*UPDATED 20/10/11* Demonstration/tutorial on what I did to the tomohawk!
The other week a long awaited item arrived in the post..the Cold Steel Trail Hawk!
I chose the trail hawk for a few reasons, it was cheap, light weight, a good chopper and packable! but what got me even more interested was the mass of modifications that can be done to the thing.
So with my new tool in my hand and rough idea of how I wanted to change/modify it in my mind I got started a few days ago.
A few pictures of the hawk before I done anything to it..
Now as you can see it doesn't look very special out of the box but not as ugly as others have said either. Even with the factory edge it can cut quite well so it's obviously got some serious cutting potential once sharpened better!
Now the first thing I done was remove the 'grub screw' from the head as I wanted the hawk to be a take down, meaning I can remove the head when I wanted as when I felt like it. But also I'll need to sand the inside of the head as it's very rough from the factory and will tear up the hande!
To do this unscrew it (and throw it away..) and tap the head of the hawk untill it starts to move downwards and check carefully every now and then to make sure those rough edges aren't scagging up your handle, if it is then remove the wooden curls/scuffed bits and keep going!
Once you've finally managed to get it off (easier for some than others) give any roughed up and scratched bits a good rub down with sandpaper so it's smooth.
Then file the inside of the hole where the axe handle goes so no sharp edges are left inside and this means your handle doesn't get messed up when you take off the head!
Now after I done that (does take a while) I decided to strip the paint off the head, not that it's naff paint and won't protect the metal but it's a bit..meh and the head looks very nice when showing its natural skin.
To do this I got some Nitromors spray on paint/varnish remover and applied 2 coats to each side and leaving for 20 mins in between each coat and finally taking a wire brush to the head to remove the paint! Not very difficult once the paint stripper has set in and I was done in about 10 minutes! After reomving the paint I washed it down with soapy water and dried it.
This is what it looked like when stripped..
Pretty neat huh?
I know some people would have taken a flap disk and polished it up to remove the forging marks but I like them and with proper protection from rust it won't make a difference!
So abou that protection..how about a deep patina? A simple and effective method used to protect carbon steels, it's also very easy!
To create a patina I went in the kitchen cupboard and got out a bottle of vinegar, (you can use anything acidic i.e lemons,apples,mustard) yep basic vinegar that goes on my chippies!
I wrapped the hawk head in tissue paper and soaked generously in the vinegarand left it for about 3 hours turning half way.
Something like this..
Yep that simple!
once the time was up I gave the head a good clean with soapy water then dried it off and oiled it with standard multi purpose oil.
It now looks something like this..
I'd say that patina turned out very nicely!
Other than a making the factory edge more convex the head is right for me! obviously if you want to go further and polish, reshape and etch or carve detail on it thats great but I like it simple!
So what about the handle? well it's white in colour and a bit slippy..also the tear drop shape of handle digs into the bend of my fingers when holding it so I figured I'd change few things!
Here's the handle before any work..
First was to sand off the varnish coating on the handle, that job doesn't take long and in minutes it'll be ready to take a bath
Second was to file off some of the edge where the middle of ym fingers wrapped around, with a small file and a few minutes a few mm was taken away and gripping the handle was no longer uncomfy.
About that bath.. a raw linseed oil bath to be precise! infact a 2 day bath! You can use wood stains and other oils but raw linseed can be found quite easily and it's cheap and effective!
the reason for doing this is to protect the wood from rot and moisture and also to bring out some natural grain in the wood
So like the head it's gona do a session in a foil tray..
I flipped the handle over about 3 times a day and once it sat there for the desired ammount of time I rubbed it down and let it hang to dry for a day. I will keep oiling it every so often..say once a week for a month and after that once a month just to keep it protected!
Once it had dried I gave it another rub down and this is what the assmebled hawk looks like now..
For me, that's lovely. I really like the simple appearence and the abilities of the axe as it now is! But there is a heap of stuff that can still be done if you want to make a seriously snazzy bit of kit!
All I want for it is a leather slip/shaft gaurd to go on the handle under the head so the handle won't get damaged during a bad swing. so I got busy again!
I should mention at this point the hawk does not come with any type of sheath. So you may want to make one so you don't accidentally get cut..I did make one to use during the modifying process out of cardboard with the intention of buying one later on.
