- Joined
- May 6, 2019
- Messages
- 101
CPM 3V Wakizashi
Specs:
19.5" Blade (nagasa (cutting edge) 18.7" and habaki 1")
1.2" blade width at habaki
28" total length (8.5" handle)
Pre Delta 3V
~.216" thickness
~ 1.7 lbs
Antique tsuba ~17-18th century (mogarashi souten design)
Tsuka (handle) core mahogany
Full wrapped samegawa (sting ray skin) (lacquered for protection)
Japanese Silk ito (namikawa ltd) wrapped in hineri maki style and lacquered for protection
Saya (scabbard) mahogany sealed ans lacquerd for protection with buffalo horn details (koiguchi, kojiri and kurigat) wrapped with silk sageo
Mirror polished blade
Brass habaki and copper seppas are also polished
Blade bevels are ~15 DPS
Edge bevels are ~25 DPS
Sori (blade curvature) is small ~0.4" for better chopping ability.
I always loved japanese blades. I never had thousands of dollars to buy antique one so I used to forge some tantos from old files and spring steels and swords from spring steels also.
Last year I've decided to make one from supersteel.
I always admired Dan Keffeler with his japanese style swords, and found Ben Tendick who was doing some swords also.
Their choice was CPM 3V steel. That was more than enough for me to know that it is top choice for sword. I knew that only steel wasn't enough, heat treatment is where blade is being born from piece of steel. So I search who was doing best heat treatment for CPM 3V and I found Nathan Carother (actually it turned out that he and Dan Keffeler are good friends and have many projects together)
I've contacted Nathan and asked him to help me with heat treatment. He gave me recipe for pre delta 3v heat treatment as D3V is proprietary. He told me to contact Brad at peters heat treat company and tell him to heat treat my blade with "low temper tweak developed by Dan and Nathan".
When I've asked Nathan about pre D3V and D3V he told me next "The chief advantage to the Delta protocol over the immediately preceding low temp tweak is enhanced edge stability in rough use. --->edge stability<--- not gross toughness. And the low temp tweak was already used for good edge stability and has a proven track record with Dan Keffeler's swords. Delta is not stronger, it stays sharp better. The previous tweak is a good process, perhaps just as good when used in a large knife."
So I gave rough shape to my CPM 3V
This are pictures when was getting ready to ship to peters for heat treatment.
After recieving back I started polishing my blade. Gave mirror polish and then wrapped in protective tape so I could start working on details.
Made habaki from brass and cut seppas from copper.
I wanted my wakizashi to be heavy duty chopper, not only aesthetically beautiful.
So I soldiered habaki on blade and glued tang in handle. (Usually japanese blades are with pin and you can remove all parts from them, but that isn't as hard as glued one, plus side effect of Nathans heat treat protocol gives "higher percentage of free chromium, so although it is not stainless, it is nearly so").
Also tweaked a handle for better chopping abilities, and made it bit longer than traditional wakizashis had, so one can hold with two hands when extra power is needed.
Fully wrapped samegawa (sting ray skin) as it gives extra protection and is best way of applyin it on handle (pannels on side are cheaper version for only visual look, they don't give protection, full wrap is protecting handle as making it one whole piece as core wood is two pieces carved and glued together). For extra protection lacquered samegawa as it is weak against water (rain).
Carved and polished buffalo horn details and fitted them on saya (scabbard)
After all of that wrapped handle with silk ito imported from japan (namikawa ltd) in hineri maki style, with hishigamis inside (small wedge shaped papper triangles) and then lacquered it with very thin lacquer for protection and "massaged" lacquer inside so ito has same smooth silk feeling in hand but is hard as nails.
As for saya (scabbard) lacquered it with high gloss lacquer for better and richer look.
After lacquer dried wrapped saya with silk sageo for aesthetic beauty.
Here is how everything looks now:
Saya wraps around habaki that tight that it can't fell off while upside down (even if you shake) but it also has some space so with pushing your thumb on tsuba you free blade without any extra force needed.
