Hults Bruk – Turpentine Pattern – Pre 1988

I “rescued” this old Hults Bruk off a Norwegian auction site. The handle was cracked and the head was very rusty. The bit had been filed down quite a bit (!) from its original profile. You can compare to my other Montreal on this forum.
However, it had relatively little mushrooming and the bit had been filed down with great care. Geometry was still good. This axe clearly belonged to someone who knew what they were doing. The handle was much too damaged to save. I got a new 50cm Hultafors handle which I took extra care to fit snugly. Burnished the wood to darken it and bring out the grain structure before i gave it a couple coats of linseed oil. It took me a while to sharpen and reduce the edge angle with a file. Went over it with 1200 grit sandpaper before I stropped the edge to razor sharpness. Cutting angle is about 22 degrees with no bevel. I know that is steep but I have a feeling the steel is good enough for it. It took forever to file down with an almost new file from a good brand, so this is definitely some hard steel.
I polished the rest of the head very lightly. It must be smooth to prevent snagging in the wood, but at the same time – battle scars like these can never be faked. The Japanese have a word for this: “Wabi Sabi”. End result is one of my sharpest and probably one of my favorite axes. It will give my GB-SFA some real competition.