This may be the season to be jolly but for me it is also the season for some of my weapons to "rattle." Both my custom A&A sword and my A&A Danish War Axe are doing this. I live in Boston and it is quite dry, so I guess my question is is the "rattling" phenomenae a normal seasonal change? I have had my Axe for four years but this is the first year that this has happened. I have pounded a bit on the wooden wedge at it's head so that it no longer rattles. Is this going to weaken the integrity of the wood? What say you? and Merry Christmas!!

Are you bringing them inside and outside alot?

I've noticed this myself when the metal gets colder, then warmer, then cold, then warm. The little bit of contraction and expansion going back and forth jut seems to loosen it up a little. Peening, or tightening seems to do the trick for me as well.

During winter the air is much drier so wood shrinks ( all our hammers suddenly come lose from thier handles
round about the begining of December and stay that way till March-April ) some .

Greetings All, Hey this is well timed. I was able to procure an older MRL Viking axe head. I love this thing. I would call it a smaller type M. I remounted it the first time on an old axe handle I had. It looked great. Very aged and very light. 2lbs. total. I water swelled it with a friction fit. This was during the summer. After about 2 weeks it started to rattle. So I wedged it and water swelled it again. Same thing happened again. I figured the AC dried the old wood out. Fine. This time I bought a new sledge hammer handle, finished it down and mounted the axe head with no wedge and no water treatment. The axe head was shaving wood as I put it on so I figured the fit was good. It was until about a week ago when I picked it up. Rattling again. :mad: Of course now it is winter and we have been running the heat. I need to visit the Axe Forum more but I think this is a common complaint, however none of my wood cutting axes that I remounted have loosened but they live outside. I have not had any swords or spears loosen though. I would surmise a base line experiment would be to leave the axe safely outside and see what happens. While we are at it, I would welcome any opinions on the historical accuracy of wedging the axe head. BTW, Happy Yule Tide everyone!!! :D Sincerely, Patrick Fitzmartin

You might want to try something I picked up from Jack Vargo, a darned fine axe/tomahawk maker: Substitute automotive antifreeze for water. The swelling effect is generally much longer lasting.

JSA

Hello everyone,
I have alleviated the rattling in my war axe by pounding the wedge a bit. Do you guys think that this will compromise the wood when the seasons change? All of my weapons are kept inside as I live in the middle of Boston and the authorities may become edgy if I brought any out resulting in pepper spray or worse :\ In any case, there is nothing I can do with my A&A custom. Craig has invited me to send it in to have a new grip put on or just wait until spring. But I HATE rattling of any kind! So what do you guys think? I have already had the sword peened with good results, but the DAMN rattling continues! What can be done?

Hello Jeremy

Did you actually talk to me or someone else here at A&A ?

I am asking as I do not remember discusing this with you and I would normally not say "wait till spring". It certainly should be possible to adjust the piece to tighten the rattle away. There are several different ways to go about it. When you say you peened it with good results, but the rattle is still there it sounds like it may be some other issue.

If you have a chance give me a call at 800 745 7345 and I can suggest some resolutions to the problem.

Happy Holidays
Craig

I have read that one solution is to re-saturate the wooden shaft with needed oils; one suggestion is to soak/submerge the affected portion of the weapon in linseed oil for a day or two.

To my experience it is not such a good idea to soak the haft in water. It will swell, sure, but the added pressure will also compress the wood, making any rattle worse afterwards when the wood is dry again. Linseed oil might work, as it hardens. Never tried that.

A trick I was told once is to have a thin peice of soft but strong leather between the steel in the axe head and the wooden haft. Changes in the wood will then be taken by the leather instead of making the wood compress. I have had some success with this method.

For this to work you need to have a very good fit between the haft and the axe head. Wedging is more a case of locking the haft in place rather than making the fit tight. The fit must be so tight to begin with you need to pound the axe on to the haft by striking the butt end with a wooden mallet.
The leather should be thin. Thin suede leather is good, or thin buck skin. This is put on like a puch over the end of the handle. The axe head is pressed on and pounded home. Afterwards excess leather is trimmed down on both sides of the axe head. You will not see the leather other than as a thin line on the inside of the eye of the axe.

Also, it is good to use two wedges for securing the axe head. One at a slight angle to the grain of the wood (slightly diagonal across the eye of the axe head) and another across this at right angels to the grain. This way the wedges lock each other in place and it is easier to get the haft to expand evenly in all directions. The first wedge can be of wood (inserted with glue), the second wedge can be iron. If barbs are cut in the iron wedge it will take much to work this loose.

Hope this helps.

Greetings All, Thank you all very much for the advice. I remounted the axe today using some of the information I got here. Everthing looked good but only time will tell. I have marked the date on my calender.
Peter Johnsson, I really like the leather idea. I wish I had thought of that. I may use that one on my next axe project or this one if it fails. :eek: Sincerely, Patrick Fitzmartin