scorpion swords NEGATIVE REVIEW

Yep, it will be nice to see a comparison with the old one.

In regards to this post, this is the e-mail response to this customer that I am sharing on this post.

Hi Troy
I have been giving the issue at hand a great deal of thought over the last few days and have come up with a few additional options for you to resolve your issue, but also some thoughts and insights into the product itself. Because I’m a businessman that wants to make his customers happy and have always had the motto that the customer is always right, I quickly jumped on trying to make things right with you on that post, by offering to make you another one. However after thinking about this and reading your comments on the posts, I think that we may need to go another direction with this.

As you know, most of the swords we make are quite stout, and are tested destructively before a new model is released. However the testing has not to date included any flex tests as our swords are case hardened, and so while they are designed to flex to a certain degree they are not spring tempered. This means that if you try to bend the swords, like a differentially hardened Katana, they will take a set. So when I read that you want to deliberately try to bend the new sword for comparisons sake, while it may resist better than the one you received, it will still basically just destroy a new sword and leave everyone disappointed as these swords were not designed to have a spring temper.

For longer swords of any kind, when they hit a target they cannot cut through cleanly the energy has to go somewhere. Best case scenario, the sword is bent and takes a set. Worst case, it shatters or snaps and comes flying off. Because our swords are intended for heavy use, if the blade fails, we prefer it bends rather than breaks and so we temper our swords accordingly.

Obviously once you break one, you can never use it again (and there is a chance that if it shatters or breaks during cutting, someone could be seriously hurt or even killed). A bent sword, depending on how bad, can be straightened out and still used. That’s not to say that when a sword is bent it’s as strong as it was before. It is the same principle with bending a paperclip back and forth enough so it gets weak. To check the flexibility of a sword, I and many sword makers do NOT recommend bending a sword over your knee. It will either bend or break.

A flex test is performed by resting the tip on the floor or piece of wood and increasing slowly the body weight on the handle until it flexes, so it flexes in a way the blade does it naturally in the right area of the blade. Same as if you took a wood bow, if you stuck one of the limbs on your leg and pressed it down, you would break it. I know. I’ve made bows for many years. But if you flex it like it’s supposed to be, it will last a lifetime. I’m not sure if you’ve seen Jason’s videos, the man who designs and demonstrates some of these but those blades that he chops concrete, steel drums and granite with were heat treated exactly the same way yours was. So as you can see, they didn’t break or bend when used correctly and performed at a high level.

Our longer blades such as the Tactical Jian, Daywalker, and Dark Ninjato are tempered to have hard wearing edges with a softer, shock absorbent core to prevent breakage or shattering. This means that the longer blades are not designed to be flexed excessively and if used against a target they cannot cut through, are designed to deform rather than shatter or snap. By their nature the longer swords are not designed to flex and spring back. It would be the same as flex testing a traditional Katana - they would ALL take a set, but that does not mean that they are bad swords.

So to end this with, knowing what you want to do with the next blade, I am going to offer this to you: Either you can pick a shorter broader sword from me that you can’t bend if you tried (unless you forced it) or get your money back for the purchase from the Daywalker. Or option number three is knowing the limitations of the Daywalker I will absolutely send you another one of those that I think if you use properly you would be very proud of. Before it’s shipped, I will do a video that will show your sword performing a flex test, striking it against wood and then immediately slicing through multiple jugs in one video take. And that will be the sword that you receive.

Here is a link to our Care, Use & Warranty Page:
traditionalarcherybows.com/scorpion_bows_and_knives_care_and_warranty_info_p5.html

For Reference here are a few links to Jason's durability vidoes for our Daywalker Sword, Dark Ninjato, and KO Katana:

You're correct. Case hardened is usually an unwanted result of not thorough heat penetration. I helped detected and corrected this problem for a lung chuan forge by having them switch to electric oven for better heat soaking. Case hardening is a natural result of less performing heat treatment, like those typically used in lung chuan, performed with coal fire. 

I think he meant exactly that, surface hardening. I've helped correct a particular lung chuan forge's swords from that kind of "feature" into a better performing sword. 

The only thing I somewhat agree with is that flex testing is not something I recommend being done by a customer. It has its place but that is for the maker and even there other tests are more important to ensure the quality of the blade.

