Mounted! Micheal Moorcock/ Elric inspired black sword

00:01 here.... zzzzz and "Stormy" as I shalt call it is finally mounted and ready to suck soul!!!!!


Final spec: 31.5 inch blade, total length just over 46 inch, 1.53kg, point if balance 2 inch in front of  guard.

Decided on plain 1mm waxed cotton string as I left the handle like a katana (secured with 2 pegs) so once unwrapped and the pommel collar moved up, I could unscrew it and take the blade out. 

The handle I had to make but happy with the the it came out, BTW it is exact the same length as my shinai for Kendo.


Here is Stormy next to my Shinken for scale, pretty much a bastard sword class sword (slight shorter blade and longer handle tho).... 

12:10 now, may post some mounting pic once I have caught up with Mr Sandman. Actually I may stab Mr Sandman when I see him just to see if the sword sucks souls, it didn't work on me when the blade drew blood whilst mounting 




 

Nice looking sword there you've made. Would be interested in a follow up such as cutting and handling.

Thanks guys for the kind words.

Sandman ran away and hung out with Hawkmoon when he saw the black sword. Actually I did dream of a moorcock novel blade last night but not Stromy. It was the big cleaver in an Elric novel, belonged to the city of thives or something like that?

Stormy has a brother too, the longquan forge still got the other blade that wouldn't turn black (used 65mn by accident). When I get paid I may order it for $190 mounted in chinese fittings. It is not Mourn blade but "moan blade" because I moaned about the color and rejected it. Btw Longquan is chinese for Dragon Spring so it is a very fitting name for thr birthplace for Stormy.

Think the 5160 Dane sword will be hard to blacken, what have you tried? Maybe cold blue paste will work?

Handling is fast, considering it os almost 3.5 lbs. But then the guard and pommel are 30% of the total weight plus a massive katana style tang that is 11 in long. However I keep wrecking myself because the guard is too big. I am used to small kantana guards hahaha.

Not cut with it yet, need to sharpen it first as it was done up like a jian, the tip is super sharp but the rest so so. Will do the leadind edge paper sharp for slicing and false edge so so sharp for skull hacking (and prevents it from taking my finger if I try to do an Iaido draw and cut)

Ok, so there’s how I fitted the sword

The guard off ebay, the only plain carbon steel (I hate stainless, besides it needs to be black) cross guard I could find less than $100 (it was only $25 or so). The habaki filed to fit the notches of the blade, then it was thinned down and the slot in the guard filed to fit, the back of the habaki was also profiled to give a less chunky look. It was the hardest part as I needed to get the habaki, guard, tang and handle to all line up in the centre, file, look, file look and repeat. The guard was a pain as they must have used air hardening tool steel welding rods, the joints refused to rust, nor cold blued so I had to file/sand the joint as far down as possible while making sure the joint don’t come undone.

I wanted a shinai length handle and the one that came with the sword was too short. So I dug up an old tsuka blank I had, the inside was possibly meant for those one size fits all production katana and my tang was bigger so I just dug out the inside for a good fit, the seller said it was oak, the grain looks like chestnut or durmast oak, it felt pretty robust and definitely not junk wood.

The tang was cut, filed and threaded with M5 die (the thickest part in the bottom of tang was 5mm). The pommel was made out of M10 mild steel eye bolt, filed to fit collar made from 1inch steel pipe, and threaded to M5. The tang and pommel is connected with a female thread M5 tube. This is not the most robust set up but the joint is protected by the wood and reinforced by the steel collar. At least the tang is secured in the handle like a katana (2 pegs) and it is beefy so even if the pommel comes off the sword will still be functional and has ok balance.
The wood is then planed and sanded to fit the guard and the pommel, the collar wall was too thick so I had to glued some wood shaving back on to get the wrap to sit flush with the collar. Waxed string was chosen ($2/90 meter) and it was harder to handle then rattan, being so thin, it dug into my skin when pulled. My calculator said I would have done at least 340 turns (2 pulls per turn), plus glue application every 2 inches and the tucking in the end, took me 3 Metallica albums’ time to do.

Still need to make up a sling and do some final fitting of the scabbard mouth but the hard work is completed, total about 30 hours of work Could possibly do it in 10hr if I had the right tools and didn’t have to worry about neighbours complaining.

For a change, didn’t have to buy new tools for the project, just some materials, blade in shirasaya was $195, add $80 supplies. $275 for a sword exactly the way I want, think I have done well.

Thank you, I'll look if I can order it or something like this here in Germany.

Very nice, it fairly screams "fantasy sword" but not in a cheap SLO way, just that it looks unique and...well, fantastic.

Historical correct Stormbringer replicas are hard to find!
What I dislike in fantasy swords are all those sqiggles and thorns like Kit Raes etc.
Your's is refreshing.

And two guys would attack simultaneously and not wait until the hero throws away his shield, takes his backcarried sword and kills them one after another.
But we can still have leather bikini warrior girls I think.

Final finishing touch!

Wood in scabbard mount fitted to guard. Then the hangers fitted edge up. The waxed cotton wasn't as strong as I wanted, so I put a few turns on Kelvar strings under it to make sure the D ring stay put.


Tried it with a SMG sling and felt pretty good, leather sling will come one day. 

BTW, decided to build my idea the Mourn Blade now, I have another blade, slightly longer edge but shorter tang (the pic is taken at an angle, they are about the same length), it is very close to a proper bastard sword. The cross section of the double edged part is diamond, unlike Stormy's Tang Dao shape, false edge 2/3 of the way like Stormy. I got it to build Stormy a few months back but gave up because it has no "rune" and was not black, besides it had stiff katana temper, not springy at all. 

When  AndiTheBarvarian brought up the topic of blackening the whole blade, I gave it a try with cold blue, looks pretty good, I shalt mount it! All the fittings were fitted already, except the handle wood, I have even rattan wrapped the scabbard. Hehehehe, GF working this weekend, got a gap to finish it I guess


 
Should be in bed now.... but, just one black coat first