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Thread: I agree with Fowler, an axe is a wasted pick on the Alone TV show

  1. #1

    Default I agree with Fowler, an axe is a wasted pick on the Alone TV show

    if you have a saw and one of Cold Steel's shovels. Axes have sent 2 people (out of 44 so far) home with injuries. What works ok in nice weather, when you're well rested, well fed, well-hydrated and healthy is not the same when those conditions are far from your reality. Trying not to screw-up (at least to not do so big time) on international TV is a pretty heavy stress to have on yourself, too. Me, I'll use my body weight to break off dead wood, or a big club, so that chances of serious injury are greatly reduced. If I can't break it, then I'll use the saw. I would NOT take a big 2- handed saw, tho. I'd take a Silky and not the folder, either. When you know to use a combo of hot rocks, the Dakota Fire pit, and the Siberian fire lay, you dont need to do much bucking and almost no splitting of wood.


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    Senior Member Antonyraison's Avatar
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    I agree. I do not use Axes at all.
    I find a saw way more useful, its easier for cutting wood and faster... and more compact.
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    Senior Member Phaedrus's Avatar
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    An axe in the hands of someone well versed in its use can be impressive, but I agree- for my uses a saw is much better. I can certainly process more wood with my Silky Katanaboy than I can with an axe.

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    with dry wood, in nice conditions, an axe can do wonders, but one slip with it can mean complete disaster, and in bad conditions, that slip is all to likely to occur.

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    Senior Member Antonyraison's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by jayd View Post
    with dry wood, in nice conditions, an axe can do wonders, but one slip with it can mean complete disaster, and in bad conditions, that slip is all to likely to occur.
    The only place I can see a use for an axe to me is a smaller one for bushcrafting.
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    An axe is like any other tool. It has some uses. When it is used for anything other than those uses there is a possibility of things going wrong. Personally, I prefer to use a machete for most of the cutting around a prospective campsite. I use the axe to break up larger sections of dead fall for campfire use. You won't find me chopping on a log. With a machete I can get small shrubs and such cut off flush with or below ground level to save tent floors and more importantly air mattress bottoms. I do use a heavy canvas tarp for a ground cover under my tent. Since I rarely (never) camp more than 10 yards from my truck carrying extra tools is not an issue. Actually, most often clearing an area is a matter of hooking up the dc/ac inverter or generator and firing up the little $40 Harbor Freight electric chainsaw.

    Alan

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    Senior Member Antonyraison's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Alan R McDaniel Jr View Post
    An axe is like any other tool. It has some uses. When it is used for anything other than those uses there is a possibility of things going wrong. Personally, I prefer to use a machete for most of the cutting around a prospective campsite. I use the axe to break up larger sections of dead fall for campfire use. You won't find me chopping on a log. With a machete I can get small shrubs and such cut off flush with or below ground level to save tent floors and more importantly air mattress bottoms. I do use a heavy canvas tarp for a ground cover under my tent. Since I rarely (never) camp more than 10 yards from my truck carrying extra tools is not an issue. Actually, most often clearing an area is a matter of hooking up the dc/ac inverter or generator and firing up the little $40 Harbor Freight electric chainsaw.

    Alan
    Machetes work well. I really enjoyed the use of my kukri in the bush for 7 days... That worked really well for batoning wood if I did need to split larger logs
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    I found a "super machete" at a garage sale once. It is over all 32" long and is double sided for the front half of the blade. It is rounded on the point and I think it was actually made for and used to harvest bananas. They hold onto the bunch and stab the stem with the rounded (sharp) point and the bunch comes loose.

    But, as there are precious few banana plantations in South Texas, I use it for general chopping of brush. With the long blade I can get some real speed at the tip and take finger sized limbs and brush off clean without leaving a snag or a sharp stumplet.

    Alan

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    I dunno. A few weeks ago I had to take out a green tree. The saw would bind. No problem for the axe.

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    Senior Member kyratshooter's Avatar
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    Right tool for the job. If it is an ax then use an ax.

    If you have not been properly trained to use and ax, or if you are scared of one then take a beaver on a leash and let it chew through the wood.
    If you didn't bring jerky what did I just eat?

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    Senior Member randyt's Avatar
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    on another note my NA friend makes crooked knives from beaver teeth.They work well on the spruce and cedar from the region they were developed.
    so the definition of a criminal is someone who breaks the law and you want me to believe that somehow more laws make less criminals?

