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Post by kloborgg on Dec 1, 2012 5:42:04 GMT
I'm very new to collecting swords, but it already seems pretty clear to me that the market for Katanas is significantly larger and more popular than the market for euro swords. I've always had a bit of a preference for medieval euro swords, but it seems significantly harder (and more expensive) to get a sword of comparable quality to a japanese one. The Musashi shirakawa swords are as low as $75 and though I understand the steel on them is rather soft and the fittings are fairly cheap, you can still get a fully usable and, in my opinion, very attractive sword. On the other hand, for an arming or bastard sword, the cheapest option to have anything better than a wallhanger seems to be the ~$150 windlasses, and compared to the musashis these are very plain and basic looking weapons.
I guess my question would be, does this price-quality inconsistency between the two sword styles extend past the lower-price market? I just bit the bullet on a Tinker Bastard after reading the countless recommendations on this forum, and while I'm incredibly excited to get my first real euro, I was wondering if the sword I'm getting is comparable, let's say, to a ~$250 Katana from Hanwei or Ronin in its construction, blade strength, and relative cutting ability (once properly sharpened). Obviously just based on the type of sword it is I'm not going to get a very fancy looker (which is fine by me), but would you guys say the overall bang-for-your-buck is similar?
Thanks.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 1, 2012 7:33:43 GMT
The price difference is because there isn't as much rubbish swords in the Euro sword market thankfully, the buyers are more discerning, so they tend to be more functional than the super-cheap useless katanas. Every kid wants to be a samurai... :lol:
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Post by ineffableone on Dec 1, 2012 7:58:12 GMT
I noticed the same things, Euros tend to run a bit higher.
I think it all has to do with demand really. There is more demand for katana so the price for them is driven down. There really is a lot of different forges and vendors selling katana and trying to give the best deal for people.
Euros don't have the same demand that katana do, so their prices tend to be a bit higher. Less Euro swords are made, there are less Euros sold by vendors, and so the prices are higher. Sadly this also means less variety with less companies coming out with different choices.
It is due to the price inequality that has kept me from getting a good Euro, to replace my current older crappy one. I hope to get myself a nice Valiant Armory Euro in 2013. I have been loving the work they do and have gotten to swing a few around from friends who have 'em and I really like their quality.
From what I have heard, most of the Euro companies who make functional swords tend to be pretty good on quality. Due to the Euro market being smaller, and there being less companies making them. They sort of have to put up decent products or they will quickly loose their customer base. Especially for the guys who only do Euro stuff. If they aren't doing Asian style swords (where there is always a stream of ignorant new sword buyers to buy crappy nonfuctional swords) they really tend to be on their game with decent quality from what I have read.
So in answer to your question, I sort of think the Euro market tends to have less crappy quality offerings due to having a smaller customer base. The Euro market has to worry a lot more about their reputation, so put a lot more effort into putting out decent quality. So in all the Euro market your likely to get what you pay for. While you might be able to find a better deal in the Asian sword field for functional swords. Your less likely to have worries about issues with the Euro swords that you will find commonly in Asian swords.
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Post by Tater on Dec 1, 2012 8:17:56 GMT
I have to disagree, if the demand is so high for a katana, prices would go up in order to prevent shortages and increase quantity supplied. If the demand for a Euro is low, prices would go down to attract more customers. Correct me if I'm wrong.
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Post by StevenJ on Dec 1, 2012 10:13:46 GMT
Katanas are extremely standardized, many will accept the same fittings, no pommel, and are single eged. Western medieval swords are anything but standardized, can be single or double edged, have varying shapes of guards and pommels, and require more effort to secure the hilt. Chinese straight swords aren't dirt cheap like Katanas either and I think it is for the same reasons. I had one Hanwei Tinker the Norman and it was good but I didn't like the hilt setup as the pommel rubbed my hand. I replaced my type X hat pommel fetish with a Windlass Create Your Own Sword which I like far more. i think the Tinker bastard is too light and short but it is a good sword from what I heard.
