Staining hickory tomahawk handles

I have some hickory throwing hawk handles arriving soon from Crazy Crow which I believe will be unfinished. After fitting the hawk head to the handles I would like to stain them. I have no experience in wood staining and would like some advice in this regard as I see various methods of staining such as sanding or not and using a wood conditioner or not.

I like just oil on mine. But you can go as hard as you want.
Hickory is very dense and can sand very smooth. When I have stained it was with a water base stain buffed with steel wool
You sand, dampen the wood and sand off the whisker a few times till it doesn’t whisker when dampen. Then stained buffed and may take another coat to get the color you want, then oil.
You can use tong oil, linseed, olive oil and bees wax mix even mineral oil.
Historicly a red stain was often used and dark wood color
If you plan on a lot of use your handle will get banged up, while there are a lot of hawks that are show pieces, I bet the average is jut a tool.

Thank you very much for your detailed explanation.

FWIW, on this hawk, I removed anything on the wood surface with some lacquer thinner, then applied some Min-Wax stain (available in several colors like black walnut, red mahogany, etc)

I often mix different colors of the stain together (after much color testing) to get a reddish walnut color (YMMV).

Thanks that is the color that I am looking for.

I have used aqua-fortis on hickory ramrods and hawk handles. It makes a very rich tobacco color and I sometimes char it lightly too. Colors won't come off on your hand either.
Robby

I take it tou char the handle after staining? What method do you use for charing and to what extent?

I char it before using the aqua-fortis, its easier to see the extent the char, which can be light or dark depending on ones taste, it can also be done after the AF application. I use a simple Bernsomatic.
Robby

I just finished the Hickory ramrod on my Kibler. I used Kibler tannic acid and water. Then an iron nitrate application. This will turn the wood a weird green blackish as it dries. This is so easy it's silly, it's like a little kid painting with water.
When it's dry just hit it with a heat gun it'll turn a real nice red-brown.
I rubbed the wood down with beeswax , then using a torch and a scotch bright pad I worked the whole piece over, liquefying the beeswax a little at a time and polishing it in with the Scotch-Brite pad.

Awesome! Thanks

Fiebing's leather dye works pretty good....

Guess I'm going to be the spoil sport on this one. If you are going to be throwing at an event or in competition, your handle is going to get wrecked by other throwers who think it is fun to 'play handles'. And, even if that doesn't happed, handles all break eventually. With throwing, the impact seems to put more stress on the handle than when used for fighting injuns or splitting kindling in camp. I don't understand the dynamics of that but I do know I have heard the sickening sound of a handle breaking when thrown at a block. In other words, unless your hawk is just for show, do nothing. I have always left mine as they come.

Rifleman1776 said:

Guess I'm going to be the spoil sport on this one. If you are going to be throwing at an event or in competition, your handle is going to get wrecked by other throwers who think it is fun to 'play handles'. And, even if that doesn't happed, handles all break eventually.

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Well said...... but the iron nitrate and beeswax treatment is super fast and easy, and leaves a beautiful finish.
Here's my Hickory ramrod done in the way I described in my earlier post.

The one I have on order has a nicely done handle and I asked for it rawhide wrapped.

I don't have an example to show you, but fire coloration is a good way to give plain wood some color.

Build a campfire. wipe some kind of animal grease on the wood and hold it over the coals. Not close enough to char it, but close enough to get the wood and grease pretty hot. It will start to turn brown. Rotate it and move it around to get even coloration over the entire surface. When you get the color you want, rub the wood briskly with a coarse cloth, like burlap or an old terrycloth wash rag. It takes a nice polish, and once you get the hang of it, you can regulate the coloration pretty well.

I first heard of this in Bernard S. Mason's The Book of Indian Crafts and Costumes (1946). I still have my old copy from when I was a kid. There is a lot of real old-time knowledge in there.

My dad used to stain hickory ramrods with aqua fortis, although he called it nitric acid. It gives hickory a very appealing color very quickly. I watched him color ramrods many times. When the color got to the stage he liked, he would quickly wipe it down with household ammonia to neutralize the acid. It worked great.

I have used laurel Mountain stains on hickory ramrods with good results, also.

Notchy Bob

Jeff Gleason said:

Fiebing's leather dye works pretty good....

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What color was the Fiebing’s dye used on the top hawk (the one with the darker handle)? I really like the way it turned out.

I use potassium permanganate which oxidizes the wood. It has a purplish appearance upon application, but soon turns dark brown to black. After a day, give it a scotchbrite scouring until you like what you see & then rub'er down with some beeswax oil stuff. I use a denatured alcohol soaked scotchbrite as pre-application prep.

That is a hickory stick that I cut from a root spout,,, It aged out after de-bark'n for about 2 years, it was infested with wood gnaw'n critters, so I heated my oven up to around 250 degrees and put the stick in to cook the varmints out. That's why you see those tiny, random holes.

With Hickory being as tightly grained as it is, I wipe down the wood with a hot rag to open up the pores before staining.

BlazingIron said:

What color was the Fiebing’s dye used on the top hawk (the one with the darker handle)? I really like the way it turned out.

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That was cordovan. Applied heavy and steel wooled off to the color shade you want.