A friend recently asked me to rehandle an old garden tool. I'm not sure what you'd call it, a scratcher seems appropriate. It's somewhere in between a fork and a rake, ideal for going over vegetable patches and breaking up the large clods of earth left by digging.It's the kind of tool that you don't see in the garden centres these days.
I find there is something enormously satisfying about taking an old tool and refurbishing so that it has a new lease of life.
Sometimes getting the old handle out can be the biggest problem, and I have had to resort to leaving them in a fire to burn out the handle. But in this case the wood was so rotten and worm eaten that it came out easily once I'd cut through the rivets with a jigsaw.The new handle is an ash pole thats already a couple of years old (in fact its part of a standby polelathe pole) so quite dry but should do well for many years as a handle.
Fitting the handle is a straight forward job using a draw-knife on the shave-horse. Each trial fit the handle leaves a mark on the high points which can then be shaved until the fit is snug.The trick with these tools is to fashion the new rivets.
A friend who used to work as a coppicer taught me how to do this by peening (cold hammering) over the ends of six inch nails. First drill the hole and then drive in the nail. Cut it to size but leave it standing proud by about 1/8 inch or so.
The metal is soft enough to hammer around the edges until it forms a domed rivet head. A single six inch nail is enough for 3 or 4 rivets. One of those things where a good job looks right.
A quick scrub with a wire brush and a liberal coating of boiled linseed oil, cut with turps substitute to help it penetrate the wood of the handle. I use boiled linseed oil as it dries and hardens relatively quickly to a protective coat on both the wood and the metal.Of course you can add some bees wax to the mix - and you'd then have the original wax-oil, still used by blacksmiths to put a protective coat on their metalwork.
5 comments:
Hi Mark
These indeed are wonderful tools and I have owned one for many years, they are very versatile. I too do not know the name for them, Is there anyone who does?
Sean
I have seen these in a hand version, about 9 inches long overall, but I don't know what they're called either. Putting an old tool back to work is time well spent. You did a wonderful job with this one. Back in the '90s on this side of the Pond there was a fad to decorate the walls of restaurants with detritus from antique shops. Every restaurant would have four or five old tools from shovels to wooden-body hand planes slathered with varnish and hung on the wall. I was always tempted to ask the owner or manager if I could buy them. My wife was not amused.
Bob
Had a message left on the answer phone by Peter Jameson to say (if I've understood the translation correctly) that its an old muck fork, known as a 4 prong drag. As always that seems very plausible. I didn't get to hear the message myself so I'm claiming it's all down to the interpreter, but apparently its also the case that they don't make them like they used to, and the modern versions tend to be on the heavy side. Thank you Peter.
Mark
Coincidentally I saw one in use by the local council workmen today. Used to smooth over the sand used as a safety surface under the local playground equipment. But I live in Germany so it's clearly not just a Brit tool.
Closest I found for a name was cultivator/four pronged hoe - sounds a bit too general. I like the four porng drag idea better.
I remember a couple of years ago at Amersham Farmer's Market an old lady going . . F-I-F-T-E-eeen pounds!! when I mentioned how much to replace her favourite old spade handle. (I was buying in the handles for £10.50 !)
She said she could buy a new one for that - but the truth is she couldn't ........ yeah it's a drag !
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