Pro tip : I like to keep the head of the axe rusty so when You're out doing you're murderin' they don't see the moon shine off it and alert people

Alot of people commenting on how much faster and easier it would have been with power tools. Some people don't have power tools and specifically search out videos like these. Also, when you get finished with a project like this it is so rewarding when done by hand. Some people just enjoy the aesthetics of doing it this way. Lastly, some people love having one arm look like Popeyes and the other arm looking like Olive-oil's!

Spent 40 years as a tool maker and polishing was one of my jobs. I’ll be dammed if I’m going to polish something then stick it in a tree.

Just a little tip, always fold your sandpaper in thirds. It keeps it from sliding around all over the place, as well as giving three surfaces to sand with as it is difficult to apply pressure at the edges of the sand paper.

There is something satisfying about hand polishing, total waste of time, but satisfying.

Thats impressive i repair and restore axes for friends and family and ine guy asked me if i could do a mirror finish. Knowing i do everything by hand i just loved to see this video.

WONDERFUL job! Thanks for sharing with us and taking all the time/effort to make and narrate this fine step by step video!!!

This guy has some serious patience and discipline. Well done!!! Make the handle!

Wow. That’s dedication for you. Stunning job dude. Thank you.x

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and demonstrating the complete process in real time, just remarkable. !

This video should be called "Why we invented power tools!"

This is absolute madness. Ever since I polished my first knife I wanted to do it on an axe head too , but knowing how much work it will take I never did. Thanks for sharing it with us. I would love to see the shine after a buffing wheel. Only then all this work with the sandpaper will pay of.

I enjoy your dedication to your work.

Good on you for doing this completely by hand 🖐 That must have to some serious patience and dedication! It turned out fantastic 👍

Excellent video, man! Thanks for showing all this - it's handy knowledge to reference! Have a nice sunday Cheers.

Waiting for handles. Great job, final product very inspiring

Great job on the video. I purchased a tanto knife blank and want to polish it up. I dont have much time for hand polishing without power tools but this video gave me some inspiration. Thank you.

Wow, thanks man. For enduring all this although havin power tools available. And all the expertise. It helps in getting an intuition without having to go all the way yourselves which I think most of us are here for. Keep it up!

That came out nice. I have been picking up axes and hatchets at estate sales. I'm gonna have to try this.

Que gran trabajo haces mostrando ó mejor dicho, enseñando a las personas lo que sabes y te apasiona, te felicito

Outstanding polish work! Thanks for sharing.

I was looking for instruction on polishing a cast metal part. This video was instructive on technique. I can apply this information to my task. I have some sanding to do!

You wore me out on this. You can make the handle with power tools. It'll take me a week to get over the Axe polish. Thanks very much for your time and effort.

Sublime patience. Well done.

Now that is beautiful!- Great job- I restore antique Military swords , bayonets etc. and know exactly how long it takes to do what you have done on this axe head. I just finished restoring a 1907 British Sword Bayonet and I'm tired. It's amazing how sore you get polishing metal by hand. When I restore I'm not in love with patina - I love the mirror finish look. Anyway great video

Trick from a guy who restored a couple of medieval armor replicas: Let your 600 and 1000/2000 grit sandpaper clog up some as you work and get mirror finish in less time with the same car metal polish and no more than 2000 grit. Just keep sanding when your 600+ seems clogged up and see how it goes from there...

Magnificent work sir, well done! Nice video!

Very nice work. I'm going to do the same with an antique sword. Maybe not as mirror finished as yours but it will shine again. Thanks for the lesson. Cheers from Montreal.

Thanks/Merci, I have a big restauration project ahead and this video helped.

this isnt sped up, he's just that fast.

You made art. Beautiful.

Love this video, ive done fair few knive before. But never an axe! Fantastic.

Excellent job, my axes will become your system. Thank you sir!

Love your dedication.

That's neat. But the fact that you can do that with a buffing wheel in about an hour makes it seem silly. Then again I just spent 20 minutes watching someone polish an axe...

Nice job. In my experience, normal cloth towels and paper towels are abrasive to mirror polished surfaces. I think that's why you had scratches in the end. Try to buff off with clean microfiber with gentle pressure if you can and see the difference.

Beautiful work, always satisfying working the metal by hand, time consuming and takes it's toll on the body but worth it.

Great results, persistence and skills.

So much patience. Thanks.

awesome video! Love the time lapse filing!

