Caulking mallet and irons - photo

[Jon]

Caulking mallet and irons, for wooden shipbuilding.




Previously:

1942 enormous rope drop hammer - photo
Old hammer+anvil headache treatment - photo
Hammer with collated nail dispenser by michaelyoung4190 - video
Hammer + ratchet in one - photo
Hand engraving a hammer - GIF
Four-sided hammer - GIF
Cell phone hammer - photo
1877 Le Creusot world's largest steam hammer

[Philip Davies]

I believe that you can see on the underside of the left hand mallet that there is a saw cut. I have read that as the caulking material was compacted in the seam, the tone of the mallet would become higher pitched, which is the purpose of the cut. Do you have any other views? I don’t recognise the woods from which they’ve been made.

[mklotz]

Is the shape of the mallet dictated by some element of the caulking process (about which I know very little)? Or is the shape simply a traditional hand-me-down?