Pickaxe dimensions

[Lynn Eades]

Yes Hanno. The British style has a steel wrap that the pick head sits on. The handles you show would be U.S style.
There is a British miners pick in the same style, but it is substantially smaller. It is about half way between the Vehicle one and the infantry one that has the webb cover and the mine thingy on some handles. I'm not very knowledgeable on them either.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by Lynn Eades

The British style has a steel wrap that the pick head sits on. The handles you show would be U.S style.

But the heading tool layout photo shows a plain wooden helve WITHOUT steel reinforcements?

Do you mean to say Canada used the U.S. style and not British?

In a way that would make sense, as the packing list states the material remains with the vehicle when delivered to customer. So the tools were supplied ex-works, and were thus sourced in North America, correct?

Anyway, let's keep digging

[rob love]

I have always differentiated the British pick from the US pick by the extra shank on the pick axe head for the US one, vs the no shank on the British one. As Lynn mentions, the British one has the metal reinforced handle at the head, and a ring on the bottom. The US handle is all wood and larger diameter.

I have found that pretty much any Canadian made vehicle that has a brackets for the pick axe, used the British pattern of pick axe head and handle. I had not noticed before that the pick axe in the photo of the cmp tool layout is a US pattern version.

A surplus store in Calgary Alberta had hundreds of the WW2 Cdn pick axe heads and dozens of the handles, all to the British pattern.

In the 1950s, the Canadian military went to the M-series vehicles (aside from the Centurion, the Ferret, and the Triumph Motorcycle) and the US pattern pick became the norm. When I was still in the service, you would get the odd WW2 Cdn pick axe head mixed in with the US ones when ordered from supply.

[Michael R.]

Originally Posted by rob love

I have always differentiated the British pick from the US pick by the extra shank on the pick axe head for the US one, vs the no shank on the British one. As Lynn mentions, the British one has the metal reinforced handle at the head, and a ring on the bottom. The US handle is all wood and larger diameter...

Paraphrased ...

The ferrule may be found marked ‘UNIVERSAL 2’ on one side.
The tool image layouts found in the Ford Canada universal carrier parts manuals, FUC-02, FUC-03 and FWC-02 show a pick helve with ferrule.

(British part numbers in FUC-03)

F8B65663-D0FC-42A5-B078-B6DC1015DFFE.jpg DC91EC37-767A-4E03-A908-4D6FE8C53A28.jpg 0ECCF8AC-2C21-4C10-B7F9-EF4B43F9A2C0.jpeg

56472AE1-DD09-4A42-87B6-7CAE1058AD8F.jpeg

[David Dunlop]

Would the British Master Reference Manual list detailed specifications for JA 0072 and JA 0073?

David

[motto (RIP)]

The nomenclature being used confuses me. In Australia the implement being discussed is known as a pick. I have never heard it referred to as a pickaxe. No part of it is an axe. It has a chisel at one end and a spike the other.
The Americans seem to have settled on the pick mattock as their standard on board digging implement. That is what their vehicle mountings and standard U.S. pioneer rack were designed to take. They are not readily come by in Australia. I picked one up (no pun intended) in the Northern Territory where the Americans were involved in an exercise some years ago and it has been very handy around the property. I have found it to be a more useful tool than a pick.
Just as an aside, when we were staying on South Sea Common Portsmouth prior to crossing over to Normandy in 1984 there were a couple of reenactors dressed as MPs on gate duty who were carrying white painted pick handles.
I said to them I hoped the handles were balsa wood. The response was"they're not balsa, they're bloody good hickory". They took the job seriously.

David

[David Herbert]

Motto,
You are quite right that the term 'pickaxe' is misleading but certainly in the UK it is the normal general term for anything that even vaguely resembles a pick. Similarly I am used to the term 'mattock' being used to describe the American standard tool that has a spike at one end and a digging blade at the other.

This is like the use of 'crow bar' to describe any long bar used for levering things despite all the variants having correct specific names.

David

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by rob love

I have always differentiated the British pick from the US pick by the extra shank on the pick axe head for the US one, vs the no shank on the British one. As Lynn mentions, the British one has the metal reinforced handle at the head, and a ring on the bottom. The US handle is all wood and larger diameter.

