Dont know if anyone gives a shit but if you guys are stoned like me during the covid times you can stream pretty much all the new series on InstaFlixxer. I've been streaming with my brother recently =)
you should have tried to bend the Tang, after having removed the the grip. If the Tang was hardened that would explain why the pommel broke of and it would mean that all other copies will have tendency to braking pommels. The Tang on a european sword should never be hardened, wich is one of the major differences to a Katana, where this does not matter at all.
Exactly. Fitting of the pommel to a full width tang would add strength to that weak area also. That skinny tang end is a cheap shortcut in fabrication.
I've had my eye on that sword for a while now. I'm so glad that you decided to review it. Seeing it put through the wringer is always helpful. On another note, what is that purple, gold, and black katana behind you? That is beautiful.
I always boil the handle before tearing it down to melt the glue off its way easier although I think you wanted to see how much glue it had. When I rehandle the sword I use a lot of glue in the handle and guard afterwards and then peen the pommel so there is less stress on the pommel.
now just remove some of the blade from the area above guard and slide the guard to the new position, and make a new handle to fit the new handle area and now use a die to thread the tang above the break and get a new pommel and nut and give a return whirl
I see it tapers thinner at the pommel. May also have been their peening process Heating the peen and pounding it that changed the temper and made it brittle where it broke or maybe thats just 1060 steel.
The Templars were disbanded and executed in 1307(although they may have lived on in the form of other knightly orders), and longswords weren't a thing until about the 1360s at earliest. So there is no such thing as a "Templar longsword"!😃 It's because katana fanboydom has created a situation where everybody wants everything to be a two-handed sword. This includes swords that existed prior to the period of the longsword. The truth is that, in Medieval Europe at least, one-handed swords were always more prevalent than longswords. The longsword's "hayday" was about 1360 to 1550, but even during that period, the arming sword was still the most widely used sword. Hollywood simply cannot accept that though. They think everything must be a longsword to be "cool".
Oakeshott's work shows several hand and a half swords of type XII(I)a that are dated way before 1307 with the earliest entry somewhere around 1240 if I recall right. (From Records of the medieval sword) They weren't common but probably existed. If I recall right there is even one with the teutonic cross on it's disk pommel. There is some critique to his work in the historical sword community nowdays, but as far as I heard, his assumptions about sword ages weren't part those concerns. *Edit* I actually looked it up. The earliest example of a XIIIa longsword in oakeshotts work is dated to 1120-1150, so even earlier than I remembered. (Source - Records of the Medieval sword by Eward Oakeshott, page 106)
Matthew I have question do you recommend jkoo or ryan sowrds or any other websites or manufacturers that make katanas your the guy I had to ask so please sir answer my question Matthew dono
That pommel issue is a feature not a bug. Whether they're threaded or peened, European sword tangs of this type are too thin for large blades. Every bit of vibration caused by striking something with any kind of sword travels down the blade and hilt. If you check out some historical European swords, you'll find a lot of these tangs were forge welded onto the blades using inferior steel. The two most common places for sword with a tang like that to break are at the crossguard and the pommel. Even if the thin tang is forged as part of the blade as one piece, the vibrations from a strike are concentrated in those two spots. As a matter of design, katanas and messers have better tangs because they are a forged extension of the blade. I can only guess that the reason broadswords and longswords never developed with a proper tang is that they're more expensive and more difficult to make that way. If you're a feudal lord arming your peasants for war then good enough is probably good enough...