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Post by Lukas MG (chenessfan) on Dec 1, 2012 11:05:33 GMT
Euros are generally much harder to get right compared to katana. Double edged blade are a semprini to get straight in HT, western swords generally sport much more distal taper and the whole harmonic balance thing one needs to get right to make a good Euro further complicates things. Add to that the huge variety of blade shapes, pommel and guard designs. On katana, it's much simpler. Little to no distal taper, massive single edged blade that doesn't warp on you nearly as much as a thin double edged blade, comparably similar blade shapes, nobody giving a damn about pivot points, etc... Most chinese forges just don't have any idea how to put out a good quality Euro. The few that do consequently have to put more work into them than they put into a katana and logically, Euros are more expensive.
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Post by kloborgg on Dec 1, 2012 15:48:16 GMT
I can understand of course that there is a huge market for "wanna-be" samurais and that helps increase competition and drag the price down in the lower end, but I'm wondering if that extends up to, say, the $500 range. After all, you don't hear of too many kids taking up the $500 sword market. Also, standardization obviously helps, I'm not sure why I didn't really think about that. You don't really hear of vendors slapping 20 slightly different crossguards on to an arming sword and selling them as separate products And I never realized how much more complicated it was to forge a decent euro blade. I guess the katana just lends itself more to the mass-production market. Thanks for the great answers.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 1, 2012 16:33:28 GMT
Hold up now. I think a great many see the katana market shows a lot of quality for the price but the truth is that most of the katana market is selling swords less worth their price than it might seem. I see a lot of the katana owners seem to be more likely to accept subpar factors of the swords. Some of that simply because katana are generally more appealing to a lot of first time buyers these days. There are a lot of options from a lot of sources but when you render it all down, the value of most of the katana market is based purely on subjective values instead of the real quality of the sword. What had been the junky stainless steel katana have been replaced with a lot of junky "carbon steel" swords but that still have a lot of faults many overlook. It is not just that a given sword type lends itself to mass production, it is the demand for cheap katana regardless of the quality.
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Marc Kaden Ridgeway
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Post by Marc Kaden Ridgeway on Dec 1, 2012 16:55:10 GMT
IDK where everyone in this thread is coming from really.... Katana have no distal taper? Really? Of course katana have distal taper. Euros are harder to make? I won't deny they have their challenges... but so do katana . You know how many blades are lost to a water quench? How complex it is to get the shinogi crisp and straight , and the munekado and the koshinogi saki ? What about just to build a decent habaki? Also .... people are willing to acccept more flaws in katana? huh? Lets see ... do an ebay search Viking sword www.ebay.com/sch/Knives-Swords-B ... king+sword Bastard Sword www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=eu ... sacat=1401 Long sword www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=ba ... sacat=1401 knight sword www.ebay.com/sch/Swords-/43336/i ... ight+sword Take a look at those and let the crap roll over you .... Then look at the companies putting out Euros with no distal taper, risers over the leather... etc. ad naseum... what about Strongblade? No heat treat even? Depeeka? Then you have Windlass... best value for the money really , in that market segment ... though hanwei and even Dynasty Forge are making headway... But once you go into midrange , the katana market offers a lot more value and choice than the Euro market.... hell the only company even coming close to matching the package offered in production kats at the $500 range is Valiant Armoury... and how hard is it to buy one of those? At the mid range the katana market offers WAY more value for the cost across the board. Now if you go up from there the Euro market is offering some incredible swords from genius makers in the $600 - $1200 range.... swords by Angus Trim ... Albion ... Lundemo... Arms & Armour... these are incredible values. The markets are not identical... but they are pretty close IMHO.
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Post by kloborgg on Dec 1, 2012 18:16:09 GMT
Thanks for your input, Marc. Could I ask where you consider the midrange begins and the lower-range ends? I just ask because at the moment for me anthing more than $200 seems fairly high-end
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Post by Lukas MG (chenessfan) on Dec 1, 2012 18:23:43 GMT
Sorry if it sounded like I was saying it takes no skill to make a katana, Marc. That's not what I meant at all. Making a high quality katana with proper geometry and performance sure is a very long and elaborate process that takes a lot of skill.
