cold steel saya.

[knife saber]

BTW, the ricasso would only work with a less thick blade profile, the habaki works well for the sword design. Adding the ricasso would add quite a bit of weight but who knows.... it might be interesting. A katana with a forte would make for an interested hybrid at least.

Lots of interesting things in the works from smiths I know. Also, Wally Hayes has his "tactical katana," which has no habaki - just a ricasso that runs an inch or so from the guard. Don't know how the sword is held in the sheath, though. Looks like it might be a friction fit.

I have to admit, I can't see how a ricasso area would add a prohibitive amount of weight to the blade. It might add an ounce or two, but unless it was a really long flat area, I don't see how it would affect weight or balance that much. Can you clarify?

 

[senoBDEC]

Lots of interesting things in the works from smiths I know. Also, Wally Hayes has his "tactical katana," which has no habaki - just a ricasso that runs an inch or so from the guard. Don't know how the sword is held in the sheath, though. Looks like it might be a friction fit.

I have to admit, I can't see how a ricasso area would add a prohibitive amount of weight to the blade. It might add an ounce or two, but unless it was a really long flat area, I don't see how it would affect weight or balance that much. Can you clarify?

What kind of a ricasso are we talking about? Small, large? Etc. Also... if you mean like on Wally Haye's katana (where you can't really grip it) then that shouldn't be an issue. If you mean a ricasso where you CAN grip it... that would both be weighty and reduce the cutting edge of an already relatively short edge.

Like I said, a forte (unsharpened blunt region that is geometrically similar to the rest of the edge) would work just as well.

 

[knife saber]

I was referring to a shorter ricasso. I've seen longer ones, particularly fond of the Danish longswords from ATrim, but they don't seem to work within the context of the traditional JSAs - particularly since, as you've already implied, the length of a European-style blade gripped at the ricasso can actually be longer than that of a katana held at the tsuka.

The forte (not the concept as such, but the practical implementation) seems to already exist in katana - the ubuha. Unless of course there are geometry changes present in the blunt section - I don't know much about Western swords. Or about Japanese swords, for that matter, but everything's relative.

Of course, the JSA people would eat anyone proposing this alive - tons of complaints about nukitsuke and noto and tradition and so forth.

On another forum I read a suggestion about making a ricasso in the shape of a habaki. That was a fun thread

 

[senoBDEC]

On another forum I read a suggestion about making a ricasso in the shape of a habaki. That was a fun thread

So we are in agreement . Yeah, that is true. I don't actually know how sharp a forte should be, I don't recall reading it in any manuals... most of which are dedicated to swordsmanship... not manufacture. There's books available, but I've not gotten around to reading them.

 

[Redleg]

Don't shim the habaki!
Have a competant smith-type tighten it the right way.

Also, you can shim the saya to reduce/eliminate rattling, it's done all the time...

 

[senoBDEC]

Don't shim the habaki!
Have a competant smith-type tighten it the right way.

Also, you can shim the saya to reduce/eliminate rattling, it's done all the time...

.....? Why oh why would you shim the habaki? YOu shim the saya where the habaki would fit.... I forget if it's edge-side or back... but shimming edge-side seems to work.

Better yet, get a custom-made saya.