I've have had one for a long time, I think I ordered it from Bailie's a loong time ago. Some crappy weather had me bumping around in the shop so these are what happened. The handle's are from a rejected hand railing for the stairs. I was going to use this long pole (Hornbeam) but it's so hard that It wouldn't take a screw and after snapping 4 screws in it because I was not able to pre drill the holes, I used a nicer & straighter piece of Ash. It is very tight grained and the local folk say that they used to use hornbeam for the pitman arm on sickle mowers & it was strong. The metal was in my various "uncatagorized excess material" piles. Very crude handles but comfortable. A friend stopped by today and sanded my 1/2 mile of ice I call a driveway and one of them fell in his truck.
I find them very helpful, esp. stacking off the splitter pile. I cut at 26" and the hookeroon to one and stand it up, grab top with left hand then re pick down at the bottom & throw on the stack. This ol fat boy does not like to bend over I highly recomend them along with a pulp hook. Real handy loading the splitter with icy, soggy rounds or general moving rounds. I can carry one too big for "one handed" with one hand and a smaller one with the other. If you get down to Conway, check out Labonville's store.
Bending over constantly gets old and bothers me after awhile. I was in there a few weeks ago, loads of great stuff, carharts, things to make the hoard bigger!
I was surprised how well the pulp hook works and how much I end up using it, even for moving big rounds around.
I'd like a small forge myself. My first "shot" at making the hook was heating a 3/4"round c/r with a rosebud. Too slow & too cold… I think.
You can make a forge for cheap. A old charcoal grill a pipe running through it with some holes it to supply air to the coal and a hair dryer for the air supply.
