Founder member of our heritage collection, Mick Tighe, saw this ice axe on the internet and thought it looked a bit unusual so he bought it and it is unusual. The absence of a maker’s name or any other markings often implies that something is homemade and we suspect that’s the case with this axe. However, the quality of engineering is very high for a homemade item though plenty of climbers were/are engineers with access to good workshops. It could be some kind of prototype and if we assume it dates from 1970/1980 then it would have been pretty innovative. All we really know is that it’s very unusual, very collectable and that Mick Tighe was very happy with his purchase!