New Project - Sabers

I don't care if Andy grinds it out of 1/2" rebar. If he puts one of his Fiddleback handles on it, I can make it move:)

Then again, my roots are with knives and swords cobbled from reclaimed truck springs and beaten to shape on an anvil on a dirt floor in a third world country. Finer sophistication is something I'll never be accused of, but I'm ok with that.
 
Honestly theres a misconception about smithing, you can forge a masterpiece in a dirt ditch filled with charcoal. the forge doesnt mean shit really, its the quality of the metal and where its located, just as well for the purpose of swords, ore made into steel is far superior to any spring steel. Just saying.

Try W2 for the sabers, its better.
 
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So this gets into metallurgy, its not quite relevant with knives but for swords the alloy composition not the elements but how the elements are located inside the material matters. Spring steel was designed specifically to retain and absorb energy, given the nature of a spring is to dampen shock and transfer it away from another source which would take the impact, Ie your tire then spring a second spring then the car then you, the second spring buffers the first. So for explanation it could be simplified as three components; Primary, transfer and buffer. 10XX series as well as 5160 are very good transfer steels but poor primaries, W2 on the other hand was meant to be a primary. and it has a good mixture of hard carbide forming elements while still having a decent amount of soft elements in the mixture.

Idealistically in a blade you might use 3 layers bent into a U shape and then forged closed or a Wei Mai, (5 layers) going Primary transfer, buffer, W2,1084 or 1075, then Iron. Tool steel is also what was used for swords, not spring steel, and ancient blades tended to have alot of trace elements of things like copper and nickle, and other odd things.

The problem with W2 is it tends to have a very very variable batch variance on just the carbon, which a smith can determine and feel with his hammer blows as well as observing heat while working on the material over an amount of time, a knife maker who uses an oven with preset variables doesn't have this advantage so much (its still there but harder to observe) and that makes replicated heat treat difficult. Of coarse independent study on a large batch can overcome this.

The other advantage is using a material with higher alloy content such as chrome vanadium, tungsten, mollybdenum, ect it has small amounts of just about every good, is you can bring your RHC down to 57 even though it will function at 65, gain a large amount of durability because of its alloy content a 10XX series doesnt offer, while still functioning performance wise because of its carbides.

As stated there are so many more variables that go into sword making then knife making, and a good sword maker will do every small detail to make a blade better. Better profiling, Balance, weight distribution, Differential components, differential heat treatment, differential tempering, anything and everything that will give you an advantage in your weapon in combat. In a knife you dont have to do this, and the problem is when a dedicated knife maker converts to trying to make a sword they don't account for everything or see the purpose, but a sword is a sword and it will demand it the first time its used to cut or whack something apart, and the customer will want to go grab everything in sight and try it out, even on other metals.

So we come to overhead, 3 feet of 10XX can run 15$, W2 is just as cheap but only maybe 1-2 more per foot. Lamination can run maybe 30-100 to make$ but its sell value suddenly goes from 100$ to 2000$. W2 also sells higher.
 
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Wow, it sounds like you are wasting your time with backyard forges and should be explaining why the majority of modern sword production is not using W-2 (including swords from some quite noted smiths, well versed in metallurgy).
 
Joseph Gardner said:
Interestingly enough, the forging process for american sabers civil war and onward is really noobish from a forging perspective. Most blades end up being a flat bar with the tang just thinned, above that is left as stock, further no beveling is done to the blade, and then the blade section is peened into a bevel forming the curve out to the tip, the thing just gets sharpened after that all the way down to maybe a rough 4 inches of stock which gets engraved.

Really its shit craftsmanship from a swordsmith perspective. Not to say it isnt effective as a weapon but it's pretty much an axe.

Good smithing would be to forge a bar drawing out two angles, one extremely long and going down to almost a point while the other maybe drawn to half an inch. at this stage the tang section would be forged in from the smaller cross section. the bar is thick at this stage so the tang while not being wide is still thick leaving a good deal of mass inside it. despite there being a long section the bar is balanced, from there the blade is beveled, the bevel is worked down to straiten the bar and rebeveled, and the spine is worked down as well to straiten the bar, the combination of these two created the double triangle shape found in most swords. Despite all of this the balance point can remain consistently close to the tangs meeting of the spine, the mass is kept relatively centered throughout the blade wheras grinding creates more mass at the spine. (weird to think of the edge as squished mass instead of removed mass,squished mass the balance does not change). The end section of the tang can still receive any additions such as the pommel and the guard. The result is that the blade moves extremely fast because of the leverage and as it cuts it gains leverage on the draw. This format is found in every sword throughout history and is the standard of excellence.

