Drywall Hammer

Bastien1337 · Jan 24, 2011

I've wondered for a long time and ive asked alot of people but can not get a straight answer or an answer that seems to be common enough to be the right one.

"Why does it look like this, what is the purpose of the hatchet side?"

whitesideout · Jan 24, 2011

the hatchet side is used for collecting your money :laughing:

OCRS · Jan 24, 2011

From the estwing site:

....... the blade will score drywall ........

I used to have one, never used the blade for that though. The dimple is nice if you have a lot of misses.

Warren · Jan 24, 2011

That notch can pull out drywall nails in tight spaces. Not to seem like a hack, but I thought the hatchet end was for fine tuning the cuts??

detroit687 · Jan 24, 2011

Lift it off the floor, tweek it end oh, hack out a chunk doing top out , I had one ran it over with a lift broke it will never buy another there's no need

OCRS · Jan 24, 2011

Way back when.... in school for the drywall union, they said the history of the shape of the hammer came from the day when the roofers were responsible for installing the wood lath. When the plasterers took over the lath, they used the same hatchet style hammer the roofers had. Or so the story goes.

Paulie · Jan 25, 2011

I really don't know what the axe part is for, I just always figured it was for cutting in the middle of the board for ducts and things.

I did come up with a youtube for a specific hammer tho. It claims the half moon towards the axe side is for smoothing the cut, kinda like a rasp.

Ashcon · Jan 25, 2011

I didn't know for sure but if I were to guess I would think the hatchet side

was useful when wood lath was used. It would be great for chopping the

thin lath instead of cutting each piece with a saw.

I think OCRS has it right.

Just my .02 cents

Chad

txgencon · Jan 25, 2011

I believe that guy was a rock hanger for real. Even had a buzz going on sounded like to me.

griz · Jan 25, 2011

Watch a hot shot board crew for awhile, well maybe 10 minutes.:w00t:

They'll use the axe part to jack a sheet around, fine tune a cut or hole. Spike it into a stud to hang their belt on. Also seen them split kindling in cold weather to get the fire going.:thumbsup:

At lunch it'll split a rack of ribs pretty quick.:clap:

oldrivers · Jan 25, 2011

we used to use the hatchet to mark ceiling trusses /joists on the top wall plates .. so that when you put up a sheet of drywall the nallers were covered , then look down the plate and see the hatchet mark where to start screws .. it was fast way to mark nailers .

Terrorron · Jan 25, 2011

oldrivers said:
we used to use the hatchet to mark ceiling trusses /joists on the top wall plates .. so that when you put up a sheet of drywall the nallers were covered , then look down the plate and see the hatchet mark where to start screws .. it was fast way to mark nailers .

One of the first "tricks of the trade" that I ever learned.:thumbsup: Very quick way of marking out and unlike using a sharpie on the poly, you dont lose your marks when the poly gets sucked up under the sheet. Real handy for pulling bad fasteners (misses) too...
The "chopping lath" thing makes sense as well, but that was way before my time...I see hatchet marks on top plates all the time when I'm tearing things apart.

Cheers, Ron

Big Shoe · Jan 25, 2011

Back in the day we used to actually measure and cut out boxes and lights. We used the hatchet end to clean the backside of the board after knocking out the board on the face side.

If your hanging board 100% of the time you will want a hatchet in your pouch. Prying,lifting,chopping marking and chisel.

As far as the guy in the video, we used to just stick the head of the nail in the butt of the handle(wood) and tack it to the board.

And the old lather story makes sense too!

oldrivers · Jan 26, 2011

that was one of the very firstthings they hadme do .. but you need to be pretty acurate as i got my marks off a little i got yelled at alot for that ...

ebivremodel · Jan 26, 2011

The PR crew I had used it to bend up my welded drywall frames. All 62 of them. Big backcharge!

CJA · Jan 27, 2011

I use mine to wedge the rock at the bottom outside corner to tighten up the top of the rock joint. Sometimes the tope of the rock joints are meeting up fine but the bottom is not tight. At that point I'll wedge it at the non-screwed sheet of rock and rock the bottom joint together. Great tool. The notch in the hatchet isn't worth a ****. They all break off and are useless.

Rockhound · Feb 1, 2011

Probably a holdover from lath and plaster days but great for nicking a stud to pull a measurement,prying a sheet a little tighter,cleaning out a nasty corner where sheating isn't cut all the way(usually around the stairwell) and best of all...making people nervous:shifty:

moore · Feb 10, 2011

The hammer end is for making the money. the hatchet end is for collections !!

Drywall Hammer

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