I started this hammer about, I dunno, maybe 5 years ago.
This one was fun because it had been through a fire.
Now usually this is not a good recommendation for a tool of any kind. But being a hammer, it annealed the steel soft as 7-UP.
That meant, I could work on it, with files!!

   I love to file steel. Sometimes when I am having an otherwise bad day, I will chuck up a piece of scrap and just cut it. Something about the rhythm and watching the work slowly change. The precision of it all. Making such slight adjustments in your stroke and watching it change the shape of the work .
Its just magic.

  So when I had finished my filework, I hardened/tempered it in something new.
  Well new to me.
  And I found out something wonderful!
       Used motor oil makes for a spectacular finish!

  I had some osage orange out the other day for another project. A spokeshave that went off to Hawaii. I found a spare stick when I was looking for the shave stock.  I laid it aside for something nice.

     Wanna hit something yet??
Dig this





  yours Scott

Interesting work Scott.  The handle reminds me of something, a gavel handle maybe?  I didn't know you had that kind of spare time, but there is a definite need to just let things work out as they go along.   

Scott,

That is a very interesting hammer! It should make someone scratch their heads and wonder what in the world it was used for in about a hundred years or so! :-)

I like it!

Bill D.

Beautifully delicate!  Nice work Scott. I didn't know that osage orange was strong enough for a hammer handle. That puts it in the category of hickory or beech?

Quote from: johnsironsanctuary on July 31, 2013, 11:19:12 AM
I didn't know that osage orange was strong enough for a hammer handle. That puts it in the category of hickory or beech?

Thanks for the kind words
    Here in my old age, I have begun to totally dismiss wood names as a measure of much of anything.

Some osage was used for archery bows, and some of those would pack a 100 pound pull.
  This particular piece is stronger than hickory or beech either one.
     By a lot!
  I could have shaved it down considerably smaller and it would still hold.

Wood species are so unbelievably variable.
  Even from different parts of the same log sometimes, you would swear its a totally different kind of wood.

I have doug fir you can shove your thumbnail clean through,
and fir that will snap your nail like a twig and not even be marked.
Some is snow white and some brick red.

      yours Scott     

Great Job Scott;  Love seeing your projects.  RnB

Nice work, Looks like you had fun shaping it... that osage orange wood is great wood for handles..

Beautiful work.
"Some osage was used for archery bows"
I'm pretty sure you know this already, but another name for osage orange is bois d'arc, which is American French for bow wood.

Cool, looks like a work of art.

Thanks for sharing...

I need one of those.

Looks like a amazing piece. You defiantly sure do good work!

If you don't mind me asking, what type of finish did you use on the handle?

Like the metal work and the handle but wherei live we call that wood headge which I mostly use for fence posts it tales forever to rot I know where one is and my grandfather planted it for a corner post over 80 years ago also when it's dry I've cut it and thrown sparks it's tuff as nails and it makes a hot fire in the fire place

I can't find confirmation in my literature but here in Idaho I'm told it's called Syringa — the state flower — and the Nez Perce used it for bows.