However, I do believe the basics on katana are easier to get right than on Euros. True, kats do have distal taper but it usually is a lot less than on Euros. It's not unsual for katana to go from 8mm at the habaki to 6mm at the kissaki. Most Euros have much more than that. The short 28" katana is not as sensitive to mass as a 38" longsword blade. So one can get away with less or no distal taper and still have a well handling sword. On long Euros the distal taper is more crucial (of course on short double edged swords the distal taper also isn't as important. That has nothing to do with katana or not. Only with length. A gladius hardly needs any distal taper for example.) The single bevel and thicker blade indeed makes HT easier, trust me on this one. Less warpage during quench. Due to the soft back, a DH blade is also much easier to straighten afterwards. A springy TH blade is a lot more pain. Regarding getting lines and bevels straight, that's pretty much the same on any blade, no matter what type. I can't see any difference there. Clean work is clean work, or not. The same goes for high-end swords. Be it katana or longsword, the details need to be right and that takes a skilled maker. I only see a difference in required skill/knowledge on Euros vs katana on the low end of the market.
A good example that underlines this is Dynasty Forge. They make good katana. Their Euros are very well shaped, clean lines, very flat bevels and good HT. These aspects are the same on their TH katana. However, the DF Euros lack all complexer aspects of western swords. No or very little distal taper (just as on the DF katana but there it is accurate) and consequently no harmonic balance. The fact that they have no idea how to get guard and pommel weight correctly doesn't help either.
Regarding crap swords, etc I think there's varying quality all over. There are absolutely horrible Euro SLO as well as the infamous Stainless Katana. I can't see much difference there between kats and Euros other than there being a lot more crappy katana number wise which is only logical as there are also much more good quality katana than Euros. The katana simply is the more popular sword. I also don't think katana owner are any less picky than owner of Euros. People want high quality, no matter what they buy. I mean there are uneducated sword buyers of course that will think their 100$ stainless steel junk is a proper sword but they will think that no matter if it is katana shaped to looks more like a Euro. People who know a bit about swords will notice flaws in them, no matter what type it is.
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Marc Kaden Ridgeway
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Post by Marc Kaden Ridgeway on Dec 1, 2012 18:48:38 GMT
Lukas ...
I agree completely that heat treating a Euro has its perils... and heat treating a thicker blade is indeed easier, heat treats being equal. However , you as well as I should know that heat treats aren't all equal . More blades are generally lost on a water wuench that an oil quench, no?
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Post by K. Vander Linde on Dec 1, 2012 19:22:11 GMT
I have to say there are more Cheaply made Katanas than Euros, but as you start getting in to functional swords the prices reflect the work & functionality of the sword. As for what one is willing to pay, that depends on so many things that range from production to the buyer that you would have to create target markets & production methods to explain. Example something "handforaged" will usualy go for more than something made on a mill. It don't hold true for every situation but you get what I mean.
As for the cheap Euros, anyone else notice that they tend to consist of claymores?
