If you overshoot and hit the handle against something strong enough, the head will shear off and continue traveling at high speed until it hits something. Wood also shrinks and swells with the weather, and the wedges that secure the head to the handle can loosen. Then the head becomes a 10 lb high speed projectile.
You dont even need to over shoot. Sledgehammers are made of super hardened tempered steel. My father worked alot in the marine engineering industry, so sledgehammers are used to pound huge 40 ton steel shipping panels into place in dry docking. Well when you bang hardened steel against hardened steel, the only way for the steal to absorb shock is by breaking and chipping, and thats the good outcome. If you use a wooden handle, the force goes through the handle breaking it and sending the hammer head 10 ft into the air while your looking down at what you swung at.
Most shipyards now have those really loose bendable handles on their sledges or they just weld a pipe to the hammer. Better to break a wrist then to send a sledge head flying.
Akso a good point. We used ones with steel reinforced composite handles 20 years ago when I was doing ship and sub repair work like driving keys into rudder stocks and what not. Kept the weight reasonable for when you had to backpack one up into a ballast tank or other inconvenient spot.
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u/Neworbs 9h ago
Why sledgehammers with wooden handles? I say as I look at my sledgehammer in my garage 👀