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My creativity involving Evil Dead stretches back quite some time. I ran EvilDeadChainsaws.com from 2005 up to the start of 2008. This was a hobby company selling replica Evil Dead 'hand' chainsaws. You can find a link to a complete archived version of the company website at the bottom of the page.
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The idea was first started around July of 2002, when I bought a Homelite XL chainsaw off EBay. As a pet project, I modified this to make it look like the real working chainsaw from ‘Evil Dead II’, although this only meant a small amount of work changing the handle shape and adding a grill to the side, and I was happy to leave it at that.
Before starting EDC I spent much of my spare time working on a range of special effects gags in my spare time; like trick machetes & compressed air squibs. I was sinking money into new ideas like there was no tomorrow, but not doing anything with them once they were finished, so not seeing any return on the money I was investing. Around 2005 someone suggested I should try to sell some of my effects rather than just making & storing each one, then moving on to the next idea. After a few months thinking about it I thought the best way to start out would be to keep it simple and concentrate on one really good idea, maybe introducing other items later on, and any profits could be used to fund additional new effects ideas without spending vast amounts of my own money.
During this period I discovered NightmareGloves.com run by Anders Eriksen in Denmark, He makes replica Freddy Kruger gloves. He gave me the idea to do much the same thing; find a prop I can replicate and setup a website selling them. After a little research I settled upon the chainsaw from ‘Evil Dead II’.
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From May to December of 2005 I prototyped the idea until I knew I could make something I could sell. I launched the website around December of 2005 with the first of the 3 model saws; the workshed saw. The remaining two saw models were designed & added to the website by the middle of 2006.
After I first started EDC I found out about the first Toronto run of Evil Dead The Musical, and I emailed them in December of 2005 to see if they’d be interested in buying one of my saws. The production run that was well underway at that point and they decided to stick with the trusted props they already had rather than chopping & changing mid production run.
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In May of 2006, I was emailed back regarding the upcoming New York production and it went from there. To date I have supplied saws to the 2006 New York run, the 2007 Toronto run & the 2008 Korean Run. Tom Sullivan has one of my saws in his travelling Evil Dead museum, this was one of the first two chainsaws supplied to the 2006 New York run, although by now it looks rather sorry for itself, being battered & broken after all the abuse its taken.
The Musical's saws were a fine compromise between reducing the weight to the bear minimum (as the actor has to dance around with it), making it very easy to maintain, and trying to keep the look right. Having leant lessons from each previous saw, I feel the final pair of saws sent to the Korean run came very close to achieving this fine balance. I also introduced many of the improvements from the musicals saws into my standard line of saws, if they survived the musical run relatively intact then they would easily be strong enough for the odd fancy dress party.
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At the start of 2007 I decided to stop making Deluxe 'working' saws and concentrate on the standard three saws. This was for a number of reasons, but mainly because they took so much time to make. A 'working' saw took roughly 5 times longer to make than a 'non-working' saw. I also always had issues finding a reliable supplier of battery packs as the individual batteries had to be configured in a particular (non-standard) way to fit into the tight space inside the saw. The price of a deluxe saw was only double that of a standard saw, and I was never able to find a happy balance between getting a decent price for each saw, and making the price low enough so that units were sold. Those factors combined coupled with the fact I also had a full time job working in special effects, meant I had to make a choice.
I called time on EvilDeadChainsaws around the start of 2008. Even only producing 'standard' chainsaws, all my spare time was being eaten up, which left me no time to spend on making other new effects gags, and that was the reason EDC was started. Because I was investing any spare money I made into prototyping new modifications or getting new equipment specifically for producing chainsaws, I wasn't really earning anything out of it either. Finally I decided to pull the plug and move on. I produced my final two chainsaws at the end of 2007, and I think they are my best work, one was made for me, and one for my final customer.
Since shutting up shop, I have been contacted by a fair number of people asking for advice or help with their own chainsaw projects, so I have decided to share some of the information & experience I built up over the years. I wouldn't see much point in writing out a step-by-step guide, as I used a lot of industrial machinery (such as a metal lathe, bandsaw, disc sander, pillar drill, bench table saw, slide mitre saw, metal shear, etc...) and have professional experience of things like silicone mould making & casting, much of which would be inaccessible and therefore useless to the average person. Instead, I have uploaded an ZIP file containing a number of folders, photos & files which people can check through and draw on where they are able.
In this ZIP file you'll find various files & folders, including a number of PDF files, which You'll need Adobe Acrobat 5+ or equivalent to read;
Prototyping & Production Progress Raw Photos folder contains the vast majority of my personal photo album (over 1000 images, which run in chronological order) covering every point of EvilDeadChainsaw's history; from the first Homelite XL chainsaw bought on Ebay in 2002, prototyping the first saw and building the workshed background, how the chainsaws were constructed, the Musicals' various chainsaws, right up to the final saws in 2008. As you will be able to see from the photo collection, with every saw I produced I learned lessons and made little improvements in the look or construction; to make it stronger and lighter.
Offline Website folder has the most complete form of the EvilDeadChainsaws.com website, viewable offline. Over the years sections were added and removed to the site, but for the purposes of preservation, everything have been composited together here.
EDC Deluxe Saw Instructions.pdf was the instruction sheet sold with all three of the deluxe chainsaws.
Evil Dead Chainsaws Design Notebook was my working notebook, used to record every idea, drawing, observation & note made over the life of EvilDeadChainsaws, from the first doodlings to the final saws. This is not a step-by-step guide, it was only really intended as a reference notebook for me personally.
Parts List - Deluxe Chainsaw & Parts List - Standard Chainsaw is a complete list of all the parts I used for each saw. These lists were revised & updated with each new improvement I made, but these are correct as of the final saws I produced.
Above is a link to a complete online archived version of the company website. It's only included for posterity, and as a piece of internet Evil Dead history just to be looked at. I no longer make or sell replica saws, the company isn't re-starting and you cannot order anything.
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