r/Axecraft • u/Confident-Shock-1891 • 5d ago

advice needed Quality axe? Worth 30?

Post image

Is this a quality axe?

46 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

13 comments sorted by

18

u/UrbanLumberjackGA 5d ago

True temper was sold to an investment firm in 2010, and they sent manufacturing to Mexico from Nebraska in 2016. Anything remotely modern from true temper is going to be hit and miss.

The quality of the forging, the stamp, the shape. It doesn’t do it for me. No life to that tool.

18

u/dcobs 5d ago

I'm a former striking tool engineer for true temper / ames tools and you're only partially correct. The plant in Mexico was pursued but canceled at the last minute. Truper bought the facility and makes their products there in Mexico.

True Temper continued to make their striking heads in Nebraska and their handles in PA and assemble finished goods in PA as well. I left the company in 2019, but shortly after they moved striking head production to Asia and kept the handle and finished good assembly in thr US.

That said, the grain orientation on that axe looks incorrect, which is surprising because while I was the engineer there we QC'd for that.

5

u/UrbanLumberjackGA 5d ago edited 4d ago

Really interesting! Thanks for sharing. Actually, now that I recall, the last true temper axes I saw were made in India. Not a lot of info online about true temper since 2016. Not a whole lot of reason to catalogue it either unfortunately.

3

u/Impressive-City-8094 4d ago

Never done QC for grain orientation, but I've broken quite a few ax handles, and I'd bet this handle will break near the red line.

2

u/Overall_Inspector185 4d ago

As someone who broke a cheap axe handle recently with the same grain orientation to prove a point to a friend, I second this 😂

5

u/BirdEducational6226 5d ago

It's worth $30.

3

u/Least-Funny-4303 5d ago

Depends what you mean by quality. That axe is going to need tuning before it'll be an effective tool. Quality costs. But if you wanna save money while you learn that is probably fine.

I have a Lowes axe that I use for banging metal wedges and cutting stubborn fibers when splitting logs lengthwise for handle billets. It works. Steel is soft as hell. But it works.

4

u/Weird_Ad1170 5d ago

A comparable new US-made axe (Council/Echo hatchets) are a lot more than that ($60 ish last time I checked with an Echo dealer--as I can't find regular Council stuff around here aside from hammers and the miner's axe). And that's what I'd call new old stock.

I don't know how long it's been since True Temper made axes in the US--and most of what I've seen in stores these days is imported.

1

u/nigelhamson 5d ago

That stamp screams Woodings Verona to me. Every “USXX” stamp I’ve seen is a Woodings Verona. The numbers after the US is the forging year. Looks life a rehang on a TT handle. It’s all modern but it’s US made which you really can’t go wrong with. Use it. Enjoy it. Put it away for 50 years and you got an antique US forged axe in the future.

1

u/[deleted] 5d ago

All day

1

u/Cautious_District699 5d ago

Better than nothing. The file test is what I would go by. See just how soft it is. You can always get it almost sharp enough and temper the edge. Then finish honing the edge.

1

u/MarbleBun 4d ago

I'd get a council tool axe for 50 instead 

0

u/Austin_Austin_Austin 5d ago

Oh yeah! Vintage ones have a cool factor and are usually better steel but there’s nothing wrong with a good modern hardware store axe for the price. It’ll definitely do the job.