Mallets

[Marmotjr]

What's the deal with hardwood mallets?

I have a soft rubber walmart special mallet, it works great for gently tapping things into place, whacking the crap out of things that are stuck, and I've used it a few times on chisels with good success. 

Now I eventually do want to make a wooden mallet, but I want to know why I want to make one.  Are they just traditional?  One of the "required" shop tools all woodworkers must eventually make?  Eye candy for the shop? Or do they have a practical advantage over mallets of other materials?

[Brendon_t]

This answer will stink with, "it depends"

Definately not required though. I normally use a dead blow for chisel work. My qswo and cherry mallet has much less mass to it which helps with more delicate tasks. 

 

And it's fun to use a tool you made..

[OldSouthWoodCraft]

The simple answer is tradition. Mallets were traditionally made of wood and were used with traditional joinery techniques. IE. mortise and tenon, dovetail, through peg, etc. Rubber wasn't invented until the mid 1800s with nylon invented about a century later. So by the time these two modern mallet materials came out wood workers and craftsmen had long been using wooden mallets. Hope this helps.

 

PS. I've been using a rubber mallet for years and only within the last 6 months got a traditional wooden mallet.

 

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

 

 

[Eric.]

I just prefer the feel of wood on wood when I'm chiseling.  Less effort lost like with a softer mallet, no damage to chisel handles like with metal mallets, more tactile feel.  Wood on wood driving into wood.  Just feels right.

I have two carver's mallets that I grab about 99% of the time.  I also have one of those cool little Glen Drake brass mallets with the stubby handle, #3...I'll grab that for more delicate tasks, and the fact that I use Japanese chisels means I don't risk damage to the handles.  I also made a joiner's mallet a long time ago - because every woodworker has to make one of those once - but I usually only use that for pounding down my holdfasts since I hardly ever mortise by hand.

I think the ideal general-use chiseling mallet is a carver's mallet made of dense hardwood...even better if it's resin infused like some boutique makers are offering these days.

[Tpt life]

I prefer hard for finicky work as the feedback is more reliable. Hardwood, brass, whatever... For rougher work I have moved to urethane. 

[drzaius]

Just compare using a dead blow hammer & a wooden mallet when chiseling. The mallet is so much nicer to use that you'll never go back to a dead blow.

[pkinneb]

Feedback from a wooden mallet is much better than a dead blow when using chisels. Having said that both have there place for sure.

[Woodenskye]

Wooden mallets are just a tradition, because Amazon and Walmart weren't around hundreds of years ago.

[davewyo]

I like to have a few of them.

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It all comes down to feel.

I use the dead blow hammers for assembling furniture, the carver's mallets for carving and chiselling, and the wooden mallet for chiselling...unless another one is closer than the other. Then all bets are off because they all will hammer if needed.

[Brendon_t]

1 hour ago, drzaius said:

Just compare using a dead blow hammer & a wooden mallet when chiseling. The mallet is so much nicer to use that you'll never go back to a dead blow.

I challenge that as purely personal preference. For general mallet work including mortising and assembly, I went from a cheap dead blow, to a mallet from woodcraft, to a better dead blow and consider myself stuck there a as I will reach for it first. 

[Tom King]

I got tired of wearing out wooden ones (and chisel handles), and tried a Wood is Good urethane mallet.  Haven't been back to wood since.   I have used a mallet for days at a time.  The quiet, and ease on the wrist are welcome, as well as the gentle push on the chisel.  This one as the last wooden one I used.  It finally broke where the handle meets the head even though it was all the same piece of wood, and no knots. Even the Ulmia squarish ones never lasted long at all, and I ended up preferring a round mallet for the feel.  For timberframing, I use the 30 oz. Wood is Good mallet.

This picture shows the 12oz.  Wood is Good that gets the most use, as well as the soft Sorbothane mallet for taking things apart with zero possibility of damage.

If I'm taking apart an 18th Century window sash, or piece of furniture, this is the only thing I will use:  http://www.sorbothane.com/sorbothane-soft-blow-mallet.aspx   If you feel it with your fingers, you wouldn't think it would do anything.

[Eric.]

1 hour ago, Tom King said:

I

 

 

Tom, I may have mentioned this before...but you look exactly like my dad did at your age.  Same head, same beard, same white t-shirt, jeans, sneakers...and always working on something.  He had a more German nose, but other than that...it's a little spooky.  Doppelganger.

[lewisc]

The brown one is my favourite mallet made from Tasmanian Blackwood. It doesn't take much timber to make and they're fairly simple to turn. I haven't yet been able to replicate the feel of this one. It's nice to hold, feels good and the grain is pretty. It's not the heaviest mallet so if I need heavier, I'll turn to the red one which is Jarrah. 

