Well today i finally found time to get back on the forge and decided i would see if i could make myself a hot cut hardy. I started with a piece of 1 1/4in shaft then tapered it to fit into my hardy hole. After that i upset the metal to for a bit of a lip over the hardy and to give myself a bit more metal to spread out to make the edge. after i got everything situated where i wanted it i flattened the round stock out and drew out the edge. Heat treated it then sharpened and of course tested! Was like a hot knife through butter and beats the heck outa my hacksaw lol 

As you resarpen it reenforce the convex egde, the geometry of an axe is realy advantagius.

Ditto the convex edge for a number of reasons. Next hardy try not drawing the blade out quite that thin.

All in all a good serviceable tool. Well done.

Frosty The Lucky.

Just a word of advice, make sure the hardy is only in your anvil when you're using it. If you forget it's there you are liable to lose a finger or two.

Also make sure it seats on the lip and not on the taper---pounding a taper into your anvil's hardy hole is not suggested!  Just little tweaks on a tool you have proved works!

Edited September 21, 201510 yr by ThomasPowers

Looks good to me. What was the bar originally? 

All the best 

Andy

thanks guys, as for thickness its actually thicker than it looks in the pictures by quite a bit. as for what the shaft was originally, i have no idea, probably an axle or shaft from a piece of farm equipment since i got it from my buddies farm when they were cleaning out their scrap pile. think half of that pile made its way into my truck  instead of the scrap yard. including ~4ft of 1/2" wrought iron