So my wakizashi came out aesthetically beautiful but with lots of chopping power and durability. (Have bent it on my knee many times before asemblying at ~60-70° and it was coming back to original shape)
Specs:
19.5" Blade (nagasa (cutting edge) 18.7" and habaki 1")
1.2" blade width at habaki
28" total length (8.5" handle)
Pre Delta 3V
~.216" thickness
~ 1.7 lbs
Antique tsuba ~17-18th century (mogarashi souten design)
Tsuka (handle) core mahogany
Full wrapped samegawa (sting ray skin) (lacquered for protection)
Japanese Silk ito (namikawa ltd) wrapped in hineri maki style and lacquered for protection
Saya (scabbard) mahogany sealed ans lacquerd for protection with buffalo horn details (koiguchi, kojiri and kurigat) wrapped with silk sageo
Mirror polished blade
Brass habaki and copper seppas are also polished
Blade bevels are ~15 DPS
Edge bevels are ~25 DPS
Sori (blade curvature) is small ~0.4" for better chopping ability.
I always loved japanese blades. I never had thousands of dollars to buy antique one so I used to forge some tantos from old files and spring steels and swords from spring steels also.
Last year I've decided to make one from supersteel.
I always admired Dan Keffeler with his japanese style swords, and found Ben Tendick who was doing some swords also.
Their choice was CPM 3V steel. That was more than enough for me to know that it is top choice for sword. I knew that only steel wasn't enough, heat treatment is where blade is being born from piece of steel. So I search who was doing best heat treatment for CPM 3V and I found Nathan Carother (actually it turned out that he and Dan Keffeler are good friends and have many projects together)
I've contacted Nathan and asked him to help me with heat treatment. He gave me recipe for pre delta 3v heat treatment as D3V is proprietary. He told me to contact Brad at peters heat treat company and tell him to heat treat my blade with "low temper tweak developed by Dan and Nathan".
When I've asked Nathan about pre D3V and D3V he told me next "The chief advantage to the Delta protocol over the immediately preceding low temp tweak is enhanced edge stability in rough use. --->edge stability<--- not gross toughness. And the low temp tweak was already used for good edge stability and has a proven track record with Dan Keffeler's swords. Delta is not stronger, it stays sharp better. The previous tweak is a good process, perhaps just as good when used in a large knife."
So I gave rough shape to my CPM 3V
This are pictures when was getting ready to ship to peters for heat treatment.
After recieving back I started polishing my blade. Gave mirror polish and then wrapped in protective tape so I could start working on details.
Made habaki from brass and cut seppas from copper.
I wanted my wakizashi to be heavy duty chopper, not only aesthetically beautiful.
So I soldiered habaki on blade and glued tang in handle. (Usually japanese blades are with pin and you can remove all parts from them, but that isn't as hard as glued one, plus side effect of Nathans heat treat protocol gives "higher percentage of free chromium, so although it is not stainless, it is nearly so").
Also tweaked a handle for better chopping abilities, and made it bit longer than traditional wakizashis had, so one can hold with two hands when extra power is needed.
Fully wrapped samegawa (sting ray skin) as it gives extra protection and is best way of applyin it on handle (pannels on side are cheaper version for only visual look, they don't give protection, full wrap is protecting handle as making it one whole piece as core wood is two pieces carved and glued together). For extra protection lacquered samegawa as it is weak against water (rain).
Carved and polished buffalo horn details and fitted them on saya (scabbard)
After all of that wrapped handle with silk ito imported from japan (namikawa ltd) in hineri maki style, with hishigamis inside (small wedge shaped papper triangles) and then lacquered it with very thin lacquer for protection and "massaged" lacquer inside so ito has same smooth silk feeling in hand but is hard as nails.
As for saya (scabbard) lacquered it with high gloss lacquer for better and richer look.
After lacquer dried wrapped saya with silk sageo for aesthetic beauty.
Here is how everything looks now:
Saya wraps around habaki that tight that it can't fell off while upside down (even if you shake) but it also has some space so with pushing your thumb on tsuba you free blade without any extra force needed.
So my wakizashi came out aesthetically beautiful but with lots of chopping power and durability. (Have bent it on my knee many times before asemblying at ~60-70° and it was coming back to original shape)
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