  12. #12

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    What KYrat said.
    Axes are like guns. You learn not to point them at things you don't want cut off.
    If we are to have another contest in…our national existence I predict that the dividing line will not be Mason and Dixon's, but between patriotism & intelligence on the one side, and superstition, ambition & ignorance on the other…
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    Super Moderator crashdive123's Avatar
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    For those that believe that an ax is not as useful as other tools I would suggest that the limitations may come from the abilities of the individual declaring that those limitations exist. Obviously they have never come across anybody as skilled as Angus Baptiste.

    This is a 30 minute video, and well worth watching.

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    Senior Member randyt's Avatar
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    I thought of Angus when I first read this thread title.
    so the definition of a criminal is someone who breaks the law and you want me to believe that somehow more laws make less criminals?

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    Senior Member kyratshooter's Avatar
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    Yep, case of ability.

    About 2 million years ago the ax was the first universal stone tool Homo Erectus carried into the wilderness of every part of Africa, Europe and Asia as a general purpose tool.

    Otsi the iceman was not found dead in the Alps with a bow saw by his side. The ax was the first tool made from smelted metals when that technology was discovered.

    The French did not consider the machete their primary tool. That place was held by the Francesca, the ax from which the nation took its name.

    Then folks came to American and the wilderness here forced the first transformation in ax technology in 5,000 years when the flat poll and oval eye was added to aid in control and cutting power.

    Now someone decides an ax is too dangerous for me to have in the woods, and I don't need one???

    I do not care how much of an expert you think you are, that ain't going to happen.

    Next thing you know someone will be telling me I do not need a semi-auto rifle, or one with a pistol grip and more than 10 rounds in the magazine.
    If you didn't bring jerky what did I just eat?

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    Senior Member hunter63's Avatar
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    I did as well......Oldies but goodie.

    I'm an axe guy...
    One of the guy was complaining that his hand was all bruised and hurting him, from batoning a lot of wood with his knife for his fire.... last nite on Alone...
    I was just wondering why he was making so much kindling unless the wood was wet ir green?
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    Senior Member Phaedrus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by crashdive123 View Post
    For those that believe that an ax is not as useful as other tools I would suggest that the limitations may come from the abilities of the individual declaring that those limitations exist. Obviously they have never come across anybody as skilled as Angus Baptiste.

    This is a 30 minute video, and well worth watching.
    I agree. If this comment was aimed at me then I will clarify that I meant "for me" a saw was better. It depends too on what you want to do in the woods. If I'm vehicle camping and plan to be processing a lot of wood you'll never get me to go without my Fiskar's splitting ax! But if I could only have one or the other- just a saw or just an ax- I'll generally take the saw. It does a lot more work for the calories expended. But if I was as good with an ax as Baptiste then I might take the ax!

  18. #18
    Super Moderator crashdive123's Avatar
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    My comment was not aimed at you.
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    the point is, on the Alone show, taking an axe means that there's a more useful item that you can't take. Like I said, you aint going out there to homestead. You're just going to hang out for 2 months, win a clear 1/4 million $, and go home. The axe is not needed and it's also a severe, unnecessary risk. So it's a silly choice. You aint allowed to cut living trees on Vancouver, so what you'll be doing is picking up downed wood and drying it on a rack, and breaking/off-sawing dead lower branches. After boiling off the seawater to get salt, the fire is needed only for drying meat and fish. When you've got a big "haul" of fish or bear meat, you build enough smoky fires and enough drying racks, to get the job done swiftly. Other than that, you dont want to bother with much (if any) fire. Gathering/hauling firewood sucks, especially if you have to do it in the rain, snow, slippery conditions, and you aint gonna HAVE any huge shed in which to store/dry such wood. If you're just laying around the shelter, cause it's raining, etc, you should be in your sleeping bag, and thus, not need a fire.
    Last edited by jayd; 08-05-2017 at 10:46 AM.

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    Senior Member kyratshooter's Avatar
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    Your obsession with this TV show is really over the top.

    So is the obsession to tell us how it has to be done, with no other opinions accepted.

    None of this, and none of these opinions matter.

    It's a game.

    It's TV.

    It's not real.

    It has ho connection to the real world or real survival.

    It is just another reality TV show, except in the woods, without food.
    If you didn't bring jerky what did I just eat?

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