Hollow grinding a conan sword, need feedback...

Thanks Peter! I just checked out some of your work and it is truly inspirational! I love the those wide blade designs, strong curves and leather accented handles. Great stuff!
 
Thanks Rick! The picture of the completed sword was taken a month ago of one of my earlier works (I wanted to share a pic of the bronze in response to one of the movie reference posts above). I'm working on my next one right now and trying to improve my results based on the great advice I'm learning here.
 
Very nice work. Hey, you're in Denver? That's pretty close. I'm curious how you do your fullers? That sword came out really well. I like that a lot.
 
Your work looks super to me as it is in the pictures, but your wanting to improve it because of what you see is to me a sign of a real artist and professional !!! For some of us, it seems we can never get to that "perfect Knife". Frank
 
Hi crimsonfalcon07,

I live up in Erie, just past Thornton.

I've done all of my fuller work by hand (see blurry photo below). I make clean marking lines on the blank and then I use a fresh 36grit belt and light pressure to gently get the groove going. I check my grind marks and flip the blank over (still grinding the same side) to balance out some of my off-sided grinding tendencies (I find there are always differences introduced when switching from left hand to right hand, etc... trying to grind 4 bevels...). Start in the middle with an 8 - 10" section...then slowly expand out, trying to maintain the center line.

I'm now practicing the bevel grinds with a jig (tool rest)... and do the fuller last. If the bevel grinds are good and full size... they made great visual guides for grinding the fuller... plus you get a little forgiveness because I grind the fuller until it touches the bevel lines. The nice straight edge bevels keep the fuller looking good.

For this particular blade, I used a 6" wheel for the bevel and fuller. That's a pretty deep hollow grind. I did this based on plans I drew up looking at pictures. It gives it a great visual reflection and blade geometry... but not practical. I just got an 8" wheel last week. So I'll start working with that for other projects.

fullergrind.jpg
 
Frank Niro said:
Your work looks super to me as it is in the pictures, but your wanting to improve it because of what you see is to me a sign of a real artist and professional !!! For some of us, it seems we can never get to that "perfect Knife". Frank
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That's a very nice thing to say Frank!

This type of forum is truly invaluable when it comes to sharing support and interest with our similar hobbies/profession. I've been very impressed with information and helpfulness of the members! :thumbup:
 
Thanks for the pics. I'm impressed you're grinding those fullers in freehand like that. Also, good to know that a wheel that wide can still yield a fuller like that. I thought it would take a much smaller wheel to grind those. I like the idea of starting in the center. Love the bronze work on that piece as well.
 
Great job savage! Love the whole package, and the bronze work is really nice.

Rick, historically there were swords that were hollow ground, but the hollow is generally MUCH shallower than what savage is doing with his 6" wheel. The ones that I have seen look as if the wheel was a minimum of 36", and some were probably done on wheels twice that size (driven by a waterwheel I'm guessing).

Best,
Steve
 
stevomiller said:
Rick, historically there were swords that were hollow ground, but the hollow is generally MUCH shallower than what savage is doing with his 6" wheel. The ones that I have seen look as if the wheel was a minimum of 36", and some were probably done on wheels twice that size (driven by a waterwheel I'm guessing).
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Ya mon, I saw the 13th Warrior.:thumbup:
 
Thanks for the nice words! I just checked out the Mad Dwarf stuff... they've done some awesome work!
 
Very nice work. The script on the blade is especially impressive. A good site for swordsmiths to explore is Don Fogg's site, www. Bladesmith's Forum.com
Not sure how to do the link, but anyway, they have a lot of smith's there who specialize in European swords such as your's.
 
Thank's David! The script on that blade was actually machined with a CNC mill. I've done some inscriptions with simple stencils and ferric cloride marking.... but the CNC style allows the etching to be .020" deep. It was a very long process to finally find a machinist to do this. I always assumed the process would be to grind the sword first then do the inscription. But this always scared the shops because the blade isn't easy to clamp down or to locate properly. Finally it dawned on me to have them do the milling on a the bar stock first.... but to make sure the inscription was extra deep so I could grind the fuller and still have the inscription in there. That's the process we went with and it worked!

Thanks for the reference to Dan Fogg's forum, I'll check it out!
 
CNC, no wonder it looks so sharpand clear. Well, since you seem to have the Conan swords down pat, here's one to consider. The Warg sword. Someone posted it here many years ago, and it was so cool I copied it to my file. Let me know that'ya think.
 

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Here's another pretty cool sword from the movies. The John Carter sword. I think I remember reading somewhere the guard was cast.
 

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