YarinoHanzo Dotanuki Katana Review
Oct 18, 2012 13:55:51 GMT
Post by Jussi Ekholm on Oct 18, 2012 13:55:51 GMT
Introduction
Well I received probably the best customer service I've ever gotten. Francesco the owner of YarinoHanzo sent me an email, that he was unhappy that I've gotten bad products from them (I did not contact him, he contacted me). We sent few emails, and I understood what sort of mishaps there had been. Most of the members here probably know that when dealing with Chinese companies there will be communication errors at some point. Well Francesco suggested that he would send me a blade that would better fit the quality that he wants YarinoHanzo products to be, as the earlier ones were not up to his standards. So I kindly accepted his generosity.
Historical overview
Dotanuki school originated in the village of Dotanuki in Higo province during the late Sengoku period, and continued c. 1532-1615. These swords were famous for their very good cutting edge. Other than that these blades are usually mentioned not being very high quality. Usually Dotanuki blades had wide mihaba and thick kasane. One source mentions that their general appearance was very blunt, and having absolutely no gracefulness or any quality.
In the production sword world, beefy blades have been occasionally called Dotanuki by some makers for several years.
Full disclosure
So I was blown away by the kindness. I would be getting my hands on good quality factory second, I'll just note that this sword is a factory second. I'm now more aware of the Italian sword laws, and I now know that the sword will be blunt. I have kinda mixed feelings of what to expect, as the earlier products did disappoint me, but the owner is genuine nice guy, and knows about swords and is involved in the process (not just buying regular swords straight from the forge) so I was really eager to see what would come. I have never before received a free sword in my collecting years, so that could affect my review. However I try to be as honest as I can be, and Francesco hoped for an honest review too.
Initial Impressions
Well I was expecting a sword in plastic wrap, but the package was whole different. There was a nice black box in the package. I'm generally not too fond to Chinese made boxes as they usually seem gaudy to me, but this one was nice.
Then after opening the box there was pretty good quality swordbag.
Then after opening the bag I got my hands on the sword. Immidiately after grabbing saya I felt this would be a beefy blade. There were no hishigami used with this sword by mistake, so the wrap was expected to look like that. When I drew the blade out I thought it was of very good quality.
Statistics
Nagasa: 72,8cm, 2 shaku 3 sun 8 bu
Overall length: 103,8cm
Overall length in saya: 107,5cm
Motohaba: 3,45cm
Sakihaba: 2,5cm
Motokasane: 8mm
Sakikasane: 6mm
Sori: 2,6cm
Kissaki: 4,3cm
Nakago: 24,5cm
Tsuka: 28cm
Sugata: Shinogi-zukuri
Mune: Iori
Hamon: Suguha
Hada: -
Hi: Bo-hi
Steel: 1060
Components
The blade is very good. I like the sugata, and the lines are crisp. Personally I'm a big fan of suguha hamon, so it's a plus also, and it's nice suguha. I like the fact that bo-hi ends before habaki. Kissaki is very well propotioned and ko-shinogi matches the fukura pretty well. The blade has a mirror finish, which makes taking photos bit difficult with my limited skills. I really like the blade, it feels intimidating. As I love big swords, I wish this would have c. 10cm or more in length, but I think this length will please more users. I just wish the blade would be sharp, I really liked the feel of this sword.
Habaki is really nice, and it fits really well. Among the best habaki fits I've seen on production stuff. It doesn't touch the blade sides pretty much at all in the front, and it builds up towards tsuka, plus due to large motohaba, it's probably custom fitted to these models. Unfortunately habaki is so tightly on, I haven't tried removing it to see the machi, as I would probably damage the blade or habaki in removal process.
Saya is of ok/good quality. Top part kuroishime, lower part kuroro, I kinda like how it feels in hand. As this was 2nd there were no buffalo horn parts, but I don't really care about those anyway. Saya feels solid and pretty well made.
Seppa are of good quality. Tsuba is nice sukashi tsuba of mokko shape. Don't know the material possibly iron but it took some beating (more of that soon), and it survived it so it's tough tsuba.
Fuchi, Kashira and Menuki are some sort of alloy. Mediocre quality, nothing special here.
