Thats what it says in an old woodworking book I have...spotted gum


as for tuart..lovely timber for parquetry floor we had and got for next to nothing...long story but the borers we didnt want

[Poppa]

Thanks Paul, appreciate it. The reason I like Grey Gum for chisel handles is that the grain is so dense that the handles become really smooth. Lovely to handle.

[Ratbag]

My father was a piner on the West Coast during the 20s &30s. A hard life. They'd row up the rivers in a King Billy pine skiff with all their gear & tackle: Chains, ropes, bridles, log shoes, dog & felling wedges, peaveys and axes, saws & sharpening gear, chaff & feed for men & horses for 3 months & a team of Percherons.

Totally self sufficient, some places on the Gordon, Franklin & Spero rivers & their tributaries would take over a week to access, requiring offloading all gear and portaging around rapids & cascades. The Huon pine they accessed (all easily accessed pine had been taken by convict "slaves" a century before) was dragged to the larger watercourses, branded & made into rafts in anticipation of winter floods taking them down to Macquarie harbour or the sea.

Timber on the west coast is basically either green or rotten. There's no in between in wet temperate rainforest. So the most suitable timber for handles of all sorts was the legendary Horizontal Scrub (Anodopetalum biglandulosum). This species, renowned and hated in equal measures by all who know its growth habits, is a small understorey tree that grows upright to access scarce light, before toppling sideways, reshooting again vertically & toppling in a cycle that creates huge utterly impenetrable thickets. There's been reports of men falling to their deaths through these thickets whilst thinking they were walking on solid ground!

Horizontal is strong in tension, shear and compression, tough, resilient, elastic and dense, displays little or no shrinkage or cell collapse, and is beloved of green stick, pole lathe and "no glue" wedged tenon & shave horse furniture makers. As an endemic species, it's remarkable properties and values are virtually unknown outside Tasmania. Due to it's limited range within the state & growth habits it's not commercially harvested.

[Bushmiller]

Having talked the talk, I thought I had better walk the walk and show a spotty handle .

Carving Mallet 004.jpgCarving Mallet 001.jpg

Just two coats of oil for the moment.

Regards
Paul

[code4pay]

Having talked the talk, I thought I had better walk the walk and show a spotty handle .

Carving Mallet 004.jpgCarving Mallet 001.jpg

Just two coats of oil for the moment.

Regards
Paul

Seems over kill for a babies rattle to me.

[pmcgee]

Carving Mallet 001.jpg

Omg I love that.

... and just realising I actually have a lathe now and can try something like this.
In theory.


Cheers,
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Seems over kill for a babies rattle to me.

We breed 'em tough up here .

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Omg I love that.

... and just realising I actually have a lathe now and can try something like this.
In theory.


Cheers,
Paul

Paul

I understand the reference now having just read the Perth auction thread .

Regards
Paul

[DSEL74]

That baby rattle is lovely. did you name the kid Bambam?