Cutting Jian repairs handle to tang retention.
Apr 27, 2010 13:12:10 GMT
Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2010 13:12:10 GMT
I had an issue with the tang/pommel retainer nut, i thought it was the nut itself... but it turned out that it was the tang threads. it apppears as if the threads were died before the heat treat process, and thus had shrunk the OD of the shank. a regular nut would only pass a few threads and drop straight down. i will be posting how i handled this myself in repair thread. i couldnt send it back since i had already altered the tang by driling the tang/handle to add a bamboo pin. they were going to send a new nut but i blew it off.
so i did a little research to check into something that i remembered from my sifu's best jian. i remembered that his jian did not have glued parts nor nuts and bolts. i highly doubt that it was an antique, but it was built rather solid. what i found on the net was a pin through the pommel near the handle. so i set out in a quest to reinforce this wonderful blade's hardware.
as i stated in the first paragraph, i had already drilled the tang/
handle to install a bamboo pin, which was a drudgery since the whole darned blade from pint to pommel screw was heat treated. i found localized annealing did absolutely no good and wound up burning up 4 drill bits. where did they get this thing outerspace. doggone, it wasn't like i have never done something like this before. what did ring a bell, however was the Tinker/Hanwei bastard sword blank that I made a hydrid jian from, that was equally hard to drill. it had been marquenched, which is outrageously tough. it might be possible that the cutting jian was similarly HT.
that in mind, i had to just act like i had never annealed and try to drill HT steel. think man think...cobalt bit. i went to ace hardware and got some cobalt bits. that is how i finally got through the tang for the handle pin. so planning ahead, i had also purchased the size i would need for the pommel pin. this worked wonderfully. so i drilled thru th base of the pommel, having previously measured to ensure that there was enough width of tang at that point.
now i have a secured handle and pommel ready to truly be a cutting jian. after doing all of this I filled the recess of the pommel retainer nut with a custom metal bonding agent, and no more loose nut either. here are pics of this repair.
so i did a little research to check into something that i remembered from my sifu's best jian. i remembered that his jian did not have glued parts nor nuts and bolts. i highly doubt that it was an antique, but it was built rather solid. what i found on the net was a pin through the pommel near the handle. so i set out in a quest to reinforce this wonderful blade's hardware.
as i stated in the first paragraph, i had already drilled the tang/
handle to install a bamboo pin, which was a drudgery since the whole darned blade from pint to pommel screw was heat treated. i found localized annealing did absolutely no good and wound up burning up 4 drill bits. where did they get this thing outerspace. doggone, it wasn't like i have never done something like this before. what did ring a bell, however was the Tinker/Hanwei bastard sword blank that I made a hydrid jian from, that was equally hard to drill. it had been marquenched, which is outrageously tough. it might be possible that the cutting jian was similarly HT.
that in mind, i had to just act like i had never annealed and try to drill HT steel. think man think...cobalt bit. i went to ace hardware and got some cobalt bits. that is how i finally got through the tang for the handle pin. so planning ahead, i had also purchased the size i would need for the pommel pin. this worked wonderfully. so i drilled thru th base of the pommel, having previously measured to ensure that there was enough width of tang at that point.
now i have a secured handle and pommel ready to truly be a cutting jian. after doing all of this I filled the recess of the pommel retainer nut with a custom metal bonding agent, and no more loose nut either. here are pics of this repair.