I feel your pain... I restore and sell norlund axes on ebay with exotic handles. Most polished.. I do use a flapwheel for primary grind, but i hand sand the rest. 60(flap) 120, 180, 220 320 400 600 1000 1500 2000 then black then white compound on a wheel. It takes me about 4 hrs start to finish on a polish.

Amazing job!! Yes I would love to see you put a handle on it!

Beautiful finish.

That was so satisfying to watch thank you for this video

Looks fantastic, nice job! It definitely needs a handle to make it complete though ;)

This is so satisfying to watch

Well it seems that is the way to go, when guys use the grinders and power sanders you can really see waves, high/low spots in the metal that ax turned out perfect, looking forward to you making the handle.

The Ax looks great.

I did this with a Wade & Butcher 1830 (guestimate) hatchet, starting with 60 grit, thru to 2000 grit (the best I had available) ... then using cymbal polish nicked from my mad-drummer father. I could have pulled out a power tool or two, but was more interested in seeing what could be done with sandpaper and compounds. Mine has many pits and blemishes, but the shiny parts are awfully shiny ... even though the hatchet is basically blunt. I haven't tried to sharpen it yet. Great video. I lived the experience myself ... just not as meticulous or fastidious. Cheers $0.02

Very impressive. Impressive how much free time you have.

very patient man you are , your wife must be happy .

I am polishing an axe head by hand as well, this gave me a great guide, as I have never done so before. Please make a handle, I havent done that either. Very instructive and helpful video, Thank you! I am also Canadian!

that was wonderful, nicely done.

I think it looks beautiful

This is an impressive video how to transform iron-cost axe to gold-cost axe!

Glad I found this video. I want to polish my hatchet, but I don't have any power tools. Actually, I'd prefer to do something like this by hand, it feels more satisfying.

Beautiful job! 👍

I agree with the process, that is, up until the polishing. the mag polish is for magnesium, not steel. if you change to a German metal polish like Semichome, as well as, keeping your polish stokes straight and not going around in circles, it will produce a clearer reflection. The thing to also take note of is for people trying to do this, make sure you remove "ALL" the scratches caused by the previous sandpaper. If not, you will get a distorted reflection (kind of like a carnival mirror). If you would like to keep the polish, you will need to seal with a metal lacquer to prevent it from oxidizing. However, for me personally, I would have used machines, it's just a little faster.

You're great man. Love your channel.

hat off to you sir.... really nicely done thanks for sharing...

Beautiful job !

When he said ' This isn't perfect, I literally dropped my phone.

Nicely done!

Impressive- learned what I needed to know

Nice work, congrats! It is always nice to see this kind of art, if we could say so. No power tools, but a lot of time invested. Unfortunately I don't have so much time to waste for that, for me an axe is just a tool, it only needs to be sharp to get the job done, and that's it. No bling, as the bling is hard to be maintained on a working tool, it is time consuming. Nice to see it finished though.

I am a man with a lot of patients but you put me to shame lol... Your efforts are worth it in the end. That's a beautiful polish. I have a double bit axe I want to fix up. Maybe I will try this. Thanks again for sharing your video with us.

Awesome job 👍

Nice job looks great 👍🏻

1000 likes for you, I really enjoyed your video and like it very much. I didn't feel time the 20 minutes went fast 👍🏼

first off ....I`d like to tell you that you have about 1000 times the patience that I have Gilbert and that a big compliment because ask my daughter....I don`t give too many compliments....I love to see the axe handle with now power tools because....some time I want to make one with a sample J.P father gave me that come from his father which makes it over 100 years old and do it out of ironwood....when I come up I will bring you a piece of Ironwood if you want one....a friend of mine brought me a few big pieces.....CHEERS

Très bon tuto. Merci beaucoup.

What an amazing job. Fantastic

Awesome job brother

Very well done!

I love seeing videos where people use hand tools instead of power tools. Shows their true skills.

I've been using this (and other videos) as a reference for trying to clean up the finish on a firearm from 1891 (don't worry, it's not an heirloom or rare/expensive, it's basically just a project) I'm in an apartment and besides the occasional dremel there's not much I can do besides hand work, it's some good exercise after a while I'll give it that lol

Looks great!

Thank you for your hardwork!!!!😅

Best ASMR ever!

That's great, I doubt when new it looked half as good. Only the ones in video games look better, so use the wheel to complete the task. The point is taken, you can only go so far by hand. The scratches gives the personal touch, a piece of human soul.

You get a thumbs up from me for perseverance!

