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Post by zabazagobo on Mar 22, 2016 16:50:45 GMT
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Post by zabazagobo on Mar 22, 2016 17:07:48 GMT
Huawei just "gets" it. I know that they're not a forge, and that they probably source their blades from the forge of Zheng (source of many other vendors such as Ronin, Musashi, etc), but Huawei get the aesthetics of a katana more than any other ebay vendor. The fact that they offered hishigami as part of their normal production; the fact that they rarely go crazy with fittings (like those overly ornate habaki and tsuba other vendors put on their blades); the fact that they offer different levels of polish (their high polish is amazing - though I have a feeling they lightly etch areas of the blade for the hamon-popping effect) show me that they understand what the sword-crowd want in their katana. At the other end of the spectrum, you have the "production" katana from Hanwei, Ronin, and Musashi (the three most popular production brands from my observation). They also "get" it, but in a different way. They understand what sells. They understand which blades work, which ones don't. You won't really go "wrong" with them, but they rarely stand out (only certain blades from them stand out IMO). I prefer Huawei's designs to theirs at the $300 price point, but it's fair to say that they have outstanding katana as well. In any case, I've also derailed this thread enough. I'll go play with my heavy niku katana a bit and see if there's a way to improve the geometry Agreed 100%. Jacky's also given me consistently great customer service, without any of the ebay positive feedback shenanigans. Huawei definitely is the best DH seller out there in the $300 +/- $100 price range. Although I kind of wish in a way they would take a cue from Hanwei and start developing stock "premium" models with nicer koshirae out of the box for a higher selling price.
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Post by Kiyoshi on Mar 22, 2016 17:42:27 GMT
I don't see any shots of niku in that link. It's pretty hard to tell niku without some kind of reference. Even if you can tell it has some (which I can't in this case), telling what kind is tough. The only thing I could use is that straight shadow in one of the pictures which would indicate no niku at all, but that's kind of stretching things.
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Post by zabazagobo on Mar 22, 2016 20:17:28 GMT
Its definitely far from easy to tell just by looking at pictures, the index card trick works great for discerning whether or not its a vegetarian blade. That's what I thought too, the way the shadow fell looked like a completely flat ji. I misunderstood what you meant by hira niku earlier, late night reading is a bad idea. Is there a specific term for the swelling of a blade around the shinogi?
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Post by Kiyoshi on Mar 22, 2016 20:48:57 GMT
Depends on what you mean. If you mean the niku is very full around the shinogi, that is a very meaty hira niku. If you mean when a shinogi is wider than the rest of the mune, I know swords with steep oroshi have that appearance, but I don't know the name of the diamond shape offhand. The clam shell shape of hira niku can be thick at specific points, like hira niku with it fuller near the shinogi or the ha. Hopefully this helped.
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Post by Bushido on Mar 22, 2016 21:20:44 GMT
Wouldn't a Ronin Elite or Hammer Forged fit your bill pretty nicely? Built in the Doutanuki style they should have plenty of niku, they have geomteric yokote and machi and from what I can see on the pictures they seem to have a bit of fumbari as well... My dojo pro is meatier at the base compared to the tip at least. If you take a shot at a scratch and dent model it even fits your price range :)
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Post by zabazagobo on Mar 22, 2016 23:59:07 GMT
Depends on what you mean. If you mean the niku is very full around the shinogi, that is a very meaty hira niku. If you mean when a shinogi is wider than the rest of the mune, I know swords with steep oroshi have that appearance, but I don't know the name of the diamond shape offhand. The clam shell shape of hira niku can be thick at specific points, like hira niku with it fuller near the shinogi or the ha. Hopefully this helped. I was referring to the latter case where the shinogi is significantly wider than the mune. Thanks for clarifying the diamond shape is not the same as hira niku.
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Post by Jussi Ekholm on Mar 23, 2016 11:34:57 GMT
In English it's usually called high shinogi. In japanese it could be called shinogi-takashi or the shinogijioroshi kyū.
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Post by zabazagobo on Mar 23, 2016 22:42:13 GMT
In English it's usually called high shinogi. In japanese it could be called shinogi-takashi or the shinogijioroshi kyū. Thanks again Jussi. I really need to teach myself some better nomenclature in addition to photography techniques while I pen these reviews in a month or two after my workload lessens appreciably.
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