Hammer handles is there a trick to make one

[rmanning]

This may be one of the stupidest questions ever but I made a handle for my cross pein hammer and a ball pein hammer.  Both of them broke right where the handle went in the hammer.  I used some dried straight grain oak to make them.  is oak not fit for handles? I didnt know if it was the wood or my lack of handle making skills haha.

[dablacksmith]

oak isnt the best for handles ... ash or hickory would work better also check your hammer eyes and make sure they have a nice flair and are not sharp where handle inters head... other than that i make my own handles all the time..some fruit woods also make good handles also..

[bigfootnampa]

How far into the handle did your wedge slot extend?  The wedge slot should end about 1/2" above the bottom of the housing on the hammer head.  IME if the slot extends to near the bottom of the hammer head the handle will break as you described.  Oak is not the best wood and some oaks are better than others.  In general you want a springier wood like osage orange or hickory.  The fitting is also quite important... there should be no slop where the handle meets the hammer head and the handle should have a slight swelling just below there so that the head cannot slide down the handle.  Most factory handles also are slightly smaller diameters for the handles than is ideal IMO.  the hammers that I make or reforge  have slightly larger handle slots.

[ciladog]

This may be one of the stupidest questions ever but I made a handle for my cross pein hammer and a ball pein hammer.  Both of them broke right where the handle went in the hammer.  I used some dried straight grain oak to make them.  is oak not fit for handles? I didnt know if it was the wood or my lack of handle making skills haha.

The question is was the oak air or kiln dried?  Hammer handles that you make yourself should not be made from kiln dried wood. 

 

As a general rule, you cannot air dry lumber to lower than 8% moisture content.  And air dried wood remains very hydroscopic which mean it takes on and gives up moisture depending on the environment it is in.

 

Kiln dried lumber is dried to 6% moisture content using heat and air circulation.  That last 2% does stabilize the wood so it is less hydroscopic but it also makes it very brittle and oak is one wood that is notorious for becoming brittle.  It’s OK for cabinet work but not for hammer handles.

 

So if you are buying your wood at a lumber yard ash is the best to get.  If you are cutting it yourself, drying it for a year or so, and using it, just about anything will work.  Also, lumber yards that supply the boat building trades also sell air dried lumber.

[son_of_bluegrass]

Kiln drying to 6% does not stabilize the wood, it is the heat associated with most kiln operations that changes the wood.  And all wood will stabilize to a moisture content dependent on humidity levels, that is why hammer heads tend to loosen in winter when it is generally drier. 

 

Which oak, some oak tends to be splintery and crack prone, not good for a handle.  Other oaks are ok.

 

Do you have pictures of the failure?  It would help with the diagnosis.  I've seen hammers with eyes that were woefully undersized for the weight and tended to break handles.  And as was mentioned, any sharpness at the juncture makes breakage more likely.

 

Also quarter sawn is ofter better than flat sawn and end-grain orientation matters.

 

ron

[rmanning]

it did break at the end of the wedge about half way down in the hammer.  im thinking it was the wood as much as anything.  it was from a red oak 2x10 we had in my dads shop that we sawed out a couple years ago. 

[KYBOY]

We make a lot of handles. I prefer hickory and ash but others will work..I like making my own hammer handles when i can because I have big hands(wear size XXXL gloves)..Most of the factory handles feel ike Im holding a broom handle..I somwhat prefer a flattish or a somewhat ocatagon shaped handle like this one..

Personally I dont like using metal wedges..They often split handles down inside the eye and to be honest if the handle is made right you just dont need a metal wedge..A good wood wedge will hold it on forever..

[ciladog]

 

Let’s split some hairs. 

 

Actually, son_of_bluegrass, kiln dried lumber is more stable than air dried lumber because of structural changes to the vessels of the wood fiber that the heat of kiln drying causes.  Once those vessels shrink from the heat, they will never go back to their pre-heat size.  Hence, they will never take up as much water as they once did.
 

What I said in my post is that kiln dried lumber is less hydroscopic than air dried lumber.  I did not say that it is stabilized wood.

I have more than 3,000 board feet of air dried lumber in my wood shed all air dried (red oak, white oak, ash, maple, walnut, hickory), some for more than 20 years, and when measured with a moisture meter, always between 14 and 9% (in my region of the country).
 

The wood gets to equilibrium moisture content (EMC) point and stops drying.  Depending on the relative humidity, the EMC changes a lot.
 

This is not the case with kiln dried lumber which is more stable.
 

Some examples with air dried lumber:

At 70 degrees F and 35% relative humidity the EMC is 8%

At 85 degrees and 75% rel. humidity the EMC is 14%
 

I can’t use my air dried lumber in my architectural woodworking business because it is more prone to significant dmension changes than is 6% kiln dries lumber when placed in a climate stabilized environment like a house.  I know this from 40 years of experience with lumber.
 

But you can check all this out in the Wood Engineering Handbook put out by the U.S. Forest Products Laboratory if you think I’m blowing smoke.

 

[Fe-Wood]

As mentioned in another post- Try gluing with polyurethane. This will eliminate the shrink and swell from seasonal changes... I have several handles made from scrap white oak. They have worked fine.

