over the last few weeks I been working on a John Riley 1186 1lb Axe, I got hold of it and it was in need of a lot of TLC as can be seen below in the image.
I gave it a week long bath in some vinegar, even then it still had some in grained rust in the pits, to get rid of that a scouring pad was employed, after a while of careful scrubbing, all the rust had gone, a quick wash down , and a light rub with autosol, to brighten it up a bit, not enough to make it shine, but to stop the rust appearing with in seconds.
The onto the clean up of the poll and the eye, keeping as much as the character of the ace I could, this axe has seen many years of use, and to take that history away from it, would be wrong, the edge was taken back with out really hacking the edge off, it still has a couple of small dink's in it but it has a nice edge, and they will disappear after a few more sharpens,
Then on to the Helve, the original had seen a fair few better years, the question what to Helve it with?, make another Ash Helve?, buy a hickory Helve..? then I remembered I have an old Helve from a 4lb felling Axe that had broken, and I had kept, so I got to work with that, but someone I knew had a bit of Hickory kicking about and did not want it, so I used that and made a Helve that I thought, worked better as I have more wood to play with.
I then got to work with some 3mm Veg Tan, made a Mask, dyed in Dark Brown, not used the Fiebing's Oil Dye before, but quite happy with the finish, woke up at a silly hour this morning and seeing as I am not out until lunchtime today, thought I would make a belt loop for it.
I am very happy with how it has turned out, hope I have done it justice to it, A nice English Axe that was made in Sheffield, now brought back to life from a future of turning back to Iron Oxide, hopefully to serve in the job it was made to do.
I am in two minds, I may let this one go to a new home as a complete set up, with Mask and Belt Loop, as I have too many axes now, I know you cant have too many, but I've only got a limited amount of room for storage.. but I will decide some time, I just enjoy doing this, still got three more heads and an Adze to do....
I gave it a week long bath in some vinegar, even then it still had some in grained rust in the pits, to get rid of that a scouring pad was employed, after a while of careful scrubbing, all the rust had gone, a quick wash down , and a light rub with autosol, to brighten it up a bit, not enough to make it shine, but to stop the rust appearing with in seconds.
The onto the clean up of the poll and the eye, keeping as much as the character of the ace I could, this axe has seen many years of use, and to take that history away from it, would be wrong, the edge was taken back with out really hacking the edge off, it still has a couple of small dink's in it but it has a nice edge, and they will disappear after a few more sharpens,
Then on to the Helve, the original had seen a fair few better years, the question what to Helve it with?, make another Ash Helve?, buy a hickory Helve..? then I remembered I have an old Helve from a 4lb felling Axe that had broken, and I had kept, so I got to work with that, but someone I knew had a bit of Hickory kicking about and did not want it, so I used that and made a Helve that I thought, worked better as I have more wood to play with.
I then got to work with some 3mm Veg Tan, made a Mask, dyed in Dark Brown, not used the Fiebing's Oil Dye before, but quite happy with the finish, woke up at a silly hour this morning and seeing as I am not out until lunchtime today, thought I would make a belt loop for it.
I am very happy with how it has turned out, hope I have done it justice to it, A nice English Axe that was made in Sheffield, now brought back to life from a future of turning back to Iron Oxide, hopefully to serve in the job it was made to do.
I am in two minds, I may let this one go to a new home as a complete set up, with Mask and Belt Loop, as I have too many axes now, I know you cant have too many, but I've only got a limited amount of room for storage.. but I will decide some time, I just enjoy doing this, still got three more heads and an Adze to do....
