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Post by MichaelRS on Apr 27, 2022 18:40:21 GMT
Man! On the the KoA site that sword is listed for over *361,000 Indonesian Rupiah. For that kind of money you would think they would at least send out something made from Valyrian steel š *$25
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Post by RufusScorpius on Apr 27, 2022 19:07:22 GMT
Mind taking any pics of it? I would assume those mall wallhangers would fall apart naturally after 5 years The scabbard I sort of crafted out of a couple scraps of wood. The grip wrap is nothing special, the wood on the handle is a generic hardwood, it was a little slippery so therefore the grip wrap. It meets the definition of "beater". Over the years I've used it to test out sharpening techniques and polishing experiments and so forth. It keeps soldiering on despite it being mall ninja junk.
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Yagoro
Member
Ikkyu in Kendo and Kenjutsu Practitioner
Posts: 1,578
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Post by Yagoro on Apr 27, 2022 20:39:31 GMT
Mind taking any pics of it? I would assume those mall wallhangers would fall apart naturally after 5 years The scabbard I sort of crafted out of a couple scraps of wood. The grip wrap is nothing special, the wood on the handle is a generic hardwood, it was a little slippery so therefore the grip wrap. It meets the definition of "beater". Over the years I've used it to test out sharpening techniques and polishing experiments and so forth. It keeps soldiering on despite it being mall ninja junk. Actually doesnt look that bad for a wallhanger
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Post by eastman on Apr 28, 2022 0:46:28 GMT
I would have said that one (I think every crate had one), but I inherited an aluminum-bladed SLO that was intended for Chinese martial arts. I think the SLO is even worse. I have plans to play around with cutting tools and a belt grinder to see if I can turn the "Turkish Fantasy Sword" (with all apologies to Turkish people on their use of the name) into something that sucks a whole lot less. If nothing else, it will give me hands-on time to gain experience grinding blades.
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tera
Moderator
Posts: 1,662
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Post by tera on Apr 28, 2022 1:21:54 GMT
With the anonymity of the internet, I think I'll say my worst is my first. The first Sensei I studied under taught some weapon forms, including an iaido kata of very questionable lineage. You were given an un-edged wall-hanger at ikkyu and it was presented again as your personal sword at Shodan. It was very prestigious and a big deal.
440 stainless steel, wire etched hamon, very low grade wood saya with poor, speckled matte finish. Tsuka was two plastic halves clamshelled together, single mekugi, and cheap cotton ito. Straight up dangerous. Probably $25 tops, when bought in bulk. I won't even call it an Iaito, nor do I consider the "form" I learned from him legit.
Fortunately, I have been blessed with the opportunity to train with several excellent Sensei in various arts in my life. So, I look back at that wall-hanger as a reminder of the difference between Budo and McDojo.
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Post by AndiTheBarvarian on Apr 28, 2022 13:32:14 GMT
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Post by RufusScorpius on Apr 28, 2022 17:31:41 GMT
Actually doesnt look that bad for a wallhanger Well, to be fair, the topic is "worst sword you ever owned" and that is very open to interpretation. Now I agree that it's not exactly what I would call a non-functional wall hanger, HOWEVER, its proportions are grotesque when compared to what a gladius should be. It's too heavy, the handle is way too large, the blade shape is mostly good (depending on what era of Roman history you're looking at) but doesn't really match the style suggested by the hilt. It would be laughed out of a Legio XX meeting. It's the Roman equivalent of a SLO. Frankly I'm astonished that it turned out to be a decently solid piece of steel after all.
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Post by Drunk Merchant on Apr 28, 2022 19:54:41 GMT
Lamination is usually not worth it and does nothing to help performance. Worse yet if itās in a cheap production sword it can be a major point of failure. Iād avoid it since itās asking for disaster.
Looking at the one you sent back, it looks like it had the equivalent of a gigantic kitae ware welding crack on the ha. Small ones arenāt that bad but at that enormity it could have become a stress failure point if you used. The kissaki and other geometry look a bit disappointing to so you lost nothing by sending back.
Fittings do look nice but I think theyāre outweighed by cons.
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Post by Sir Thorfinn on Apr 29, 2022 0:11:30 GMT
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addertooth
Member
Working the tsuka on two bare blades from Ninja-Katana, slow progress
Posts: 458
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Post by addertooth on May 1, 2022 1:03:04 GMT
Hands down, by at least 1500%, the worst I have ever got was a triple set (Katana, Wakizashi, Tanto) from Kaze99.
They were determined to demonstrate every major flaw which could be introduced during production of a sword. It was Maru pattern steel, but sold as SanMai lamination. The holes for the pegs were drilled diagonal (and crooked with wallowed out holes they had tried to fill with spackle to mask the severity of it). The ito (wrap) had already started to unravel from just the shipping. I do not have the time to enumerate all the geometry sins the blades had.
It is the only time I ever went through the nightmare of shipping swords back to China. I eventually got a full refund after providing eBay and the vendor detailed pictures.
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Post by Robert in California on May 1, 2022 1:21:58 GMT
Oddly enough, both my nicest blade and my worst both were Huawei's bought some years ago (5 yrs maybe). The best is a Huawei waki that had very cheap fittings (aluminum tsuba, etc?!), rattled in the saya, but the blade has actual activity in the hamon and is excellently shaped. A totally wowser blade better than I would have expected from a Chinese forge. The worst was a Huawei waki that you name it, it was done poorly. Rattled like a castanet, dull blade, very loose tuska-ito, non-tight fittings, saya rubbing on the last few inches of the blade slowly made the hamon so I could barely see it...faded.
Most of my Jkoo customs had minor but correctable issues, that I could fix or live with, in view of the abundant features for the price. Currently, a friend is very frustrated with Huawei for his katana order...going on a year, in part because Huawei keeps promising completion in a certain amount of weeks and that does not happen, and this case of "ready in ...." gets repeated.
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Post by yelman on May 21, 2022 22:53:57 GMT
Actually doesnt look that bad for a wallhanger
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Post by yelman on May 29, 2022 23:43:55 GMT
What is that blade made out of?
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Post by juardian on May 31, 2022 16:58:02 GMT
The worst for me was a Shinwa ninjato. When I was around 16-18 I looked at sites like Budk and Trueswords a lot. I still think of my cheap musha swords fondly. I bought a black and red folded ninjato one day and immediately disliked it. Blade was almost totally orange and the tsuka/fittings were about the worst you can get. Cut into a bottle cap, and the folded steel came apart like hairs on the edge. The edge steel was fraying in little wiry bits. I had never seen something like that and still haven't seen quality that bad again to this day. By some miracle the site took it back and gave me a refund. Drove a good bit to go to a blade shop a few months ago because I've never been able to shop for swords in person. They had a Hanwei Tori XL and it felt incredible to me. The rest of the sword rack was Shinwa, and seeing them gave me a chuckle remembering that old crummy ninjato.
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Post by Greenmick6982 on Jun 1, 2022 13:00:48 GMT
The worst? DSA Carpathian. Wes fixed it so at least it was somewhat salvageable, but I think they sent it to me out of spite.
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Post by Jazzviper1 on Jul 1, 2022 6:12:29 GMT
DSA Anduril, no contest. Blade too thick to wide weighs almost 5 pounds crappy guard and pommel.
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Nox
Member
Posts: 124
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Post by Nox on Jul 3, 2022 18:04:47 GMT
Albion machiavelli. Came sharp as a butter knife and it just felt horrible in the hand to me. Iāve had worse lower end swords of course but for the cost I was not pleased.
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