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Post by Lunaman on Dec 1, 2012 20:00:02 GMT
First off, to address the original question: Yes, your Tinker Bastard will be every bit as functional, well constructed and performance oriented as a similarly priced katana from a reputable maker. It just won't look very fancy. :lol: The real check is getting it properly sharpened. The blade geometry is made for good cutting performance, but especially with a sword that light, a good sharp edge will make sure you get the most out of it. For production swords, I tend to think of entry level as $100-300, mid-range as $300-600, high end as $600-1400 (beyond that usually indicates custom-made or one-off sword pricing), but these are general terms. In the earlier days, a sub-300 price limit included several nice midrange options (hence the creation of this site) but things have shifted upwards a bit since then, like the price of a movie ticket. I think Marc and Lukas were talking past each other at first, but together they've nailed the distinctions as I see it. Different knowledge and techniques are required to make a good Euro than the knowledge and techniques required to make a good katana. I don't think "better" or "more" or any value judgements are helpful for this discussion, but it suffices to say that applying the techniques that work fine for one will not work the same way for the other (as evidenced by Lukas' Dynasty Forge example). Pretty much as a rule, Low-buget swords have their blade labor done in China or India, where there is an abundance of decent-katana-making knowledge, and more of a scarcity of decent-euro-making knowledge. That discrepancy, I think, is partly market and demand driven. Great Euro blades can certainly be made by the same craftsmen (see Valiant Armory and Hanwei-Tinker Blades) but the market for accurate-handling Euro blades is much smaller and newer than the market for functional katana, so far fewer forges have the knowledge and techniques to specialize in good Euros. The result is that you have MANY options for a decent katana in the entry level market, and very FEW options of a decent Euro in the entry-level market. And some of those decent katana sources can make compromises or choices to meet lower prices that the few Euro sources simply can't (like using cheaper ready-made fittings and less labor intensive handle wrapping procedures. Those measures obviously won't be available for the few Euro sources). Hanging around the periphery, as Marc pointed out, is the vast sea of sources for crappy sword-like-objects that don't require specialized knowledge, materials, or techniques to produce, and that includes plenty of psuedo euros and plenty of psuedo kats. No style has a monopoly on being cheaply exploited. But once you move beyond a low-end pricepoint, that separation between Euros and Kats in terms of quality for money pretty much lifts away, because you are more often dealing with expert makers that deal DIRECTLY with the product. A 600 dollar Euro and a 600 dollar katana are usually quite comparable in terms of quality and execution, for example. * There are no free lunches in the sword world. *The main exception being the way we deal with scabbards. Saya are generally included with Katana on all pricing levels, as the habaki interface means they need not be custom made to each individual sword and the wooden-tube construction is simple to mass-produce at cost. But when it comes to nice Euros, scabbards must be custom-fit to the entire length of each blade, and their construction is more elaborate. This makes them very expensive on their own.
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Post by Lukas MG (chenessfan) on Dec 1, 2012 20:19:38 GMT
Yes, that is absolutely correct. Water is very harsh as a quench medium. I think Zach said it best, both types of swords require different technique and methods. I believe we can all agree to that.
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Post by stickem on Dec 1, 2012 21:39:46 GMT
I think the market for cr@p Euro swords is there too... perhaps it It's just we use a different label for 'em... such swords are often labeled 'fantasy' swords instead.
For example, take your average LOTR sword. It is a stainless steel wallhanger. LOTR characters and blades are Caucasian - certainly not Asian anyway - and their gear looks pretty much European (in my opinion), so we could call them Euros.
Bottom line, I think it is fair to say as many kids grow up wanting to be European knights as do samurai, thing is they get their cr@p swords from QVC instead of Albion, and call 'em 'fantasy' swords instead of 'Euros.'
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Post by willhart on Dec 1, 2012 22:07:32 GMT
It's actually the opposite of what you said. If demand goes up there is more competition and to compete you tend to drive the prices down. If demand isn't as high no one wants to enter that market so you have less competition and have to drive your prices higher because you aren't selling as much.
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Post by Springs on Dec 1, 2012 23:01:25 GMT
What I'd like to see is a Euro sword equivalent of all these lower priced but yet functional katana, like something that's equivalent to the Musashi Shirakawa series.
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Post by kloborgg on Dec 1, 2012 23:49:57 GMT
Thanks for the awesome post, Lunaman, really enjoyed reading it. I certainly got my answer and then some. It's nice to know I'm not getting an inferior product for the money just because I want a different style of sword.
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Post by Tater on Dec 2, 2012 0:47:34 GMT
I'm just going off the laws of supply and demand stated in my college economics book. But it also states that many other factors affect price, such as competition like you said. So we're both right in a way. Less competition means you can control the price more which is why prices will be higher.
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