MALLET OF THE HOCKEY GODS

I decided I needed a mallet. I've seen many mallets that I like : Mjolnir Mallet by OnceUponaWorkbench , Maxwell's Purple Hammer by aisaacs3 , and Jimmy Diresta's brass collared mallet

The problem is... those aren't my style. I needed something that reflected my personality a bit more. I love hockey and also love repurposing things, so I decided to make my own out of hockey sticks.

Materials

• 3 wood hockey sticks. All should be the same style (jr. or sr.) so the thicknesses are the same
• 1 aluminum hockey stick. Can be wood if you want. I wanted aluminum because I really like the old Easton aluminum style.
• Some bolts with threaded inserts (optional)
• Wood Glue
• Hockey Tape

Tools

• Mitre Saw
• Jointer (similar result can be achieved with table saw, bandsaw, or even a sander in a pinch)
• Sander
• Drill Press or Drill
• Clamps
• Hack saw
• Dremel or Router
• Eye and Hearing protection

The first step is to prepare your materials. If using second hand sticks, like I did, remove all old tape and cut off the blade portion of the sticks as they are not necessary. Picture 1 is me removing the knob tape from one of the sticks I received from a friend. Picture 2 is me using a hacksaw to cut the aluminum stick to length. It will be used for the handle. Picture 3 is of the 3 wood shockey sticks cut to size and laid out to find an appealing layout. Picture 4 is a rough mockup of what the mallet will look like in the end. The last picture I thought was interesting. 2 different stick manufacturers and the lamination patters of the wood are opposite. I don't know if it's because one stick was supposed to be flexy and the other was supposed to be stiff, but i thought it was neat.

Hockey sticks have rounded edges and that's not good for gluing, so I marked which edges I wanted to keep and I rant the rest of the edges through the jointer to flatten them. This will provide smooth surfaces for gluing. Many DIYers don't have jointers so in a pinch, a band saw, table saw or even a sander could be used to achieve similar results here

Spread the glue evenly on both pieces, line them up and clamp them tight. Be sure to leave them long enough. Don't be impatient here.

I realized that my handle was going to end up being thicker than my middle section of stick pieces, so I had to router a channel into theoutside sections of the mallet to accept the handle so everything would fit and glue up tight. I could have used a router, but mine is pretty large and clunky so I opted for a Dremel tool with a router-style attachment. it worked well. One til here is to score the line first with a knife so you don't need to get as close to the line with the dremel. After I scored the line, the dremel would get close and the wood would peel off nicely and the edge was smooth.

The middle section of sticks will need to be cut to make space for the handle. Use the mitre saw to cut them in half. In the second and 3rd pictures you can see the ends sticking out. Those will be trimmed off after the glue up

I inherited a PILE of these bolts with threaded sleeve inserts. The insert will go on one end section of boards, and the bolt will go through the opposite side and pull everything together. 2 bolts on one side and 2 bolt on the other, essentially sandwiching everything tight. In addition to the glue, this thing should not budge.

Once the inserts were in, I pounded them with a hammer to make them flush. I had to cut the bolts because they were too long for this application, but they work all the same even after being cut. I used a forstner bit to make a larger hole so the head of the bolt would sit flush.

Use the mitre saw to flatten the ends. This is before the glue up. Everything is held in place with the bolts.

I wanted to salvage the fake Gretzky signature, so I positioned the handle as such and trimmed it off right under the signature. After the handle is trimmed, glue everything up and tighten the bolts. As the glue is drying, occasionally tighten the clamps and bolts to ensure everything is snug as a bug in a rug.

I wanted to add a bit of personality to the face of the mallet and something I'd seen on other mallets was a chamfer around the face. Again, I could have used the router, but I opted to use my belt/disc sander to get a relatively uniform chamfer on each face of the mallet.

Every hockey players knows that they have their own style of know taping, so I added my personal tape job to the handle.

This was a really fun project to do. I hope it holds up and I get a lot of use out of it. Tossed a couple pics of Gus (golden Retriever) and Kella (black lab) because who doesn't like to see the furry shop helpers? If you liked this, please toss me a vote in the build a tool contest!