Originally Posted by Lynn Eades

Hanno, The (later)WWII handle did not have the band at the grip end. The pick head end will have the steel sleeve, to go with the head shown. (at least, I've never seen one that didn't) The logic is that the long hole in the American one stabilizes the handle in the head, whereas the smaller and shorter hole requires the steel sleeve to stabilize the head on the handle.

I've been wondering about the what you meant with the "extra shank on the US one vs. the no shank on the British one". Remember I am not a native English speaker.

Doing a picture search combined with Lynn's remark about the "long hole" I think I now have a grip on what the US pick looks like.

Note: the Oxford Dictionary of English states that both "pick" and "pickaxe" have the same meaning, that being a tool with a long handle at right angles to a curved iron or steel bar with a point at one end and a chisel or point at the other, used for breaking up hard ground or rock.

Pickaxe.jpg

[David Herbert]

In my experience all civilian British picks look exactly like the one in the above post #25. It is only British military picks that have the metal reinforcement at the business end of the handle. I have always assumed that this was because they were stowed separated and repeatedly separating the civilian type would cause wear to the wood. The Americans presumably just went with standard civilian tools. As usual Canada got caught in the middle !

David

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Good picture of a British pick and helve made in 1943 by Hardypick Limited, Sheffield (part of the kit of a Daimler Dingo in the USA).

It clearly shows the shank is about half as high (deep) as on the US one, therefore the British helve has a metal reinforcement for stability of the pick head.

Thus far, I have only seen the US type fitted on / supplied with CMP trucks.

26959D19-21AE-45FD-8F14-776080F6C882.jpeg 99D81AD2-6900-4A33-9735-70751A801585.jpeg

[Bruce Parker (RIP)]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

Good picture of a British pick and helve made in 1943 by Hardypick Limited, Sheffield (part of the kit of a Daimler Dingo in the USA).

It clearly shows the shank is about half as high (deep) as on the US one, therefore the British helve has a metal reinforcement for stability of the pick head.

What do period British civilian picks look like? Do they also have the narrow shank and metal reinforced helve? Or is that unique to army picks?

[Chris Suslowicz]

Originally Posted by Lynn Eades

Yes Hanno. The British style has a steel wrap that the pick head sits on. The handles you show would be U.S style.
There is a British miners pick in the same style, but it is substantially smaller. It is about half way between the Vehicle one and the infantry one that has the webb cover and the mine thingy on some handles. I'm not very knowledgeable on them either.

That's probably the "Mattock, Telegraph", which has a pick and horizontal blade head and a steel wedge on the tip of the helve (presumably to aid in burying cables, as it wouldn't last long if used as a prybar).

I have an unissued one in the hoard, er: collection, but the helve was supplied 'unfinished' and won't go through the hole in the mattock head - I need to take a spokeshave to it, I suppose.

Chris.

[Lang]

Not as complete as Collin's post but Welland Vale Story from another site. Interesting how there are small differences.

http://progress-is-fine.blogspot.com...s-country.html

[rob love]

I was at one of the QMs on base to pick up some old tarpaulins to use here at the museum. The Sgt invited me to look down a row of shelving to look for anything MLVW, which are now obsolete, to see if we wanted it. While I found nothing of interest for the MLVW, I did spot two lonely no2 handles sitting by themselves. There was a stack of heads, but all were the US style. I pointed out that the handles would not fit the US heads, and a quick check showed they went right through. So they were added to the donation to the museum.

Although painted over the years, they were in fairly good condition, with one missing the lower ring. That one still has remnants of the Hercules decal on it, along with the Turner Day stamped on the handle. It was slightly shorter than the other one, at just 35 inches.
The second handle is a new one on me. It is embossed "Excelsior" and "2" on one side, and on the other side is "ST MARYS BEAVER" "Hespeler" which is located in Ontario, Canada. I was able to clean dis-assemble it, repaint the metal parts and clean the paint off the handle. That one will be going back to that unit on their Mk1 carrier which I am finishing off. It is 36" in length, which is a perfect fit for the carrier.

The head is one of the WV43 marked heads.