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Post by Groo on Feb 22, 2012 22:16:19 GMT
Hey everybody This might sound a little macabre, but I heard somewhere that cutting tatami was equivalent to cutting off someone's arm? This doesn't sound right to me.... maybe cutting a hand off at the wrist maybe?? at least not a single mat. Is it more like a couple mats wrapped around bamboo is similar to cutting off an arm? at the humerus?? I hope this isn't too gruesome a question!
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Post by Elheru Aran on Feb 22, 2012 22:21:06 GMT
I believe that is the given reason, yes. Given that the original version of tameshigiri in the past was using actual dead bodies, this was the closest equivalent settled upon by the Japanese once that particular practice was outlawed. One wonders what all they cut in the process of arriving at that conclusion...
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Post by Groo on Feb 22, 2012 22:38:24 GMT
so one tatami mat is like cutting through either the forearm (through the radius and ulna) or the upper arm (the humerus)?? I would have thought you'd at least need a thick bamboo to represent the bones......
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Post by ShooterMike on Feb 22, 2012 22:51:48 GMT
Tatami is MUCH more cut resistant that hide and muscle. So I think the thinking was that, given the consistent resistance of tatami, it very roughly equates to cutting hide, muscle and bone together, of a similar diameter or size.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Feb 22, 2012 22:52:46 GMT
See this post ... viewtopic.php?f=22&t=9210Living bones cut quite easily, even spines. Thin dry bamboo is harder than most bone. I've cut a lot of both.
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Post by Groo on Feb 22, 2012 23:02:11 GMT
WOW! interesting yes I was wondering how living bone would be different in hardness than dry bone... I'm almost afraid to ask what live bones you've cut!!
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Post by Deleted on Feb 22, 2012 23:17:48 GMT
Carnivores, herbivores, omnivores, those kind of bones. I'll leave it at that.
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Post by Lonely Wolf Forge on Feb 22, 2012 23:34:30 GMT
youd be surprised how easily and how effortlessly limbs become severed from the body...if anything tatami is harder to cut than the real thing because it is softer and has give to it. No effort in this swing...i swung it a medium speed with no power behind it whatsoever and let the blade do its own work, this particular blade is not even paper cutting sharp.
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Post by Groo on Feb 23, 2012 0:46:13 GMT
WOW! this has been a real eye opener for me! I always thought decapitation and dismemberment was hard! I thought for decapitation and that you needed a really heavy duty sword like a Da Dao! (Not that I ever want to do it on an actual person!) But it is just interesting ,if a little macabre!
so even a jian could probably be used in a skilled hand to cut off the villain's arm in Mos Eisley cantina like Ben Kenobi :lol:
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George
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Post by George on Feb 23, 2012 10:00:49 GMT
Yep some tanto sized blades are even made to cut off limbs. Take James Williams Hisshou for example
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Post by Lonely Wolf Forge on Feb 23, 2012 14:24:25 GMT
you could take a head off with a bowie knife and good edge alignment.
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Post by Groo on Feb 23, 2012 19:40:16 GMT
WHAAAT? !?!?!?!?!? I actually usually use a jian, I just never thought it was possible to lop off limbs with it! It's almost as surprising as being told a swiss army knife can cleave skulls! :lol:
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Post by Elheru Aran on Feb 23, 2012 21:32:53 GMT
It's surprising how fragile flesh and bone is, isn't it? Gives you a new appreciation for why we came up with all kinds of armour through the ages.
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Post by Krasus23 on Feb 23, 2012 21:44:34 GMT
I've been cutting tatami (real ones and mugen dachi) and I have been told it is the same consistancy as cutting an arm as well but I have doubts about that as well.
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George
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Post by George on Feb 24, 2012 1:00:33 GMT
People shouldn't doubt what the Japanese changed for the use of real limbs. Because no-one that i know has cut through a human arm we must trust that because the Japanese DID they would find a better substitute. I mean we trust everything else they made in blade design so why pick and choose when its all relevant? Cutting through mats is by far the hardest thing i have come across to cut (i haven't been out destroying my blade on trees to fully test the theory out) Anyone who is an alright cook will know how easy meat and bones are to cut through with just a knife. Human biology would be very similar as the basic biological makeup is the same.
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Post by Krasus23 on Feb 24, 2012 2:05:34 GMT
I'm just basing it off what I have Learned through my medical studies. I have been told that tatami mats have the same consistancy as the bone in a human arm. That I disagree with but that is my opinion through what I have learned about the human body. With bamboo in the middle I do believe it could be much more similar.
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Post by Lonely Wolf Forge on Feb 24, 2012 2:09:28 GMT
i agree with you Krasus, however, if your sword will cut tatami, i can damn near guruntee you it WILL cut off an arm or a head. Because tatami is harder to cut than live flesh and bone.
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Post by Vue on Feb 24, 2012 16:11:11 GMT
Traditionally tameshigiri targets was water soaked Tatami rolled with a bamboo inner core, cutting Tatami by itself is modern thing as bamboo is not really accessible for most. You could use wooden dowels instead of bamboo and that will give you a similar consistency of flesh and bones.
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SeanF
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Post by SeanF on Feb 24, 2012 19:33:56 GMT
Wooden dowels are always old dead & dried wood. If you can get your hands on wets as opposed to kiln dried it might* work, but I don't think I have ever seen such a product.
*approximate human bone. You can still cut through dowels, it is just different from what we are trying to approximate.
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Post by ShooterMike on Feb 24, 2012 20:56:22 GMT
Sean, a point you're missing is that you roll the dowel rod in the tatami dry, then soak the complete roll. Hardwood dowels, at least fresh ones that haven't been allowed to sit outside and dry out, soak up water almost as well as tatami. I've cut tatami with 1" dowel rods in both conditions ("fresh" in the white, and darkened from sitting outside for a year or so) and there is a huge difference. The fresher rods cut very much like live bone. The darker weathered rods are very brittle and tend to break instead of cut.
Next question is, of course, "How can you know that?"
Yes, I have cut through living hide, muscle and bone (non-human) with an ATrim sword and then cut tatami, with and without dowel rods in the roll, with the same sword in an unaltered state. It's very comparable in overall consistency, though any one part is different. And no, I will not share the details publicly. So please don't ask publicly.
What we're really getting at here, what the Japanese schools of swordsmanship assert, is that a tatami mat roll is similar to cutting a living appendage of roughly the same diameter, all other things being equal. A roll the diameter of an arm roughly equals an arm of that size. A multi-mat roll the diameter of a leg roughly equates to that part of a leg.
Also, flexed muscle cuts MUCH more easily than relaxed muscle, as flexed muscle fibers tend to pull themselves apart as the blade starts to slice, while relaxed muscle fibers tend to absorb the cut and not seperate nearly as much. This can easily be replicated even on dead muscle tissue (read that "joints of meat"). So there is substantial variability in the equation, at best.
What you really cannot ever simulate with a cutting target is how a body moves in a fight. And the movement makes more difference than the comparable resistance in cutting material. For instance, who's ever punched a heavy bag, then punched a sparring partner with the same force, only to have the blow not inpart nearly as much energy into the sparring partner because your sparing partner knew how to move with the blow to lessen its impact? Same with swords.
So in reality, any cutting medium is only more or less equivalent to an unmoving opponent. As such, it really only validates the sword's potential and the wielder's technique (speed and edge alignment within the parameters of the movement), in a vaccuum.
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