The tsukamaki was done without hishimaki (this is factory 2nd), but it's somewhat tight. Tsuka has pretty good shape on it, and it feels nice in hands. Rayskin is of pretty low quality, but the panels are well applied. The silk is of ok quality, better than many other Chinese silk-ito I've seen, but not up to face Japanese ito.
Removing 2nd mekugi was probably the hardest I've ever faced (about par with Last Legend). I tried and tried, the 1st one popped out after little hard work but the 2nd just stuck in there... I ended up drilling it to pieces, and pounding with the mekuginugi, still the darn thing kept giving me trouble. The supertight fit must have been due to very tight compression fit, which happens when tsuka are hammered on.
After I finally got every bit and piece out, I just thought I'd just tap the tsuka out, covered it with cloth so I don't bang the tsuba. Couple small hammer blows, nothing happens... Couple of bigger blows, nothing happens... Then I took the cloth off and made a big swings, and used levers to get it off, it was really tight fit, and unfortunately my hammering left few marks to tsuba.
Unfortunately upon the inspection there was a small crack in the tsuka. This seems to be fairly common in Chinese production stuff, when tsuka are hammered on by force, it stresses the seams too much.
Handling characteristics
I like how this sword feels when doing few suburi. I just keep thinking how nicely this would probably cut. The balance on this seems good. And to be honest the more I handle this the more I'm liking this, as I usually like big swords.
Conclusions
This is a good sword, damn you Italian politicians that we can't get these sharp... Now I can understand what Francesco meant by those 2 earlier products not being up to their quality standards, as this sword is in a different level than 2 earlier ones. So those 2 earlier reviews of mine must be taken with a grain of salt now, they were lowest quality offerings of YarinoHanzo (and both flawed) and therefore they are not entirely truthful.
I'll not be sharpening this myself as I lack the skill, and I would end up ruining the lines of a good blade. I know some people in Europe who could probably do this work for production sword. I would only need the monouchi sharpened, so feel free to shout if you know someone too. Maybe someday when I'll have time I'll try to make a new tsuka for this.
But huge thanks to Francesco for giving this opportunity for me. And now that I know what YarinoHanzo is capable of I will definately keep it in mind in the future too, as this is a good quality product.
Well I received probably the best customer service I've ever gotten. Francesco the owner of YarinoHanzo sent me an email, that he was unhappy that I've gotten bad products from them (I did not contact him, he contacted me). We sent few emails, and I understood what sort of mishaps there had been. Most of the members here probably know that when dealing with Chinese companies there will be communication errors at some point. Well Francesco suggested that he would send me a blade that would better fit the quality that he wants YarinoHanzo products to be, as the earlier ones were not up to his standards. So I kindly accepted his generosity.
Historical overview
Dotanuki school originated in the village of Dotanuki in Higo province during the late Sengoku period, and continued c. 1532-1615. These swords were famous for their very good cutting edge. Other than that these blades are usually mentioned not being very high quality. Usually Dotanuki blades had wide mihaba and thick kasane. One source mentions that their general appearance was very blunt, and having absolutely no gracefulness or any quality.
In the production sword world, beefy blades have been occasionally called Dotanuki by some makers for several years.
Full disclosure
So I was blown away by the kindness. I would be getting my hands on good quality factory second, I'll just note that this sword is a factory second. I'm now more aware of the Italian sword laws, and I now know that the sword will be blunt. I have kinda mixed feelings of what to expect, as the earlier products did disappoint me, but the owner is genuine nice guy, and knows about swords and is involved in the process (not just buying regular swords straight from the forge) so I was really eager to see what would come. I have never before received a free sword in my collecting years, so that could affect my review. However I try to be as honest as I can be, and Francesco hoped for an honest review too.
Initial Impressions
Well I was expecting a sword in plastic wrap, but the package was whole different. There was a nice black box in the package. I'm generally not too fond to Chinese made boxes as they usually seem gaudy to me, but this one was nice.
Then after opening the box there was pretty good quality swordbag.
Then after opening the bag I got my hands on the sword. Immidiately after grabbing saya I felt this would be a beefy blade. There were no hishigami used with this sword by mistake, so the wrap was expected to look like that. When I drew the blade out I thought it was of very good quality.
