12 tatami Roll

knightsteel

knightsteel

Sword Smith
Joined
Sep 16, 2002
Messages
143
This last Sunday I did another twelve mat cut... as a single roll. One of my detractors on another (unmentionable) website recently posted that my 12 mat tameshigiri cut had little value since 12 mats in series were FAR easier to cut than twelve in a single roll. What a load of crap!

But just to show that I'm serious, I did a new cut this last Sunday severing twelve tatami mats in a single roll. Video should be up in the next few days.
http://www.angelsword.com/videos/videos.html

I didn't feel much difference between 12 as a single roll and 12 in series.

Daniel
 
knightsteel said:
One of my detractors on another (unmentionable) website recently posted that my 12 mat tameshigiri cut had little value since 12 mats in series were FAR easier to cut than twelve in a single roll. What a load of crap!
Click to expand...

Everyone is an expert huh? :rolleyes:

You made the 12 cut in a series look so easy. It seems as if you could go through twice that many.
 
Twelve is a pretty high number of mats, but anyone with good hasuji and pretty good power generation should be able to attack mats without much difficulty. I'm not trying to shoot it down as an "amateur feat" or anything, I just am wondering what is trying to be promoted/demoted, your swords or peoples' claims about tatami being such a valid test of a sword's worth. I would agree with the latter if that is the idea yer getting at.

Strangely, many "untrained" swordsmen perform cuts effectively more often than people who've been in iai for a while. Not a bad thing at all.

I say just dismiss the claims by guys who talk about mats being extremely hard to cut. Granted, there are mats that are pretty easy to cut and there are mats that are much more resisting, but in general you usually hear how hard it is coming from folks who are trying to accustom themselves to a methodology that may or may not be comfortable/familiar to their bodies.

ADDENDUM: For more political correctness, I do think 12 is a very nice cut, and I think that mats aren't *easy* targets, I just think they sometimes get more hype than they need.
 
Robert,

Using Bugei wara with a 36 to 48 hour soak as a standard mat, I am very interested in seeing what is the maximum that ANYONE can cut. Please join me in doing a cut and posting the results here. I would be interested hearing about your experience.

Daniel
 
After moving to Minneapolis, I'm afraid I've had to pass up swordsmanship for the most part, other than studying taijijian form and application. No test cutting.

I may however hook up with a local Toyama Ryu school and see if I can get some practice in tameshigiri again, it was fun and I hope perhaps to implement a changjian to that extent and see how the "major" cuts in taijijian actually work, since you never really know how the cut will work out until it's met with resistance!

On that note, what you call your "taijiquan" sword could probably be renamed to taijijian, since taijiquan itself is the hand-art (quan=fist), whereas the taijijian is the name of the sword style. The sword itself will naturally be changjian (long sword). Just thought I'd throw that bit of info out :D

Perhaps in the future I'll be able to get back into cutting. It's a lot of fun if you don't mind the cost and the cleanup.

I invite others on this forum to participate in the activity as well!
 
It has taken me over a year to work up to the twelve mat cut, even with several decades of sword practice (Chinese styles mainly). I find the cuts to be quite challenging. I wouldn't reccommend starting with more than three.

Daniel
 
I've done a lot of tameshigiri myself, and I've managed several high mat cuts, so I know pretty well the amount of practice it takes. I doubt my rust (poor pun) would take extremely long to shake off if I got back into practice.

However, for new people that want to get into it, I would probably recommend 1 or 2 mat rolls to start with rather than the 1/2 mat. It's more material to cut but the weight helps keep it from moving during the cut, which can muck up yer sword if you scoop your cut (never good).

Let us know when you get your video posted.
 
hmm?
a Changjian is what we often take for granted as a standard length jian!

In China, most people who carried a jian carried a duanjian, or short sword. It was far more common to find short swords than long swords, and only somewhat recently have people been thinking of a standard "jian" as a changjian. Odds are this is through popular martial arts like Taijijian where everyone likes the aesthetics of the longer blade in motion so much more than the duan jian.
 
Robert Marotz said:
I've done a lot of tameshigiri myself, and I've managed several high mat cuts, so I know pretty well the amount of practice it takes. I doubt my rust (poor pun) would take extremely long to shake off if I got back into practice.

Let us know when you get your video posted.
Click to expand...
What is the highest number of mats that you have cut?

We got up the first videos of "The Big Taco" cut. We will get some higher resolution vids up soon with less distortion. http://www.angelsword.com/videos/videos.html

Daniel
 
I've cut six-mat rolls several times and I've cut a seven-mat once, but I've never had the money to invest in a lot of mats to bind up into huge rolls.

It does sound kinda fun to try, but it's a luxury I'll be doing without.

Cool video though.
 
How do you know that the consistency of the mats is standard? I cut mostly 3" fast rope (free hanging or stacked on a block) and 2x4 lumber and there is huge variation between ropes (grit, fiber composition) and obviously wood comes as it grows (every which way). I've been trying to find a materal that would be standard to use for benchmarking swords and cutting ability.
 
That's the tricky part, wnease.

You do your best to buy your tatami-omote from a reliable source and be as consistent as you can. Soak time should be roughly equal, binding tightness of rolls should be similar.

You're still going to be subject to variation but you can keep it to a relative minimum.

Some people use tougher goza to gauge sword cutting ability, though this is every bit as much the swordsman as it is the sword, probably moreso. It's fun to cut, it's a good challenge to people who mostly do kata. I don't really think it is as good for testing swords as it is for testing swordsmen.

Perhaps most cutting tests are that way.
 
Robert Marotz said:
a Changjian is what we often take for granted as a standard length jian!

In China, most people who carried a jian carried a duanjian, or short sword.
Click to expand...

You just got my attention!

What sort of dimesions would a duanjian have?

What differences are there in technique/application between the two?

And is there a rule of thumb/body for the changjian/duanjian (i.e. ideal or recommended dimensions relative to the practitioners body?)

Thanks

Dom
 
lookin' good, Dan.


Re: sword vs. swordsman

I agree somewhat with this, but you have to have a good piece of steel in the first place. After that, the swordsman takes that steel to its extreme (and his extreme).
 
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