Eli5 – Putting on a new axe head.

Question

I’ve always done it this way because I’ve been told it’s how you do it.

Why do you smack the bottom of the axe handle to make the axe head creep up the handle, instead of just placing the handle on the ground and smashing the head onto the new handle.

I fail to see how the end result is different.

In: 6

Answer 1

You are taking advantage of the momentum of the axe head. The axe head have a lot more weight then the handle and therefore more momentum. Changing the momentum of the handle is therefore much easier then changing the momentum of the axe head. When you hit the axe head to make it move most of the energy is spent trying to overcome the momentum of the axe head trying to make it move. And not much energy is used to overcome the friction between the axe head and the handle. But if you hit the handle to move it then a lot less energy is used to get the handle moving and more energy is available to overcome the friction.