What a thorough, comparative analysis that comes only from one with a deep understanding of the subtleties of this ancient craft. You demonstrate that the angle of the grind explains the edge distortion when chopping hardwood rather than the quality of the Swedish steel, which is legendary. The ease with which you work through your investigative process is as enjoyable as it is educational. The clucking of the chickens in the background adds to the experience. I would venture to guess that your father has no problem with you exchanging the first axe, and that he is proud of your mastery of this topic and your skills at communicating and educating others. If the sales people had your knowledge and experience, the angle of the grind would have been suspected at the outset.
Fascinating review !!! I live in a hardwood Only area and my Hults Bruks hold up great. They do have a completely different grind though. Thank you for your time and effort. Your camera and audio quality are excellent.
This is the third video I’ve seen on this rolling issue. I was looking forward to purchasing a Gransforth.. definitely rethinking. Fantastic analysis! Earned my sub.
Thanks for taking the time to comment! The steel has been surprisingly soft. I did another video on hults bruk steel, and that was significantly harder. Very surprising.
I have the small splitting axe and the Scandinavian. Don't have the other, one. Beautiful axes, and a great video. My Scandinavian keeps rolling on me too, I thought it might be my technique. Thank you for this information 🙏🏻
Thanks for the kind words! Gransfors does make a beautiful axe. In the comment section it was suggested to put on a large “secondary bevel,” I’m going to try this so I don’t need to grind off so much steel. I’ll probably try for a 21-22 bevel and see if that helps strengthen the edge
Interesting finds. My Scandinavian Forest axe came with a 25 degree chisel grind out of the box. I used it at 20 degrees for quite some time with no issues. Then I took it down to 17.5, which causes the top and bottom corners to roll over. With a microbevel it takes no damage. I’m personally not a fan of these axes, because I think my council tool boys axe is a better performer at a quarter of the cost. I do think that their edge retention is fantastic, but unless you just use it for felling and limbing, you’re likely to bang it up on some rocks like I did, and filing these axes is not a fun experience. I resort to a belt sander for Swedish steel. Really good video, I like the line-up! Hopefully you can find a good use for that Scandinavian axe. It really is a good looking tool. Thanks for testing and sharing👍👍
Thanks for the insight! Will try that secondary bevel. I’m definitely agree on the CT axes for the value. Even aside from value, I am very happy with how my pack axe chops, it is every bit as effective as this GBA, and the grind is far more durable.
@@urbanlumberjack very similar experiences to Codi myself. I really don't enjoy working with their steel, way too hard. More than once i've resorted to belt grinders for the initial profile work on them. I much prefer a softer steel from a maintenance perspective
Interesting thanks for getting back to me. Mine is 15 degrees at the heel and toe and 17 in the center. Much too thin I’ll be filing back to 20-22 most likely.
The Scandinavian Forest Axe is meant for Pine trees. In fact it was designed for the harvesting of raw Turpentine. So hardwoods? Wrong axe. It also works great in tree limbing and camping/bushcraft where the goal is to prepare for the campfire with small pieces of wood. It is not meant for heavy duty work. Rather light duty all day long. If you live in hardwood areas get a felling axe. If you live in the highlands of New Mexico or Northern Minn or Ontario then you are good to go. Oak trees or walnut etc?. PASS.
My Scandinavian forest axe is about 8-10 years old. It’s my only regular camp axe and landscape axe around my house. Can’t recall if I have ever rolled out my edge but after the factory edge dulled I’ve only convex sharpened it and never had a problem. I have oak trees, pines and lots of dead ash. No problem on any of them.
I suspect older models don’t have this problem, recently they started grinding the bits too thin. They seem to have reversed course, though, after many people shared issues with the grind online. My GB dealer has several SFAs and when I visited all their axes were ground to 20 degrees, or slightly thicker. That’s a much more suitable grind.
Plus if you’ve filed flat bevels on the scandi Forest axe then you’ve made it into a giant carving axe. The forest axes are designed with a narrow concave for reasons that will present if you chop and hew large blanks. I only keep flat bevels on my carving axes for the control and accuracy of the cut. With a working axe in timber you’ll need the thin bite of the convex for efficiency.
Great analysis. Could you run the Rockwell test on the other ancient hewing axe that you made a bent handle for? Would be interesting to know, would probably fall in between 55 and 60 :)
I hate to do that, but I think I might have to. I’m just not sure how useful the axe would be otherwise. Would probably lose a half inch on the bit length.