Yes we would like to see you make the ax handle w/ out using power tools , please

For the heavy rust I just soak in white vinegar for about a day or two. Saves energy and time does all the work. Same with baking soda and water, good for touch ups on kitchen knives after use to halt corrosion and rust also very light abrasive.

Awesome work

friggin incredible man

who needs power tools when your hands move that fast lolol :) great job by the way

Great video. Thanks

not every one has power tools so its good to know how to do it ..how long does it last before it needs another polish kept inside

You're the first guy that i see on youtube that really cares for a perfect final product. Great job on that axe! Please continue with your amazing work.

Pretty cool but, considering my arthritis, that would take me weeks. Think I'll just stick to my buffing wheels. Great video. Thanks🙂

I appreciate the hard work that went into this, but a couple critiques that I would make is that you are using too much pressure. The sand paper will remove material no matter how hard you press, but pushing too hard will leave scratches. With light pressure you can finish in half the time. You can achieve a mirror finish using water and 2000 grit sand paper with light finger pressure. WD-40 has surfactants in it that will prevent you from achieving a good finish, so you should save that until the end after the buff. if you have any light scratches a little rouge will take care of it with a microfiber cloth. if there are any major gouges I'd recommend a bastard cut mill file. It won't cause deep scratches, but will take a little longer. Never change directions. if you're sanding from heel to edge do that the through whole process. Once the scratches disappear from the previous grit then go to the next higher. If you move the the next grit too soon you will have scratches though that won't come out. I normally use 60, 120, 220, 400, 600, 1000, 1200, and 2000.

Amazing job.

Very good job!

Mothers is my absolute favorite polish!

Well done mate, champion effort 👍👍👍🤳🤳🤳

big job,excelent video,thanks

I’ve done this many times, but with sanding disks in a drill. The ONLY thing that kept you from being thrilled with this result was that you skipped too many grit numbers. You should have stopped and waited until you had what you need ... then you would have results commensurate with your effort, patience , and attention to detail... well, except for this ... Anyway, what has worked well for me is the following sequence: 230, 320, 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1500, 1800, 2000, 2400, 32k, 4k, 6k, 8k, 10k, 12k. The last eight grits were in a set of 5” velcro-backed padded disks I found on Banggood... the whole set was about $20 ... 12k grit is recommended to bring model airplane canopies to optical standards (!!). A place called MicroMark sells 2x2 sanding pad sets designed to do exactly that .. (it’s a modeler’s heaven) ... the coarser grits were all available locally from Walmart, Ace Hardware, and NAPA auto parts. You can try and remove 320 grit scratches from hardened tool steel with1500 grit sandpaper through sheer effort and patience, just like you can try to level out the Grand Canyon with a garden hoe, and you will be equally successful in both endeavors. Availing one’s self of available grit numbers, you can even be a little sloppy and hasty and yet still come out with even the tiniest of hairline scratches gone. After the 12k grit, I finished with cotton wheels (NOT felt) loaded with black emory bar, brown bar, white diamond bar, and finally jeweler’s rouge. Just as a side note, after I saw what could be done with the 1800 - 12k grit abrasive pads, and the polishing bars up through jewelers rouge, I decided to see if I could improve the condition and appearance of my poor 20 yr old wedding ring, dirty and scratched. My wife, after hearing the tool running for some time, was curious when I came in with it saying “Look what I was able to do with this ...” Now, mind you, the finish was absolutely flawless, and the gold literally glowed with a very slight hint of a warm rose tint to it that it had not had since it was new ... but she didn’t know that ... so when she asked what I had been working on so long and hard, and I said “my wedding ring” - she spun around and had this look on her face that was about the same look she would have if she asked “So, what did you and the baby do while I was out?” And I said, “Oh, we went to the park and I strapped him to the big box-kite and got him up to about 300 feet ... he laughed and laughed... “ ... yeah, about like that ... but when she cautiously looked down at what I had in my hand, and saw the same ring she had seen in that jewelry store display case some 20 years prior... well she almost started crying. So anyway, sometimes restoring something to its original glory is more than simple maintenance of property.

now give it a mirror polish i see people saying polished but its never mirror polished you get the shine but you never get to be able to shave with the tool reflection..just watched are skips along the video very very good by hand i take my hat of to you yes your right a buffing wheel would finish the job with very little work to do .said from a X knife mirror polisher that used to use buffing wheels 99.9 percent out of 10 ;)

Won a scout ax head in an auction. Had my dad take it into qork and light grind rust but there an lot of pit might have to try the method