Custom-Made Garden Tools
(Page 4 of 5)
January/February 1985
By John Vivian
SWYTHES AND SWEEDERS
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Those inexpensive, long-fanged but shortlived strip-steel blades that fit cordwood-cutting bow saws are made in Sweden, for the most part, so someone dubbed the one-hand scythes I make from old ones Swythes. Sweeders is an equally silly name for weeding tools made from the same saws and from regular hacksaw blades (which also come from Sweden these days). The heating, bending, and handle-making process is the same for all of them, but the hacksaw blades, being of harder and more brittle steel, need a little more heat and care than the wood cutters.
To begin, decide on a specific gardening function for the tool and come up with a thin-bladed pattern to fit that use. Don't restrict yourself to the one or two designs you see in stores or be tempted to copy the overpriced "Gucci garden tool" imports offered in those gardening "boo-tique" mail-order catalogs. Instead, custom-design your tools, just as you custom-plan your garden! Several patterns I like are shown here and need no further explanation. Be sure to make a paper model of your blades before you work on the steel to get the bends and angles correct in advance.
Bending thin saw steel takes heat and patience. Put the blade in a steel-jaw vise, and heat your target with a propane or MAPP gas torch until the metal is red-hot. Then use pliers to make a round curve, or hammer the band gently over the vise top to create a sharp bend. Don't force the metal and break it; heat it until it almost flops over of its own accord.
Torch-anneal the hole spots as you did for the BrushWhacker tang, and drill out as many holes as you think you'll need. Hacksaw blades won't extend far enough into the handle to supply a good glue-only purchase, so installing a pair of small through-bolts or rivets is a good idea. I use inexpensive No. 6-32 X 1" flathead steel machine screws in most of these tools.
To join your wood handles and steel, saw a slit in the end of the handle, drill holes (in the metal first, to provide a template for drilling the wood, as before), and set the blade with bolts and epoxy. (You might want to install strip-steel shoulders at the joint to give it additional strength.) Glop the tangs well with cement, slide the blade into the slits, insert and tighten the bolts, and let the glue set. Then file or grind down those protruding bolt ends, nuts, and heads to make a smooth-looking neck. By the way, don't be tempted to countersink the fasteners... the handle stock isn't very thick to begin with, and its strength is already compromised by the slit and bolt holes. Considering this, you might want to strengthen this stress point by binding it with wire.
Each tool should be used according to its design. The working surface of my Goose-Face Swythe has one toothed and one beveled business edge, like its namesake. Swung lazily back and forth, it cuts small patches of medium-tall weed or grass better than any other tool I've tried. The toothed face mows down goldenrod and milkweed faster than all the hand-peened scythes in Austria, and you can sharpen it with a couple of swipes of a kitchen honing tool. Plus, it works from a full standing position if the handle is long enough (no scythe-swoop backache with this Goose!). The knife edge is a lovely grass cutter and also weeds loose garden soil. Then the tool can be turned over with its toothed edge down to rake out weeds and scarify the soil up to an inch deep as it goes.
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