Matthew Gregory
Chief Executive in charge of Entertainment
- Joined
- Jan 12, 2005
- Messages
- 6,358

In mid-July, he mentioned that he'd be up my way (sort of) visiting family, and asked if I could give him a quick tutorial on how I wrap handles.

We ate some grilled chicken, laughed on the back deck a bit, and he even broke out the guitar:

When he came, he brought along a blade that maybe we could do a project together with...

Made of his gorgeous stainless-clad carbon steel San Mai, the sweep and flow just oozed his style. His original thoughts were that I'd run with it as a kwaiken, but something about the blade shape told me to head in a slightly different direction...

Shifting to a stick tang, I elected to use some modern materials to feed off of his new/old material blade construction. A stainless steel seppa and carbon fiber guard:

After a bit of fiddling and scootching:

For the handle, I wanted to do something very different. The core is TeroTuf...

...which I sleeved in carbon fiber fabric, and coated in numerous coats of resin and polished to a sheen.

Getting closer:

...then some fancy details to complete the package, and some carbon fiber tsukaito:

The final results:



The blade is 6-1/2" long, with a 5-3/8" long handle, and an overall length of just shy of 12". Weighs in at 9-5/8 ounces. The tiger-and-bamboo menuki are sterling silver and gold plate.
Fun project! Ben's a good time, and I'm glad he and his family got the chance to swing by. I hope he thinks I made the best of his work. Hope you like it, too, and thanks for looking!