Just use it as is with the wood in your area, if it starts rolling on you just add a little more convex when you sharpen it until it is stable. That’s what I did with mine and it holds up really well and still cuts great. same thing with convex knives I’ve had. I think the overall thinness and flatness of the main bevel are more relevant. This thinness make it great for green softwood limbing and minor felling of 6” trees or less. It’s average at bucking for its size and weight, terrible at splitting and fantastic at carving. It’s a very light and portable high performance bushcrafting and light limbing axe not a heavy use camping/working axe. I’m not sure that they make that clear in their marketing and that’s a shame.
When I looked into the Scandinavian forest axe it did recommend for resinous woods such as spruce and Pine. It says it's a very thin profile in the descriptions from what I have seen advertised. In my experience of forging axes I find it is sensible to have general splitting axes at a lower Rockwell as these are more likely to strike a hard surface such as a nail embedded in a tree or be struck with a hammer if stuck so you would not want them to split/ shatter. Carvers I tend to forge to a higher Rockwell around 58 as like you said they are used more as a chisel. Nice video, always interesting to see reviews.
@@urbanlumberjack currently no as I am in the process of making a website, I have some videos on my channel of my work. I mostly forge small camp axes and carver's from En9 steel. Have forged some historical Peterson type axes and splitters also but my focus is on a suitable hand axe ideal for camping. Heat treated poll with good edge retention, I am still very much in the prototyping phase of having a production axe I would like to sell. So many variables to decide on.
Checked out your channel, beautiful work! If you get to the point where you are ready to sell a few let me know, and I'd love to see about purchasing one, maybe doing a video or two if we can work that out.
@@urbanlumberjack thank you that's very kind of you to say, yes I would be interested in getting feedback from others. I'm currently working through a small batch of axe heads and matching sheathes.
@@urbanlumberjack I'd be interested to get some advice on what you would like to see in a axe head profile, maybe we could prototype a head design and you could test it out for me?
I think this edge is just too keen as well. Even softwoods have very hard knots sometimes. I used to think the reputation of the Swedish axes are that sometimes the steel was too hard for most inexpensive modern files. Which to me sucks. I'd rather have an axe be a little softer. To me 50-55 is perfectly acceptable. This seems more like a carving edge than bucking. Which doesn't really make sense for that handle. I'd put a small secondary on it and see if that helps.
I like the way you put it: “which doesn’t make sense for that handle.” That’s exactly the issue, the handle allows more force to be used than the bit can handle.
All axes will fail at some point, chipping, pitting, edge rolling, cracks even corners snap off - the steel gransfors use is fine just some o1 type, but it’s ease of maintenance far outweighs any minor damage, what is the point of owning an axe that you’re not going to use after it gets wear because a normal stone won’t touch it? my gb wildlife hatchet I’ve now had for 30 years, lots of use, wear and tear, and I’ve put that little axe through some extremely tough hard wood, green, seasoned and frozen, oak, ash, plum, hawthorn, ebony, bamboo, buffalo horn, conch and bracket fungus all sorts- and all it ever has needed is an occasional sharpen and hone with a water stone 800 grit, or the little dc4 stones, but these two tips have made all the difference - maintain them often, and use them sensibly.
Temper seems right, I'd guess its the edge geometry that's the issue. Mine is a TT, about the same as yours except my edge was about 17-20° and convex. Chopped all kinds of woods never had an issue.
That’s really good to hear. I’m hoping this one I’ve got performs the same way. I reached out to the company about my issues and how I think they could be fixed/prevented. I received no response which was a bummer. These are great axes, I’m worried GB is going to screw then up trying to save a penny.
I have the froe from gränsfors bruk all I can say is that the handle is not attached well to the blade and that the blade is too bulky to cleave anything with a large diameter have not used it in forever. I think the hickory handle is bad aswell it does not allow the blade to stay in place.
Very interesting. I normally set my axes up with a microbevel anyway so if it were my axe I would add a secondary bevel that is maybe a bit too big to call a 'micro' bevel.
Gransfors Bruk recommends 25-30 deg for carving axes and wider for softwood/hardwood. Trees freeze in Sweden so even if it is ground for softwood from the factory, seems like it would be a wider angle. Curious to know what they come with out of the box. Send Beyene Kahsai an email and ask him lol.
I might shoot off an email for curiosity sake. This is still the factory grind, so I haven’t thinned it at all. Interesting about the frozen wood that’s a very good point. I don’t believe this edge would hold up to frozen wood any better than hardwoods. It’s great for carving though.
