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Post by Eric Bergeron on Aug 6, 2021 0:33:12 GMT
I've wanted a 9260 blade for a while and decided to give Swords of Northshire a try, here is the finished product ready to be shipped to me, what do you guys think? It is 9260 with bo hi, no hamon, mono tempered, 28" blade with all black fittings. Pictures of Katana
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Post by pvsampson on Aug 6, 2021 0:46:13 GMT
Should be ok for basic TH kat. How much was it?
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Post by Eric Bergeron on Aug 6, 2021 0:53:37 GMT
Should be ok for basic TH kat. How much was it? $279 total & shipped.
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Post by pvsampson on Aug 8, 2021 4:31:00 GMT
Should be ok for basic TH kat. How much was it? $279 total & shipped. Please post pics and thoughts when it arrives.
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Post by pvsampson on Oct 30, 2021 6:28:44 GMT
Curious. Has this arrived yet?
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Post by MichaelRS on Oct 30, 2021 18:44:12 GMT
Interesting. Below is my first sword that I got from Hanbon Forge for $290 last April. When asking around for quotes for the exact same specifications, including the etchings and upgraded saya, SoN told me $435. Dragon's Claw imgur.com/a/NVC2mni
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Post by Roscoe57 on Oct 30, 2021 19:45:08 GMT
My opinion is you would of been better off with a Huawei 9260 katana for $199.
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Post by Eric Bergeron on Oct 30, 2021 20:12:26 GMT
Curious. Has this arrived yet? Yes it has arrived a while ago, great entry level katana, very light feel to it and I love the all black theme I gave it. It is a beater for sure as that was the intent.
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Post by shepherd214 on Oct 30, 2021 21:34:38 GMT
Looks like a solid option for under 300. Just test it out and make sure it's heat treated well. Quick tip though, mono tempered doesn't make sense. It's a mono steel(its not laminated so only one steel type), through hardened blade. Tempering is letting the blade soak in low heat for a few hours to soften it down a bit after the hardening oil quench.
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Post by pvsampson on Oct 30, 2021 22:34:34 GMT
Interesting. Below is my first sword that I got from Hanbon Forge for $290 last April. When asking around for quotes for the exact same specifications, including the etchings and upgraded saya, SoN told me $435. Dragon's Claw imgur.com/a/NVC2mniMy opinion is you would of been better off with a Huawei 9260 katana for $199. Lol.Thread about an order placed for SoN katana. Curious. Has this arrived yet? Yes it has arrived a while ago, great entry level katana, very light feel to it and I love the all black theme I gave it. It is a beater for sure as that was the intent. Good to see you happy with it.
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Post by MichaelRS on Nov 1, 2021 19:45:48 GMT
My opinion is you would of been better off with a Huawei 9260 katana for $199. If that was for me, I don't think that Huawei would customize the sword the way I wanted it with the etchings and fictures for that price. I know for a lot of people The Cutting is the thing, but for me I view my acquisitions as functional art pieces with all five of the ones that I now have revolving around a personalized theme
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Post by noktorn on Nov 3, 2021 4:53:56 GMT
My opinion is you would of been better off with a Huawei 9260 katana for $199. And you'd certainly get a nice sword...for $200. In trade off for a 6-12 month wait, and a customer service model that can and does cancel orders for having the temerity to inquire as to the status of the order. I think that's worth putting up with for a custom from them, or even their pricier DH blades. But for a $200 beater? Not with the current wait times. I kinda look at those $200 Huawei's as something to tack onto your order if you have some extra change. But i'm not sure i'd go out of my way to specifically buy those if all i'm looking for is a backyard cutter. That being said, Swords of Northshire seems to be rather pricy compared to their other competitors. Not sure why that is. I have a 9260 Ko Katana from them, and I like it. But something tells me I could have gotten the same sword from Hanbon or Ryansword for a little less with little trade off in quality.
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Post by noktorn on Nov 3, 2021 5:01:08 GMT
My opinion is you would of been better off with a Huawei 9260 katana for $199. If that was for me, I don't think that Huawei would customize the sword the way I wanted it with the etchings and fictures for that price. I know for a lot of people The Cutting is the thing, but for me I view my acquisitions as functional art pieces with all five of the ones that I now have revolving around a personalized theme Well, you would get a nicer sword, certainly. But I have little doubt you'd pay a premium price for it. I had inquired about a custom once from Jacky. I asked for one of their already made blades (I think one of their 1.5" Sori blades-I think at the time it was a $400/$450 blade--by the way, did his prices go up? The blades seem pricier now), I picked the Nami fittings you see on some of their blades, and basically wanted a different color ito and saya. He was looking to charge me around a grand or more for that. To be fair, that was my only time interacting with Jacky, and he was prompt with responses and polite. Perhaps it was a translation issue. Or, perhaps, you pay premium for customization of their swords.
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Post by Robert in California on Nov 5, 2021 21:07:47 GMT
True, Huawei charges quite a bit for any changes. In my case...asking for a 1/2" longer tsuka and a full rayskin tsuka wrap and one mekugi changed price from $268 to $480. Top quality production swords for sure, maybe the best, but getting custom features from Huawei currently is difficult, expensive and best I can tell, increases turn around. I have a friend who ordered a high end Huawei with minor changes....was told about 2 months and it is now going on 8 months and still nothing. The Jkoo forge swords have been what I have been buying because all my orders are custom specs and I can't afford big bucks outfits (or I'd already have a Motohara...wowser!) Other makers also offer a goodly menu of customization options.
