My trowel snapped in half while trying to scrape a plaster layer off a Roman wall in Bath last month

I was carefully chipping away at this plaster in a little dig trench near the Roman Baths and the handle just split clean off, sending me stumbling backward into a pile of loose dirt, and now I'm wondering if anyone else has had a tool fail at the worst possible moment?

3 comments

3 Comments

masonm854mo ago

You ever try to finish a dig with duct tape and a prayer? Keep a spare trowel in your kit from now on, especially on the wet stuff. That Roman plaster's a beast, and the cheap handles can't take the torque.

taylorlewis4mo ago

Does anyone else just save the old broken handles to whittle a backup finger-groove trowel from, or is that just my pack-rat instinct kicking in?

irisg572mo ago

Tbh I'm with you on the cheap handle thing. Last season I snapped three of those flat aluminum WHS handles before I finally gave up and ordered a batch of the old school Marshalltowns with the full tang. The first day I took one out on a wet Roman site in York I hit a really compacted mortar layer and twisted it hard enough I thought for sure it was toast. Nope. That handle just took it and kept going. I've also learned to keep a backup trowel in my boot top now not just for wet conditions but for when you're crawling into a tight trench and can't reach your bag. That little trick saved me from crawling out mid context more than once.