Hammer Tool of some kind | ||
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Posted 9 years ago
Scodi143
(6 items)
I'm sorting through some of my husbands antique tools and found this.
I'm not sure if it is a really old piece or not. I do live in Massachusetts and very close to Plymouth. Just wondering what it was used for and who could have made it.
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I will give this a guess which is my 2 cents from growing up in New England. I would say it is a maul, which is common in New England as it applies to wood splitting. However I seriously doubt this was used for splitting wood. Both ends of this tool have a use. Only places I ever happened to see a tool even similar was in granite and marble quarries. They were used to split stone. Once the fissure was opened a bit the larger wedge end was placed in that and then hit with a sledge hammer. Other very small hardened steel wedges (some only one inch long) were also driven to open a decent crack. Just my 2 cents.
I think it looks like a makeshift splitting maul, except for the metal handle.
This has a quarry buster head but could also be a bull set. Both were used for basically the same thing.
Hi Everyone,
Thank you for responding so quick. This sight is invaluable!
So the Head of it is stone and is 3 inches long. The length of it is 10 inches. Can anyone estimate the age of it?
When did you decide the head is made of stone? I guess I missed my point. I'm gone.
I'll point out what fhr was trying to say. The back of the head is peened over & stone breaks. Appears maybe bronze to my with an iron handle. I think bronze was used for slowly splitting stone because it didn't have the sharp vibrations thru the stone that may cause unwanted cracking the steel may do. Does a magnet stick to the head?
This looks like an old soldering iron made by a blacksmith. The head should be made of copper. Scratch it with a file or knife to see if it is copper. This should have a wooden handle attached to the other end. The loop around the "iron" is forge welded.
It may have been for soldering. The copper wedge (stone) is heated with a burner or torch. Plumbing, roofing, auto fenders, etc. Used crude irons to melt lead/tin solder.
T A
Sorry, but I fail to believe it's stone. I'll join fhr at this point.
I put "stone" in brackets because I know it's really copper.
T A
In photo two, at the five o'clock position on the ball part, you can see two dings where the copper was dented.
T A
Looks like a primitive Hawiian coconut cracker.
Thank you so much for all your input. I scratched the stone a little and it is definitely copper and not stone, my mistake. Would anyone like to take a guess as to when you think this could have been made?
One more fact I think would be important. My house was built on a cow pasture across the street from where an American Indian Burial Ground was found. The Wampanoag tribe. Could it be that early?
It was fun, thank you so much for your input. It's definately a conversation piece!
Rusfarm's post is right on. Its a soldering iron without the wood handle. My Grandfather was a blacksmith in Illinois he had several of these in different configurations It was used soldering.
For soldering. Held heat well in the head.
This should be marked mystery solved, eh?
I'm pretty sure that it is a blacksmith's tool. The handle would allow the piece to be held while struck with a hammer.