My Very Own Copy of the Mystery Mallet

Looks great Glen very cool design.

I like it; I'm gonna check out your blog now. Great work!

Great job on the mystery mallet. It can't come apart and worse it can't go together.

Thanks, all! I can't wait to use it.

That looks great. Now I am going to work on one- like I need more projects!

Wow, wonderful job on this! Great stuff!

Definitely, keep the fingers clear of this one, nice looking mallet

Great work, Glen. I just may have to pick up the copy of popwood to do this mallet. That ash must be quarter-sawn-it's beautiful and not what I typically think of ash looking like. Thanks for sharing!

Wow.
You are good and fast.
I have just got my PW issue.

Thanks, all! I appreciate the feedback. What a great place LJs is.

Brandon W - I agree. I would have called it oak, but I checked with the guy who got the wood for me (he buys and sells timber/limber from stump to shop) and he called it ash. It did not work the same as other oak I've used, which tipped me off that it might be something different.

HHHOPKS - I've been watching for this issue for a few weeks. So when it came, the project was already primed and ready to go.

A little background, too. I spend time in my shop to clear my head when I'm dealing with some extra stresses with life and my job. I've had a string of funerals to conduct over the past several weeks-way more than normal-and time in the shop has been important. Hand work with wood has proven to be good time with God.

Ok, I hope I'm not missing something here, but I need to know how you got a tapered sliding dovetail in the mallet head's side? I see it sliding from the top toward the handle and the grain looks like it's continuous right through the handle. Did you sandwich/glue the outer faces of the mallet head on to the sides around the dovetail, or is the dovetail wedged then glued to the handle?

In this video by Christopher Schwarz, Roy Underhill shows how it goes together.

Glen, that mallet looks very nice.

At first, I thought you were saying THAT was your first mallet! I examined the joinery and I was really depressed I get it now and this mallet is fantastic.

@ Chuck. Thanks! I just watched the vid but Roy stops short of actually showing the install portion of the handle in to the mallet. I'd really like to learn how to do this if somebody can direct me to a web page or something that explains it all.

@ DouginVa
http://www.pbs.org/woodwrightsshop/video/2600/2613.html
If I remember right Roy also show it on this episode.

its right around 23 min.

DouginVa - check out the links everyone has posted. And get a copy of the April 2012 issue of Popular Woodworking. That's what worked for me.

Good luck!

DouginVA,

It takes some clamps, a vise, a bigger mallet and a lot of pounding!
I love watching Roy split that mallet head in the video, just awesome! (no, not the "mystery mallet", the one he uses to pound it together)

Pastor Glen, You have quite the mallet there my friend! Congratulations on a job well done! And thanks as well for alerting me to it being April's PWW, I'm going to head out shortly to buy that issue myself!

Just got a new Crown Gent's saw and performed a handle transplant on it, so it now has a traditional open handle rather than the straight handle. This looks like a good test to see if my new saw will cut good joinery! Or rather if I can manage to saw straight for a change….

Thanks for your kind words, Kenny. Like I posted in the blog on this project, I started by making one out of poplar. I happened to have a thick piece that was perfect, and the poplar was a lot easier to work with. The only problem was that the dovetails of the poplar didn't want to bend as easily as the hardwood did. But it was good practice and let me understand the geometry and such.

Take that modified Gent's saw for a spin. You can do it!

There is nothing that can replace a good mallet when you need a good mallet, and this one looks like a good one.

Jerry Bowen