So about that leather slip to protect my handle from bad swings..I figured I'd make one from some scrap leather I had. The leather was infact from an old coat but was still pretty decent even though it's nothing thick like see on custom amde shaft guards.
Here is the scrap leather that I cut into shape and with hair clips to hold into palce while I made stitching holes..
To measure it up I simpley wrapped it around the handle and slipped on a hair clip where the thread was going to be laced onto.
I don't have any fancy leather working tools, juts a stanley knife some scissors on my knife and a few nails.. I hammered the nails into the leather where I intedn on putting cord through to be able to lace it up once on.
Something like this..
Again very simple but it works, all you need to do now is just loop some thread/cord/string through the holes and slip it on and tighten!
It can be taken off easily for when I want to take the head off and will give some protection, also it was recycled! I'm quite the womble sometimes..
here's what it looks like..
and a different way to lace it up..
Turned out quite nice I'd say! and it didn't take very long.
Like I mentioned about not having a sheath for it..I had some left over leather so I got to work thinking how to do it and came up with this..
scrap before.
and after cut out and ready to be glued and folded into shape!..
The sheath isn't done yet as the glue I used is currently drying and will take a day but I will post updates on it sometime in the evening tomorrow!
I've left a flap of leather on the sheath so I can put a button on it and keep the head in properly, my first attempt at a leather axe sheath but I'm sure it'll work
Incase you were wondering about the cardboard sheath I took a picture!
So there it is, my Cold Steel trail Hawk modded to how I wanted it and a few instructions so you can do the same.
I hope you enjoyed the thread.
Ok so a few updates..
Heres the sheath I made, not very fancy and held together with epoxy!
Yep that's a toggle as the button idea didn't really work with the equipment I have.
I also reprofiled blade/edge as it was quite thick. To do this I used a 60 grit flap disc on my angle grinder and it came out very well indeed, infact the £2 flap disc has hours of life in it left and didn't even make the blade warm when removing metal. Quite the result if you don't have a belt sander!
The new edge is now finer and far less steep meaning it can bite into wood better and produce deeper chops.
I did consider using the falp disc to polish the entire head but I think i will stick to the forged looks for a while longer!
Thanks for looking!
The other week a long awaited item arrived in the post..the Cold Steel Trail Hawk!
I chose the trail hawk for a few reasons, it was cheap, light weight, a good chopper and packable! but what got me even more interested was the mass of modifications that can be done to the thing.
So with my new tool in my hand and rough idea of how I wanted to change/modify it in my mind I got started a few days ago.
A few pictures of the hawk before I done anything to it..
Now as you can see it doesn't look very special out of the box but not as ugly as others have said either. Even with the factory edge it can cut quite well so it's obviously got some serious cutting potential once sharpened better!
Now the first thing I done was remove the 'grub screw' from the head as I wanted the hawk to be a take down, meaning I can remove the head when I wanted as when I felt like it. But also I'll need to sand the inside of the head as it's very rough from the factory and will tear up the hande!
To do this unscrew it (and throw it away..) and tap the head of the hawk untill it starts to move downwards and check carefully every now and then to make sure those rough edges aren't scagging up your handle, if it is then remove the wooden curls/scuffed bits and keep going!
Once you've finally managed to get it off (easier for some than others) give any roughed up and scratched bits a good rub down with sandpaper so it's smooth.
Then file the inside of the hole where the axe handle goes so no sharp edges are left inside and this means your handle doesn't get messed up when you take off the head!
Now after I done that (does take a while) I decided to strip the paint off the head, not that it's naff paint and won't protect the metal but it's a bit..meh and the head looks very nice when showing its natural skin.
To do this I got some Nitromors spray on paint/varnish remover and applied 2 coats to each side and leaving for 20 mins in between each coat and finally taking a wire brush to the head to remove the paint! Not very difficult once the paint stripper has set in and I was done in about 10 minutes! After reomving the paint I washed it down with soapy water and dried it.
This is what it looked like when stripped..
Pretty neat huh?
I know some people would have taken a flap disk and polished it up to remove the forging marks but I like them and with proper protection from rust it won't make a difference!
So abou that protection..how about a deep patina? A simple and effective method used to protect carbon steels, it's also very easy!
