getting a jian

thanks a lot, my local sword store is having a sale on the cutting jian and it's quite a steal so i think i will go that.

Hello, my first post as well. I'm a 25 year experience Taijiquan instructor trained in China and own one of the Cold Steel jian (gim). My ranting here is, to my knowledge, only specific to one style of Taiji and not intended to be general, so if your experience differs I beg your indulgence.

The Cold Steel is nice looking and very sturdy for a factory made sword, and would be serviceable (God forbid) in a fight, I believe, but the hilt isn't exactly right for my purposes.

Firstly, the hilt is too short, and leaves the weapon point heavy. A significantly longer handle and slightly shorter blade than usually found on Chinese swords (both jian and dao, antique and modern) are helpful for clearly applying the hilt as an integral part of the weapon for striking, two handed work and trapping.

Secondly, the knoblike pommel on the Cold Steel jian (an attempt to balance the point, I'm assuming) makes it difficult to drop the blade flat from the wrist for "dust mopping" intercepting moves.

What I like about the Cold Steel handle is that the guard is rounded where the hand holding the hilt makes contact with it. Lots of Chinese swords have squared off surfaces that can damage the hand during fast training.

The description given above of the Practical sword makes it sound more useful to me, and I'm looking forward to checking it out.

Thanks for listening, cheers!

Another thing about the Cold Steel--yes it has a great, sharp tough blade, but I found the fluted wood grip really uncomfortable--I may have soft hands, but they were quite sore after even short cutting sessions with that sword.

Hello again. Yes, the CS jian's handle isn't unusually short for jian in general, it is just a bit shorter than what I would like. The balance feels point heavy to me, I'm used to massive hilts, I guess, and there isn't enough weight in the hilt to quite balance the blade for what I've been shown to do. The jian for Taijiquan was described to me as worked like a scalpel, light and extremely sharp for fast draw cuts on tendons, arteries and veins, not chopping off heads and arms. Cold Steel advertises their sword as "wu jian" which is supposed to be heavier, and I knew that going in so I can't complain too much. It is a nice sword, I've had it six months, I do train with it fairly often. I've only had to tighten the pommel once (I haven't done cutting with it, tho) but I'm going to keep looking for one that is made more to my liking.

I've got a wooden jian that was made about 30 or so years ago by an accomplished practitioner of the style I'm studying. Here's a photo of that sword, the CS jian, and a modern wooden jian for comparison:



It was explained to me that the blade was about 3" too short for me, that the sword was originally made for a much shorter person (I'm 5'8") and it is supposed to be a single hand jian, although there is two handed technique in our single hand forms. You can see the hilt is relatively large, even with the short blade, and it has to do with the preferred use of the handle and pommel for fighting. I've been using the sword since 1992. It has been damaged and repaired many times, you can see some nicks and dings if you look closely at the photo. I'll try to get some better photos in the daylight tomorrow...

Cheers!

What was that "other" jian maker? Jin Shi? Yes, I believe that was the name. I've heard that they can provide a very basic jian for a reasonable amount. Most people go to him for custom jians tho.

Again, I've only heard about them thru this forum, so I don't have any first hand experience.