Statistics
Nagasa: 72,8cm, 2 shaku 3 sun 8 bu
Overall length: 103,8cm
Overall length in saya: 107,5cm
Motohaba: 3,45cm
Sakihaba: 2,5cm
Motokasane: 8mm
Sakikasane: 6mm
Sori: 2,6cm
Kissaki: 4,3cm
Nakago: 24,5cm
Tsuka: 28cm
Sugata: Shinogi-zukuri
Mune: Iori
Hamon: Suguha
Hada: -
Hi: Bo-hi
Steel: 1060
Components
The blade is very good. I like the sugata, and the lines are crisp. Personally I'm a big fan of suguha hamon, so it's a plus also, and it's nice suguha. I like the fact that bo-hi ends before habaki. Kissaki is very well propotioned and ko-shinogi matches the fukura pretty well. The blade has a mirror finish, which makes taking photos bit difficult with my limited skills. I really like the blade, it feels intimidating. As I love big swords, I wish this would have c. 10cm or more in length, but I think this length will please more users. I just wish the blade would be sharp, I really liked the feel of this sword.
Habaki is really nice, and it fits really well. Among the best habaki fits I've seen on production stuff. It doesn't touch the blade sides pretty much at all in the front, and it builds up towards tsuka, plus due to large motohaba, it's probably custom fitted to these models. Unfortunately habaki is so tightly on, I haven't tried removing it to see the machi, as I would probably damage the blade or habaki in removal process.
Saya is of ok/good quality. Top part kuroishime, lower part kuroro, I kinda like how it feels in hand. As this was 2nd there were no buffalo horn parts, but I don't really care about those anyway. Saya feels solid and pretty well made.
Seppa are of good quality. Tsuba is nice sukashi tsuba of mokko shape. Don't know the material possibly iron but it took some beating (more of that soon), and it survived it so it's tough tsuba.
Fuchi, Kashira and Menuki are some sort of alloy. Mediocre quality, nothing special here.
The tsukamaki was done without hishimaki (this is factory 2nd), but it's somewhat tight. Tsuka has pretty good shape on it, and it feels nice in hands. Rayskin is of pretty low quality, but the panels are well applied. The silk is of ok quality, better than many other Chinese silk-ito I've seen, but not up to face Japanese ito.
Removing 2nd mekugi was probably the hardest I've ever faced (about par with Last Legend). I tried and tried, the 1st one popped out after little hard work but the 2nd just stuck in there... I ended up drilling it to pieces, and pounding with the mekuginugi, still the darn thing kept giving me trouble. The supertight fit must have been due to very tight compression fit, which happens when tsuka are hammered on.
After I finally got every bit and piece out, I just thought I'd just tap the tsuka out, covered it with cloth so I don't bang the tsuba. Couple small hammer blows, nothing happens... Couple of bigger blows, nothing happens... Then I took the cloth off and made a big swings, and used levers to get it off, it was really tight fit, and unfortunately my hammering left few marks to tsuba.
Unfortunately upon the inspection there was a small crack in the tsuka. This seems to be fairly common in Chinese production stuff, when tsuka are hammered on by force, it stresses the seams too much.
Handling characteristics
I like how this sword feels when doing few suburi. I just keep thinking how nicely this would probably cut. The balance on this seems good. And to be honest the more I handle this the more I'm liking this, as I usually like big swords.
Conclusions
This is a good sword, damn you Italian politicians that we can't get these sharp... Now I can understand what Francesco meant by those 2 earlier products not being up to their quality standards, as this sword is in a different level than 2 earlier ones. So those 2 earlier reviews of mine must be taken with a grain of salt now, they were lowest quality offerings of YarinoHanzo (and both flawed) and therefore they are not entirely truthful.
I'll not be sharpening this myself as I lack the skill, and I would end up ruining the lines of a good blade. I know some people in Europe who could probably do this work for production sword. I would only need the monouchi sharpened, so feel free to shout if you know someone too. Maybe someday when I'll have time I'll try to make a new tsuka for this.
But huge thanks to Francesco for giving this opportunity for me. And now that I know what YarinoHanzo is capable of I will definately keep it in mind in the future too, as this is a good quality product.