@@urbanlumberjack It would be interesting to reach out to GB and post the process. If they are coming out of the factory at almost half the angle they recommend, it might be a QA issue.
Interesting. I reached out through instagram and haven't received a response. I think I recall reading they said they heat treat to 57-58. Curious how far from that range these axes are.
I have many hytest axes including the craftsman. Then i got the hytest Forester knowen for hytest using a better quality finer steel, man is the steel the forest made of soft. I also have many vintage pre 80s Gransfors Bruks axes, as they were a big import axes to NZ, including a almost new old stock axes, they have a wide grind (22, 23) and a soft steel to put edge on and in no time nice and soft unlike my German pre 80s imports to nz cheaply made . I am thinking but don't know they did not export GB to Australia back then with their super hard woods
Any thoughts about better steel a bit behind the edge? I've heard the factory edge on some knives isn't as tough due to the belt grinding. I agree that 17 degrees is likely too acute for chopping.
i have seen the double bevel 1900 model at my local store. I want your opinion on using it as a camping axe. I don't need to do any hewing and I want to chop wood in camp and maybe chop down small trees someday, basically I just love the way it looks. Do you think that I would regret buying that instead of their forest axe or something?
I love the look of it too. The center bevel broadaxe is designed to notch, as well as hew flat, so at some level I think it could do what you’re asking but it is very heavy and very tall so not great as a camp axe. The handle is also designed for hewing so I think would not do well as a camp axe. For the price you could get BOTH the Scandinavian forest axe and the small forest axe… plus probably a burger nearby the store haha.
Very true and very good points! Thanks for replying, I do blacksmithing as a hobby so I am also tossing around the idea of buying a couple tools and then attempting to make my own, doesn't get more satisfying than that@@urbanlumberjack
weird because every GBA i've owned (from new) have been 20-22.5 degrees (scandi, small forest, wildlife. I actually thinned my scandi down from 20 to 15 because it wasn't cutting well for my local wood types. i've also had 2 american felling axes which both came very thick at 27.5-30. Both of which i ended up thinning down to around 20. just to clarify, i'm really not a fan of GBA axes. However, i've never had any quality issues myself. Although i have repaired significant edge damage on 2nd hand GBA axes for people in the past.
I’m going to find some time to reproduce it, probably bring it back up to 20 or better. Hoping the steel just got a bit soft from grinding and harder stuff will be found underneath
@@urbanlumberjack it can happen. I've had more reports of them being brittle than too soft. Love seeing the chainsaw/firewood sections in your videos btw.
I have the same axe and the ege rolled wile cutting through green pine trees and a silver maple I took a file and reprofiled it and reshaped to hair saving sharp and it haves rolled since
Gränsfors uses scrap steel - supposedly good, but i don't know - anway its a stupid idea especially with the eco marketing. An axe head last 100+ years so you can use premium steel there The smiths are new, rather unexperienced and most not swedish anymore. They are forged too long (in one heat, for cost efficency) and bad heat treatment batches are far too often if you look through reviews So in my experience, the older, like 10 years or older gb, are much better
That’s very interesting. Do you have any links or sources to share? would love to read up on this. I just saw in marketing video from Gransfors or they were talking about going carbon neutral or something to that effect. I wish it wasn’t this way, but in my life experience anytime accompany talks about going carbon neutral this or environment that it almost always ends up harming quality, and is a smokescreen to charge the same price for a lesser product.
@@urbanlumberjack quote : Our axes are made of a special alloy recycled steel with high carbon content from their own website, under forging. Some smiths i know say they claim that steel always has the same composition, but according to them its not so, so they get an overall "ok ish" heat treat but nothing spectacular. I have no idea if this is really true...but a gransfors should have around 57 hrc, your test shows they miss that mark quite a bit Axes made by a real craftsman who knows how to heat treat are the way to got, then handle yourself...much better
Interesting vid. Agreed, just back it up a bit till your at 20ish. Surprising though that they're all at 50-55, I remember reading somewhere that GB tempers to 58-59, I'm sure it was on their website. 50-55 is more in line with what Council advertises. Again, brings up the topic of bang for your buck/premium axes... shouldn't you be getting an advantage for your money (Style and hand forging aside)? As you said, 5 hrc is a big difference in hardness terms.
I try and figure out what you guys down there do, because I imagine if it works in Australian wood, it’s probably good enough for anywhere in the world! I was definitely disappointed in the hardness, especially because of the reputation the axes have for being much harder than other axes. At this point I think the difference between GB and other manufacturers is largely aesthetic.
