Читать книгу The Handyman's Book of Tools, Materials, and Processes Employed in Woodworking - Paul N. Hasluck - Страница 121

The form of the axe handle deserves notice, differing as it does from that of the sledge-hammer. In the latter it is round or nearly so, in the axe it is oval, the thin end of the oval being on the underside, and more than this the longer axis of the oval increases as the handle approaches the head, till at its entrance into the head it may be double what it is at the other extremity. It often has also a projection at the extremity of the handle. The increasing thickness near the head gives strength where needed as the axe is being driven in. There is, too, this further difference—in a sledge-hammer more or less recoil has to be provided for, and the handle does this; in the axe no recoil should take place. The entrance of the axe edge is, or ought to be, sufficient to retain it, and the whole of the energy resulting from muscular action and gravity should be utilised. The curvature, too, of the handle is in marked contrast with the straight line of the sledge-hammer handle. The object of this curvature is worthy of note. The handle of an American forester’s axe is very long and curved. In sledge-hammer work the face is to be brought down flat, that is, as a rule, in a horizontal plane, whereas the forester’s axe has to be brought down at varying obliquities. If, now, the hewer’s hand had to be counteracting the influence of gravity, he would have much needless labour; hence the care of a skilled forester in the balance of the axe-head and the curvature of the handle.

Fig. 344.—American Adze.