To create a patina I went in the kitchen cupboard and got out a bottle of vinegar, (you can use anything acidic i.e lemons,apples,mustard) yep basic vinegar that goes on my chippies!
I wrapped the hawk head in tissue paper and soaked generously in the vinegarand left it for about 3 hours turning half way.
Something like this..
Yep that simple!
once the time was up I gave the head a good clean with soapy water then dried it off and oiled it with standard multi purpose oil.
It now looks something like this..
I'd say that patina turned out very nicely!
Other than a making the factory edge more convex the head is right for me! obviously if you want to go further and polish, reshape and etch or carve detail on it thats great but I like it simple!
So what about the handle? well it's white in colour and a bit slippy..also the tear drop shape of handle digs into the bend of my fingers when holding it so I figured I'd change few things!
Here's the handle before any work..
First was to sand off the varnish coating on the handle, that job doesn't take long and in minutes it'll be ready to take a bath
Second was to file off some of the edge where the middle of ym fingers wrapped around, with a small file and a few minutes a few mm was taken away and gripping the handle was no longer uncomfy.
About that bath.. a raw linseed oil bath to be precise! infact a 2 day bath! You can use wood stains and other oils but raw linseed can be found quite easily and it's cheap and effective!
the reason for doing this is to protect the wood from rot and moisture and also to bring out some natural grain in the wood
So like the head it's gona do a session in a foil tray..
I flipped the handle over about 3 times a day and once it sat there for the desired ammount of time I rubbed it down and let it hang to dry for a day. I will keep oiling it every so often..say once a week for a month and after that once a month just to keep it protected!
Once it had dried I gave it another rub down and this is what the assmebled hawk looks like now..
For me, that's lovely. I really like the simple appearence and the abilities of the axe as it now is! But there is a heap of stuff that can still be done if you want to make a seriously snazzy bit of kit!
All I want for it is a leather slip/shaft gaurd to go on the handle under the head so the handle won't get damaged during a bad swing. so I got busy again!
I should mention at this point the hawk does not come with any type of sheath. So you may want to make one so you don't accidentally get cut..I did make one to use during the modifying process out of cardboard with the intention of buying one later on.
So about that leather slip to protect my handle from bad swings..I figured I'd make one from some scrap leather I had. The leather was infact from an old coat but was still pretty decent even though it's nothing thick like see on custom amde shaft guards.
Here is the scrap leather that I cut into shape and with hair clips to hold into palce while I made stitching holes..
To measure it up I simpley wrapped it around the handle and slipped on a hair clip where the thread was going to be laced onto.
I don't have any fancy leather working tools, juts a stanley knife some scissors on my knife and a few nails..
I hammered the nails into the leather where I intedn on putting cord through to be able to lace it up once on. Something like this..
Again very simple but it works, all you need to do now is just loop some thread/cord/string through the holes and slip it on and tighten!
It can be taken off easily for when I want to take the head off and will give some protection, also it was recycled! I'm quite the womble sometimes..
here's what it looks like..
and a different way to lace it up..
Turned out quite nice I'd say! and it didn't take very long.
Like I mentioned about not having a sheath for it..I had some left over leather so I got to work thinking how to do it and came up with this..
scrap before.
and after cut out and ready to be glued and folded into shape!..
The sheath isn't done yet as the glue I used is currently drying and will take a day but I will post updates on it sometime in the evening tomorrow!
I've left a flap of leather on the sheath so I can put a button on it and keep the head in properly, my first attempt at a leather axe sheath but I'm sure it'll work
Incase you were wondering about the cardboard sheath I took a picture!
So there it is, my Cold Steel trail Hawk modded to how I wanted it and a few instructions so you can do the same.
I hope you enjoyed the thread.
Ok so a few updates..
Heres the sheath I made, not very fancy and held together with epoxy!
Yep that's a toggle as the button idea didn't really work with the equipment I have.
I also reprofiled blade/edge as it was quite thick. To do this I used a 60 grit flap disc on my angle grinder and it came out very well indeed, infact the £2 flap disc has hours of life in it left and didn't even make the blade warm when removing metal. Quite the result if you don't have a belt sander!
The new edge is now finer and far less steep meaning it can bite into wood better and produce deeper chops.
I did consider using the falp disc to polish the entire head but I think i will stick to the forged looks for a while longer!
Thanks for looking!
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