Gransfors Bruks cruiser axe

[Smokin]

Hey,

Does anyone on here have any experience of using one of these axes? They aren't made any more but I've seen a couple of them available on the American eBay site in the past week and would love to get one and, if necessary, refurbish it myself. Does anyone know when stopped being made? And how does it perform in comparison to other double bit axes? I'm guessing they were available in Britain too, although the cruiser style seems to be more of an American thing, so I'd obviously prefer to buy one from over here if possible as the shipping is really expensive from America. If anyone on here does have one and is looking to sell, feel free to PM me

Here's a few pictures for anyone curious:

http://bushcraftusa.com/forum/showthread.php/77643-WTS-Vintage-Gransfors-Bruks-Cruiser-Axe

I much prefer the shape and weight of these axe heads to the current double bit axes GB sell. I think they look really nice.

Thanks,
Jack

 

[OldJimbo]

I tried to post a reply yesterday, but with no luck.I used one of these extensively to clear fallen trees from coast trails. The probem with this type of clearing is that many trees while being softwood, seem to harden and toughen when dead (proximity to salt water?), so the tool chosen has to work on a variety of wood. In addition, the trees often hang up, or develop tensions and torsion from the steep terraine, so use of a saw involves lots of wedges. A cruiser axe with a much shorter handle than a regular double, is vastly easier to carry on a pack, and safer to use in confined conditions. The advantage of a short double is that it is much more accurate than an equivalent boy's axe due to its better balance and straight handle. With bigger and tougher wood, one has to get several hits on the same cut to drive it deeper, so accuracy is vital.The problem is that most cruiser axes are designed for clearing soft wood, so designs are remarkably similar. Only the Gransfors (so far as I know) has a head with greater length edge to edge and so more acute bevels, and shorter edges leading to greater penetration on tough woods. As with the full size vintage GB made for forestry services in Canada, the cruiser works so much better on a variety of sizes and varieties of wood than anything comparable. I'm still trying to figure out why...With this axe properly finished, you can honestly say that you have one of the most purpose optimized axes in existence. The "split the match" trick is easy with this one, well it is if you can locate matches still made from aspen which actually split..The simple downside of any double is that if you walk more than a few paces to the next bit of chopping with the axe unsheathed, then you will get hurt. For normal bushcraft stuff, then a well chosen single blade axe used with a saw is perfect. A saw works well on seasoned wood which doesn't have tensions/torsion, the single bit works well with a baton where there are no chopping blocks.This particular axe is fantastic for clearing on steep coast trails. The problem is that a person gets lucky like me and survives their first six hung up trees or most likely they don't. The strange thing is that once you've survived, you come against a tree that seems totally innocent but which sends you cold. Only when you drop it with careful strategies do you find out just how it was going to reward less careful strategies.The axe shown has a poor handle. The whole concept of the GB cruiser is to chop. so you put the best vertical grain handle on it and shave the handle until it's incredibly thin, to get the centre of mass as close to the middle of the head as possible. A handle breakage due to poor grain or seasoning is really something to be feared with a flying double bit head.I don't do forum stuff very much any more, so you need to email me to find out what the exact measurements of the head should be.

 

[OldJimbo]

I did try to get formatting to take place..

 

[leon-1]

I did try to get formatting to take place..

Jim any troubles, drop me a line and I'll see what I can do.

P.S.

Good to see you back on here