Yagoro
Member
Ikkyu in Kendo and Kenjutsu Practitioner
Posts: 1,578
|
Post by Yagoro on Jul 3, 2022 23:44:14 GMT
Unfortunately I didn’t take videos at the time but I found the bugei and kurin I owned near unbreakable. Why I sold them? I nearly lost a finger because bugei was hard to manage. Yeah that’s weak evidence since no documentation but at least it gives some idea of how hard you can push something without it breaking. I don’t quite know why people who insist something is better than all others can’t just do some good old fashioned testing? For instance this thing did gouge open a mild steel bowl (a poor man’s helmet splitting) and from that and other abuse merely suffered scratches and a small nick or two. If something is legendary it should be easy to show. As for recommending pork cutting as a test. I stand by it, if you refer to Tameshigiri - The History and Development of Japanese Sword Testing, that’s what they used in Meiji Japan and other times as an aggressive test. How well it can cut and if it takes damage in the process should tell much. Perhaps it’s the litmus strip test for performance since what happens is very much a spectrum. That’s why if one test will be done as evidence of something being superlative it can be that. Speaking of which, this reminds me of Matthew Jensen's review of the hanwei oni where he deformed the edge on a cutting stand. And that was l6 bainite (but was poorly heat treated to be fair).
|
|
|
Post by Drunk Merchant on Jul 3, 2022 23:52:57 GMT
This is why I think basics (geometry, heat treatment) are he decisive factor in performance and everything else just pushes around the margins a bit.
|
|
|
Post by AndiTheBarvarian on Jul 4, 2022 2:53:12 GMT
|
|
|
Post by yelman on Jul 14, 2022 19:41:05 GMT
Weird. I was told only stainless steel swords broke.
|
|
|
Post by Drunk Merchant on Jul 14, 2022 23:22:58 GMT
Looks like ole Stefan must be making his katanas out of stainless then. Sure looks like it. All jokes aside the explode into shrapnel thing is normally dependent on stainless. I don’t know how his swords are exploding the moment they hit something harder than a tomato. All I can think is maybe he doesn’t know how to do differential hardening so instead of the usual strengthening, the residual stresses turn his swords into bombs.
|
|
tera
Moderator
Posts: 1,658
|
Post by tera on Jul 14, 2022 23:25:05 GMT
Weird. I was told only stainless steel swords broke. I've seen silencer manufacturers use the most expensive materials only to have their cans eject themselves downrange to "semprini" spot welds. The big guys control the process more precisely with full-circumferencial robotic welding. Likewise, steels with desirable properties for a sword that will see use can still fail if they aren't properly heat treated or are in some other way mishandled. It's just the consensus amongst most manufacturers and swordsmen is that stainless has less desirable properties than other available steels. There will always be lemons and outliers, but if stainless were the superior material, it would be dominating the high-end market. For some reason, it does not.
|
|
|
Post by yelman on Jul 15, 2022 3:55:22 GMT
That’s true, but there’s probably a bunch of us out there trying to wrap our heads around the fact that a sword costing thousands of dollars can just ‘ explode’ But then I think maybe we’re asking too much of swords in general—for example, we don’t buy a car thinking it will never break down. This forum is replete with historical anecdotes of swords breaking, and there are medieval artworks depicting this also. How many antique ( and older) swords would have survived today’s sword tests even in their prime? Its not only the steel , IMO. Structurally, they’re unsound- fully cantilevered objects when cutting.
|
|
|
Post by Drunk Merchant on Jul 15, 2022 4:18:24 GMT
Exploding into shrapnel is absolutely a new invention though, there has never been a recorded case of a sword exploding into little tinsel. And believe me Japan was crazy about torture testing: they subjected “bundle swords” (mass produced cheap low end swords for peons) to surprise torture testing and publicly humiliated the famous smith Naotane and striped him of his contracts since his bundle swords cracked or broke markussesko.com/2019/08/27/destructive-sword-testing/ the guy who took over his orders btw made a zombie sword that was near impossible to break. Anyways, exploding swords were unheard of, even amongst what would get you public humiliation. Also I have many average quality swords that have edge on edge damage - what made Roth’s explode. In any half decent working sword what happens is it bounces off and takes a nick, so common Japan calls it hakobore. totally average sword from Bakumatsu with hakobore mass produced war blade with many hard strike nicks, had to pass torture tests without damage to be acceptedMy guess is that since Roth was winging it he just never learned how to do proper differential hardening and so anything harder than tomato leads to exploding. That’s what happens when you never learn how to make functional. I guess dunning Krueger made him think he’s the best katana maker ever but be honest, if swords were exploding death traps more dangerous to the wielder than target, then would anyone have dared to use them? And pictures say a thousand words, what do you see there? This Roth is honestly the worst O-kissaki I’ve ever seen and terribly shaped over all. His kissaki is poorly shaped and small and bulbous and since he couldn’t do a proper O-kissaki he tried to mimick it by arbitrarily placing the yokote inches behind it should be. I’m not surprised this is unsafe to use. Also, Chinese smiths like Zsey have literally done far better okissaki cheap. Surprisingly enough the old torture tests were harsher than most of today’s: hitting wood and armor was normal and pretty much mandatory for a working sword, some even wanted them to gouge hardened steel helms without damage. Part of the reason they were so obsessive on functional during times of duress was you don’t want to be the guy who dies because your sword broke when you needed it. Good excerpt here: imgur.com/a/MNgdMsI there was a time in the middle of Edo where working swords declined and people started picking ornamental ones that couldn't stand abuse but that so incensed smiths like Masahide that it started the shinshinto era with an emphasis on functionality and torture testing Funny enough torture tests continued into Meiji and Showa Japan and one them was hitting whole pig cadavers. It's arguably the most informative torture test.
|
|
|
Post by yelman on Jul 15, 2022 5:02:55 GMT
Learning a lot here, thanks Drunk M...
|
|
|
Post by Drunk Merchant on Jul 15, 2022 5:18:03 GMT
I need to post more excerpts, but this guy is a prolific translator of old Japanese records and turned centuries worth of notes into a book on Tameshigiri www.lulu.com/shop/markus-sesko/e-tameshigiri/ebook/product-21700689.html?page=1&pageSize=4 mildly disturbing but very interesting. Then again I might be biased, I almost fetishize old swords with battle scars. It's like a kind of proof mark to me, suffered great abuse but held. A lot of bigger collectors straight up tell me that's stupid and childish lol
|
|