I might've read somewhere that you're less likely to slip/miss with a round carvers mallet and hammer your hand. 

[Pete Staehling]

Wood, rubber, and dead blow all have very different properties and are far from interchangeable IMO.

That said I'll add another choice that I use and like...  I find my rawhide mallet to be very useful too.

[Marmotjr]

2 hours ago, lewisc said:

 

I might've read somewhere that you're less likely to slip/miss with a round carvers mallet and hammer your hand.

While I'll believe it if you guys say so, to me, logically, this makes no sense.   There's a reason baseball games take 3 hours and cricket takes 3 days. 

 

31 minutes ago, Pete Staehling said:

Wood, rubber, and dead blow all have very different properties and are far from interchangeable IMO.

That said I'll add another choice that I use and like...  I find my rawhide mallet to be very useful too.

That's basically a dog's chew toy on a stick then?  I can see how that would work nicely.

 

I think I'll start with a single piece turned carver's mallet, then make a hardwood deadblow, with leather faces. 

[derekcohen]

I prefer cabinetmaker mallets to round carver mallets. They offer more control and no danger of a glancing blow.

For un-hooped chisels (bench, dovetail and mortice), I use this (now) 20oz modified Veritas cabinetmaker's mallet ...

This has a Jarrah handle and hard nylon faces to prevent damage to the chisel handles. Wonderful balance to this mallet.

For morticing into very hard wood (typical for Western Australia), I used this 32oz mallet in Jarrah and Curly Marri. The extra weight comes from the inlaid brass in the head ...

For hooped Japanese bench chisels I have a couple of gennou. 

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Eric.]

1 hour ago, derekcohen said:

and no danger of a glancing blow.

I've seen this argument posed many times before.  But I dunno...unless you have the coordination of a newborn giraffe, I don't really think it's much of a factor.  I can count on one hand the number of times it's been an issue for me personally.  After all, a carver's mallet presumably was designed for a carver...who is doing work that demands much more precision and agility than simply squaring the wall of a mortise or taking a dovetail socket back to its baseline.

The cabinetmaker's mallet you posted probably has more mass so that's certainly a benefit at times.  The round head issue...I'm still skeptical that it's that much of a weakness in most cases.

Mallets are definitely going to fall into the personal preference category.

[CandorLush]

1 hour ago, Marmotjr said:

While I'll believe it if you guys say so, to me, logically, this makes no sense.   There's a reason baseball games take 3 hours and cricket takes 3 days. 

Cricket matches take three days because no one understands the rules so they are just swatting around and running back and forth until one team gives up

[Eric.]

And because they break for tea every 15 minutes.  Buncha pansies. LOL

[Immortan D]

I use a SK Tools soft hammer. It has the right weight for chiseling and it won't damage my chisels, especially when I'm using the soft side of the hammer, which is the side I use the most. It's not the right tool for carving.The handle is a bit too long.

I will eventually make a wooden mallet, but it's not a priority project for me.

[BonPacific]

I use two mallets. A lighter joiners mallet in walnut, and a big square (think Marvel's Mjolnir) mallet in ash . I like them both for different purposes. I find the walnut one to be more "precise", with a thinner angled face and long handle, so I can apply force exactly where needed if I'm knocking a glueup together. I use the ash one for mortising, as gravity will do most of the work. Previously tried a deadblow, nylon, and rubber hammer. None of them felt right, mostly the handles weren't set up for tight work.

I also want to make a little brass hammer for adjusting my wooden block plane.

[Tom King]

If you don't hit dead center in the square headed ones, it doesn't feel too good anyway.  I don't even have to think about using a round one.  It just feels more natural to me.  I don't remember ever making a glancing blow with a round one, but I do remember off center hits with a square one.  That's just me though. 

If I need to hit a large chisel, I use a large mallet.  I used both the 12 oz. and 30 oz on this piece of wood.

[Coop]

I'll go with you Tom. Anyone that can afford to have someone clean their shop for them is bound to be doing things right! 

[Tom King]

I do this for a living with two full time helpers. ( I got the hernia getting a fat lady out of a wrecked car-not moving that beam.)  The guys can each bench press over 400 pounds, and dead lift all the weight I own, which I forget how much that is.  My requirements for help are simple-strong, quiet, and know where all the tools are.  We get more comments on keeping a clean job site than anything else.  Anyone can recognize clean, if they don't know anything else.

[lewisc]

12 hours ago, Eric. said:

And because they break for tea every 15 minutes.  Buncha pansies. LOL

You're thinking of the English.

 

Off-topic: Brett Lee was one of our greatest fast bowlers. Consistently bowling at 140-160kph (85-100mph). I'd have to change my pants if he was bowling at me.