As for the rest... case hardening is far from the ideal type of heat treatment for a blade. There are originals of poor quality that show this type of surface hardening and to a (slight!) degree, even a through hardened blade will have a slightly higher hardness at the edge than at the core due to the marginally slower cooling of the thicker parts during quench but with a proper modern heat treatment that effect is so minimal that it has no functional effect. Unless of course a real differential heat treatment like a differential quench (edge quench, clay hardening) or a differential tempering is done.
I dont know your HT methods but usually case hardening is a failure in heat treatment due to insufficient quench temperature, potentially too slow of a quench or (this is very rare with modern steel) an uneven distribution of carbon in the steel. I can't think of a reason to purpously attempt case hardening a blade as this results in a blade that is far below the potential quality that can be achieved with modern steel and modern heat treatment methods. In fact, it results in a blade that is surpassed in edge retention, durability and toughness by many originals.

I highly recommend you change your heat treatment methods, your customers will be much happier.

Woooooooooooooooooooooooow.... In my 10+ years as a member on this forum, I have never seen such a straight up ripoff. You guys have your head up your rear end if you think sending that was any kind of excuse for your blades. How are you even a business?

So, for anyone who can't see why their description is hot garbage, let me break it down for you. And this is coming from someone who is a long time blade maker, and been a full time smith for the last 3 years.

So, for starters, there's no way in the deep fiery afterlife that they are case hardening their blades. There's just no reason to. The time it takes to even do that in the first place is far longer than it takes to just heat treat a high carbon blade. And it is literally the worst option for hardening a blade. As soon as you put an edge on it, it's going to cut down below the hardened surface. So you end up with basically just a mild steel blade. So what they are selling is literally mild steel swords.

Secondly, lets talk design. To make up for their oversight (or lack thereof) in the heat treatment department and steel choice, they overbuild the ever living urinary liquid out of them. Which they openly admitted in the comment they posted. They are completely okay with selling mild steel, overbuilt blades, and then completely skate the blame with "Oh, they're supposed to be like that." No. No they aren't. No bladesmith in the history of ever would put out trash like that, as overbuilding a blade meant using more steel.

Speaking of smithing, do you really expect me to believe that ONE guy in the US is forging these? For the prices you're selling them at? Yeah, that's not gonna happen. It is worth absolutely nobody's time to forge and sell swords that are made of mild steel. It's a waste of time, it's a waste of money, and that's a ton of work. And being as the swords are "made in batches" at the volume that is put out, there's absolutely no way one person in the US is doing all that and actually making a living.

Lastly, Jason is just lying. He's not "designing" (if you can call it that) a blade to be good. He's designing them to try to not take damage, and that's it. In fact, on this site's Facebook group, he had the audacity to post a video where his blade took "no damage" and then proceeded to say that it was easily brought back to an edge with an angle grinder. So did it take damage or not? If it didn't, he wouldn't have to use a grinder. And further driving home the point that they are overweight, mild steel excuses for swords that are definitely not forged in the US. And they're probably just regurgitating whatever the actual manufacturer told them when they said there was a problem with what they were selling. In fact, when I called him on his contradiction, I was (shocker...) banned from the FB group. That I personally used to admin, and stepped down because I didn't like where SBG was heading. I'd even wager the chances of me getting banned here are pretty high just for posting this. Which is incredibly disappointing as someone who's been here so long, and my entire bladesmithing career started right here after poking around in the blade making subsection.

It's been probably years since I've posted here, and I'm really sad it had to be this I had to post. Just don't buy their blades, and let's stop letting "companies" like this ruin our market by selling inexcusable blades and telling people that it's okay and it's supposed to be like that. That's just taking advantage of people who don't know any better. Let's do better as a community and not let these things exist.

Sincerely, Spicy Mike
Forged in Fire Champion

Yes lol, just as sharp as the day I got it. I smashed it into ice too

Well, we know they're not forged, at all. They're machine cut from plate steel and given a very steep and simple primary bevel with a grinder. Which isn't necessarily bad, although I've never bought one because I don't like the grinds. But I don't think they're being farmed out to a factory in China. Maybe a few helping hands.

That doesn't explain why this one appears left annealed or what "case hardening" is supposed to mean here.

Alright, I'll give you that. I guess as a smith, I just assume things are forged. But it still doesn't excuse the product. And if they're saying it's plate steel, then I highly doubt it's anything other than mild.