I've never hacked or chainsawed out a stock, but I've done canoe paddles with both. However, a hunka birch outta the wood lot that was going to go for firewood is a lot different than a gorgeous piece of walnut. My skill level with a broad hatchet ( I own 2) is fair, but I lack the eye to do too much on a stock. I like hewing to a line. Freeform stuff like a stock is too artsy for me I suppose. I have done beams with the chainsaw followed by an adze (I own 3, maybe 4). I still kick myself for not buying the $25.00 broad axe with an edge in the 14-16" range at a flea market. It was so cheap I just knew it had to be junk. Pretty sure I was 100% wrong on that one.
Local guy back home, (WW2 Marine and NYS Forest Ranger) used to make money on the side making hard maple stocks, birdseye and curly maple. His advise after sawing out the blank was, "You start with a horseshoe rasp and when you're 1/2" from what you want it to look like you use a piece of broken glass." What he meant was that you couldn't expect to have maple act like walnut, especially birdseye where the "eye" would sometimes pop out of the stock using a plane, or so he told me. The little with maple I've done has made me appreciate what he was saying. Walnut and cherry are butter compared to hard maple. I took a nice chip out of an old Stanely low angle block plane blade on a particularly tough piece of curly maple once. Sharp as could be and set for a real shallow cut, but I did it. There are companies out there now selling scrapers and scraper holders that are supposed to be the cats for stuff like that.