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Post by Roscoe57 on Nov 6, 2021 20:29:22 GMT
True, Huawei charges quite a bit for any changes. In my case...asking for a 1/2" longer tsuka and a full rayskin tsuka wrap and one mekugi changed price from $268 to $480. Top quality production swords for sure, maybe the best, but getting custom features from Huawei currently is difficult, expensive and best I can tell, increases turn around. I have a friend who ordered a high end Huawei with minor changes....was told about 2 months and it is now going on 8 months and still nothing. The Jkoo forge swords have been what I have been buying because all my orders are custom specs and I can't afford big bucks outfits (or I'd already have a Motohara...wowser!) Other makers also offer a goodly menu of customization options. Huawei needs to get it together. Crazy wait times. I would like to order one with a 11 inch tsuka. Reading other posts if you ask for a status update you may bet a refund.
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Post by noktorn on Nov 6, 2021 20:45:33 GMT
True, Huawei charges quite a bit for any changes. In my case...asking for a 1/2" longer tsuka and a full rayskin tsuka wrap and one mekugi changed price from $268 to $480. Top quality production swords for sure, maybe the best, but getting custom features from Huawei currently is difficult, expensive and best I can tell, increases turn around. I have a friend who ordered a high end Huawei with minor changes....was told about 2 months and it is now going on 8 months and still nothing. The Jkoo forge swords have been what I have been buying because all my orders are custom specs and I can't afford big bucks outfits (or I'd already have a Motohara...wowser!) Other makers also offer a goodly menu of customization options. Huawei needs to get it together. Crazy wait times. I would like to order one with a 11 inch tsuka. Reading other posts if you ask for a status update you may bet a refund. I don't know if it's that they need to get it together. From my understanding, there's maybe one to three guys running the whole operation. I think they'd be better off hiring someone to solely handle the customer service side of things. But from the production standpoint? The wait times are crazy because word goes around that they are the best sub $1000 blades you can get production wise, and it seems to be true. And that, plus the less forges around due to COVID means they're buried under orders. It makes sense. And I get the feeling just hiring more people for the production side of things wouldn't be a quick and easy solution. What people they do have working on stuff know what they're doing, and know their QA. It takes time, and finding new workers who don't need to be trained up to Huawei standards is probably more difficult than you think. That likely means you have to look for less skilled workers who need training time, or if just put right in to the swing of things, will lower the quality and consistency--the two things that differentiate a place like Huawei from JKOO/Hanbon/Ryansword/etc. What we need, as consumers, is for other forges to step it up quality wise. JKOO seems uninterested in doing so. Ryanswords offerings are looking nicer (I saw a really nice looking Osoraku Wakazashi that looks absolutely stunning on their website), but I doubt are still on par consistency wise with Huawei. Yomikuni added a couple of really nice looking blades, including probably the first reproduction of a historical blade (The Odenta (sp?), which is one of the Five Swords Under Heaven) i've seen offered as a non one-off. But all of that is far and few between. There isn't any forge i'm aware of that really stands up to Huawei for the price range that i'm aware of. Until Huawei gets competition, or a dedicated CS person, you can expect the soup nazi treatment to continue. As for the wait times, I doubt that'll change anytime soon, and I don't see a way they can do it without compromising their quality.
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Post by shepherd214 on Nov 11, 2021 20:21:21 GMT
True, Huawei charges quite a bit for any changes. In my case...asking for a 1/2" longer tsuka and a full rayskin tsuka wrap and one mekugi changed price from $268 to $480. Top quality production swords for sure, maybe the best, but getting custom features from Huawei currently is difficult, expensive and best I can tell, increases turn around. I have a friend who ordered a high end Huawei with minor changes....was told about 2 months and it is now going on 8 months and still nothing. The Jkoo forge swords have been what I have been buying because all my orders are custom specs and I can't afford big bucks outfits (or I'd already have a Motohara...wowser!) Other makers also offer a goodly menu of customization options. There's so much wrong with everything that you say, all the time. $268 sounds like their base price for a differentially hardened katana. When you ask for a longer handle, and a full wrap, you're asking them so make a sword from scratch outside of the normal ones they have made available for sale on their site. When you go to someone who hand makes swords and knives and you ask them to make something special outside of what they normally offer, they almost always charge more. Because it's just more effort no matter how simple it seems to you. Then we have the issue of the full wrap which you just will not let go. You bring it up every chance you get. The $40 full wrap that sinosword makes for you is not nearly as good as the full wrap that Huawei will give you. You really want a human being to do a full wrap of stingray skin for only $40? And expect it to be good? $40 doesn't even cover the cost of the ray skin. Maybe barely. Then you have to take into account labor to do it correctly and make the seams look good. Go email Cottontail Customs and ask him how much he will charge for a full wrap. I bet it will be at least 150-$200 minimum. For average/decent quality rayskin too. And then you want somebody in China to do a similar job, for a quarter of the price. And thr way Sino does it doesn't even strengthen the tsuka like it's supposed to because it's not done right. Idk how you can look at 480 and think that's too much. You are getting a handmade katana that could easily go for 900 dollars for UNDER 500 BANANAS. How is that not insane to you? Sinosword can make a decent sword, but every single category takes a hit. Not as good blade geometry, not as good habaki fit, not as good rayskin fitment, not as good fittings or polish. Which is reflected in the price, many of their models don't go over 400. But the fact that you can get a katana from Huawei for just 100-200 more and yet its twice or even triple the quality, idk what your mission is but you're actually turning people off of Sinosword with how much you promote them, to a point to where it just doesn't doesn't make any sense at all.
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