[John McPherson]

Also, soaking the finished handle in oil helps keep the handle flexible, and helps slow rust on unpainted metal also. Plain mineral oil is the best, but baby oil (mineral oil with fragrance added) won't hurt anything. Don't use old or new motor oil.

 

Rub it in generously with a rag, then place it in a warm place on a cold day, or just out in the summer sun. Repeat until it will not take any more. Re-apply yearly.

[Judson Yaggy]

Did you cut the rough blank of hammer handle to shape, or did you split out a rough shape and then refine?  If cut you may have inadvertently gone across the grain, significantly weakening the handle.  Splitting a big hunk out of a plank then orienting the long axis of the handle on that hunk parallel to the splits will be much stronger.  

[John McPherson]

Oak was never used for hammer handles if there was an alternative, it was used for doors, chests, furniture, etc. White oak is used for barrels and other cooperage, black or red oak woods don't hold water. Great strength and beauty, but brittle.

 

In Europe, ash was the choice for handles, spear shafts, oars, etc. where flexibility was required. We use it for traditional baseball bats. America has hickory, which is even stronger than ash.

 

Apple and other fruit woods seldom grow straight enough for anything longer than a hammer handle, but were also used.

[Dogbyte]

it doesnt take a great deal of time to dry hickory or other handle type woods from green all the way to workable moisture content. ~mid teens, and below even, 7 or 8% is attainable. 60 days from the stump it can be done with a home made hot box, powered by nothing more than low wattage light bulbs and a little shellac to prevent checking. 

 

like others have said, grain should more or less run the same direction the hammer or ax is in motion (both share the same plane), the wedge should also be oriented with the grain, not across it. On hickory, the outer layer wood is packed with growth rings. make a bunch of splits, shellac the ends (and the back if you debark), dry them out, cut to length,  get a draw knife and/or hatchet, and go to town.  :D  of course there are many ways to go about it, this is just one way. 

 

this is some pignut hickory. some will be used as handles, some will be intended for use as bows... 

 

 

[Fe-Wood]

As far as drying- rough shape and put it in the microwave oven. Wood turners do this all the time....

[n0ah]

How would Ironwood (Hop Hornbeam south of the border) work for a hammer handle? I have hundreds of downed trees about 4-6" diameter all over my property I was hoping I could use.

[Pat Roy]

I have used hop hornbeam for a hachet handle, hickory not being available here in Maine. I wish I had some wood working tools and the skills to go with them. I have used some handles obtained from the hardware store (sacrilegious I know) and that has worked for me.

[Clodbuster]

The nuts and bolts of laying out a handle have been covered pretty well by others but I want to emphasize the "why" on grain direction so it makes sense.

 

Wood is a highly anisotropic material - it's properties vary greatly with the direction.  This is intuitive as you can easily split it firewood but have to chop it in two.  When you make or buy a handle with the grain alligned across the head here is what happens: 

 

Each impact of the head (and even more so for mistrikes) causes bending stresses in the wood.  These are largest near the head-handle connection.  Since a handle can be thought of as essentially a beam, it is informative to think about what wood beams do when they are loaded/overloaded - they split down the middle.  This is where the shear stresses are at a maximum in a round beam and by aligning the grain across the head you inadvertently align the highest stress and the weakest plane of the wood. 

 

When you align the grain parallel to the head/swing you force that same shear stress to be applied across multiple growth rings instead of a single plane and in a direction in which the wood is naturally stronger.  Hence a better handle.

 

Hope that helps someone with the "why" and ties it together with some things that they may already know. 

[joshua.M]

How would Ironwood (Hop Hornbeam south of the border) work for a hammer handle? I have hundreds of downed trees about 4-6" diameter all over my property I was hoping I could use.

 

Hey Noah, us Canadians have an advantage, find an old wooden hockey stick and that is your rough hammer shape! Cut to length, fit and you're done

[zeeko]

I have had good luck whittling down yard sale and thrift store bats. I use a sharp hatchet to rough the shape out, and a block plane to smooth it after that. 

[Tommy Traylor]

Procedure from an old blacksmithing book: Use wood wedge, then metal wedge at 45 degrees to the wood wedge. Soak in a bucket of linseed oil for a week. Works for me.

[rockstar.esq]

I've found that stores that don't stock replacement hammer handle's often do stock replacement shovel handles.  I've gotten several good hammer handles out of one shovel handle.

 

I've also caught myself putting a hammer handle on upside down.  Often there's less flaring to the entry on the top side which cuts the wood and breaks the handle quickly.

 

I've also learned that making it fit crazy tight didn't make it last longer just harder to install. - too loose and you'll crack the cheeks of the handle trying to wedge it tight.

[Peter Munz]

Well,

here in germany we´re using ash, robinia and sometimes maple and  "Eibe".

The wood grain in my handles are paralell to the blow, because the wood is in thid direction much more flexible and it prevents my hand, wrist and arm from shocks.

I´ve learned this way from the dad of my old chief, alltogeter blacksmiths sice 5 generations, maybe it´s wrong, but we have had no problems in the shop.

The last 5 years we´re glueing the handles with polyurethane - wonderful to work with it! Much less shocks!

 

btw, the grain in axe handles are in line with the blow, because of more strength in removing the axehead out of the wood when it stucks.

sorry for my bad and imperfect english

Peter

[4elements]

You were clear enough