Well, I finally got my sword from Celtic WebMerchants today after almost two months. Wish I could say it was worth the wait, but….
It’s a total POS. NOT what I was expecting. First thing I noticed as I pulled it out of the plastic was the leather on the handle (cheap thin vinyl shoe coating leather) was peeling up at the guard. I had some glue at work, so I figured I’d fix it here. As I started to apply the glue, one of the brass colored studs popped off, so I had to glue that back on, too. As I was gluing that, I noticed the pommel was loose and spinning (threaded pommel with a nut) so I put Loctite on that. Now I’m noticing the brass bands around the grip are uneven, but at least they seem secure for now. The edges on the curved guard are rough, uneven and unsanded or polished, like someone carved them out with a jigsaw and left it. Let’s not even discuss the gap!
It was only then I felt the edge, which was supposed to be “sharp”, and specifically stated to be so in the ad description. Totally blunt. Not a trace of an edge. HEMA blunt where the edge is actually flattened. Almost impossible to sharpen with anything other than a belt sander.
The scabbard, if you can call it that, isn’t worth ANYTHING! The rounded ends have crude Sharpie marks along the inside to give a rough idea of where to cut, and I do mean ROUGH! It looks like a 2nd grader did the trim with some safety scissors. I feel bad for the cow that gave it’s life to produce this trash.
imgur.com/a/dKooCEg
Very sorry I actually spent money on this. I got a Devil’s Edge Xiphos and Windlass Pugio, both of which were good quality and around the same price, though both are smaller blades,
The customer service rep was just as appalled as I was after I uploaded the pics and offered me 50% off so it ended up costing me about $60 total, which I think it’s worth it. I’m glad they acknowledged that, even for a budget sword, there has to be SOME level of quality standards and this was well below anything acceptable. So Celtic Webmerchants made good at least, though obviously, I'll be a lot more cautious and do more research before making another purchase through them.
I spent about an hour with my Accusharp putting an edge on it and touched it up with some of my Lansky stones. There were metal shavings everywhere! BUT it’s sharp enough to slice paper, so at least you wouldn’t want to get hit smacked with it and I’m not embarrassed to put it on display sans scabbard…if you don’t look too close. And don’t hit anything hard with it. I probably need a new Accusharp now…I was hesitant to even start, but the EN45 or whatever it’s made of is fairly soft steel - certainly won’t keep an edge, but I’m not going to be attacking any tatami mats with it.