@@urbanlumberjack what I've found is that a 15, 17 or so is fine but even on good steel it's gotta have a micro, and on softer steels probably even a secondary. When I've tried low angles like that taken all the way to the apex, it folds or wrinkles. On some steels even 20 taken to an apex will damage a little bit. For the most part though, 20 is my go-to. Speaking of hardness, what did you temper your nessmuk to?
I love my SFA but I have chipped the heel on wet mesquite in Arizona. My new one is doing good so far. I always liked my Wetterlings better, but they were bought out.. by Gransfors?
Since I made those videos, I have heard from so many people similar stories. I’m not sure if it’s the steel that’s the problem, but certainly the bevel they put on the edge is far too thin. It’s a nice edge at 15°, and that’s just not going to last long on an axe. I filed mine back to 20 and it’s working much better! Thanks for sharing!
Hello, can you please let me know how to do that? Did you file your SFA to 20 degrees on the whole edge (toe, center, heel)? I am new compared to your experience and I don't quite know much! I suspect my SFA (which I got few months ago) is also 15 - 17 degrees because after some mini rolls, it chipped, when I used it for chopping hard wood in my camp area. I am from Greece, and in a research about what to do I ended up in this video of yours. I know you made this video some months ago, but I would appreciate it if you can reply and let me know more about what you did! Did the secondary bevel (that some people suggested) not work? Is the solution 20 degrees and how Can I also do that? Thanks in advance !!@@urbanlumberjack
@@antoniskesidis1543 just buy a good file and go for it, man. Try to keep the same angle as you go. It is not rocket science. Lift a few degrees up from current one and start filing PS: Felix Immler demonstrates how to easily reprofile an axe edge. Look him up. PSS: I would first try to get away with just an aggressive "microbevel" along the edge. Sometimes that's all that is required. A couple degrees on each side.
Not wanting to be a smartass but it is called a Scandinavian forest axe. Swedish forests are about 95 percent softwoods, so that's what it's designed for I suppose.
Use it for what it was designed for, pine and spruce. If you want an similar size axe for hardwoods Council Tool has one that will satisfy. Overall axes have gotten too popular and are highly overpriced due to bushcraft forums and the survival shows.
I’ve heard complaints about the recycled steel and single heat cycle forging. It does seem like the more environmentally “friendly” a company tried to be the worse the quality can be
@@urbanlumberjack Yes and apparently on their website they are embracing Agenda 2030 and doing their part and they said they have to do more! Sounds nuts. Glad I bought a pack axe by Council Tool.
I'd bet you will get into some better steel as you use and sharpen it. I notice alot of knives are this way. I'd just keep using it and sharpening it first. But hey it's your axe.
I’m going to reproduce the forest axe to 20 degrees, will need to take off probably a good 1/4 of steel. Bummer but the axe isn’t useable for me until I do that. I’m hoping to retest it and see if the steel is harder further into the bit. Thanks for taking the time to share your experience!
GB do stain their handles, its mentioned on their website. They even mention the brand of linseed oil paint they use, mixed with the linseed oil finish. Edit: my mistake, it's just their "antique" line that they stain.
BEWARE! As other readers has written Gränsfors axes ARE NOT MADE OF SWEDISH STEEL that today doesn't exists but legally means only Steel produced in Sweden. As honestly Gränsfors Bruks declares in their brochure they used Recicled Steel that I suppose it's about the common 1060 steel used in Italy where I live, that's a reasonably good steel for axes but at the cost of about 0,70 US Dollar/ KG! So instead of an over 200 Euros a Gransfors axe costs in Italy you can find similar axes at the cost of about 50 Euros perhaps better than Gransfors because axes produced in Italy are conceived for Italian trees and the same for US axes! So Gransfors axes are very beautiful and well refined axes ......for collectors who can throw some money away out but for real hard use you better buy common US or Italian cheaper and better suited axes!
Thanks for sharing your insight! I just bought my first Rinaldi, what a coincidence. It’s the Milano carpenters axe. I’ve been using it all day and really enjoying it. The steel is quite good. By the way, my grandparents immigrated from southern Italy and my older brother married a girl from Taranto! We visited for the wedding and I had the best seafood of my life. Cheers!
imo its the just thecburnt edge from a less then perfect edging. my bet is agter u get through that slight bit of bad steel itll keep a fine long lasting edge.