Smiths and cut away people have lost the perspective of this geometry, 98% of katanas are trash for this reason, im assuming its worse with sabers at least of american design, and for this reason I refuse to forge them for people.
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Pardon me, as I'm no expert, but in this and another one or two of your posts it sounds like you're saying that the mass of the tang itself balances out the blade side of a/all swords, and that the balance point would be on the handle side of the guard. I think that's an error - the whole hilt helps bring the blade into balance, and that balance point is forward of the guard in virtually all sword types.


Your saber is lookin' mighty fine, Fiddleback! :D:thumbsup:
 
I think you missed the geometry or even how that works at all, it shows in your forge work, since you do forge, take a bar, hammer it down one side and stretch it long the other, you can see it for yourself, Hell you can cut away the metal if you want for a preform.

My observation is that civil war sabers are pretty much just barstock, it would take me about three hours finish a tang, the fuller, and the curve at that end, and most of that is just temperature control.

and that might just be me, but under 200$ sword isnt my cup of tea, I do really like his handles though.
 
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J Joseph Gardner do you mean me? This is my first attempt at anything bigger than a camp chopping knife, so I never have. Tell me more about what you mean?
 
Networking! I occasionally forge a blank for fun as a side project while working on other projects, Usually I don't do any of the fittings, and trade that off to other people trading additional blanks for it. (Or just sell the blanks for people)
 
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I reviewed the postings. I will add some comments.

1. I restore/modify knives/hatchets/axes/swords.
2. Before constructing any sword, consider:
a. whether the sword (sabre is a general term) is going to be straight (thrusting) or curved (hacking);
b. consider whether the sword will be carried.
I address part b.
(1) it is difficult to walk around with a full length sabre hanging from a belt;
(2) When you look at say Patton's model, it was designed as a thrusting tool with the sheath on the horse saddle. It resembled the British issued one which recorded a kill in Belgium in 1914 from horseback.
(3) Custer and his crew did not carry sabres. By the time he rolled around on horseback, a person carried multiple pistols or rifles and if rifles, would dismount to fight. Forget the movies!
(4) Do you carry over the shoulder, across the back, or on the side? If you carry on the side, then lie down on the ground and conclude it is the not the best place to carry when you probably are not going to riding around on a horse, but lying on your face.
(5) The sheath material is critical. Leather can rust the sword. Ok. So you conclude cordura. All right, if you don't do the sheath right, the sword will cut it up when drawing and putting away. The best material is probably wood - and unless you have the skills, you need to find some one. Sure, I have made leather sheaths, but I don't store a sword in leather.
3. There are a couple machete shops back east. If you are lucky (more lucky if you make a straight sword), you will find a long enough cordura sheath and not bother with making one of leather/wood/plastic like material.
4. Remember that a poor man's machete is his sword. This is not to discourage someone from making a sword, it is to inform that I know some very advanced black belts in martial arts who decided to use 18-20 inch machetes. I found 20 inches was the right length for me carrying wakazashis across the back carry style in wood sheaths.
 
Add oiling and forced patina to that list and periodical cleaning to that list of options. Especially important when using stones to sharpen as they add direct contact with rust in the pig iron. (I like to use strait dishsoap during sharpening and then oil after.)

A historical process for both leather and wooden scabbards would be to apply a generous coat of oil and then suspend some distance above a small fire to allow the oil to become less vicous and seep into the material, this process toughens the inside and adds lubercant to reduce any wear on both the blade and the scabbard. Its a pretty good idea to oil leathers occasionally as well. I just like olive oil because its somewhat historically similar.

Its not so much popular these days because its sort of dirty, it will however prevent oxidation and preserve both the scabbard and sword. The oil will etch the blade in its own way too, might not be astetically pleasing for the buffed shiny people. Most ancient pattern welded blades got an etch this way, especially the japanese ones. (You can etch in olive oil too if you like) white vinigar works for stripping oil and cleaning before reoiling. Oils for blades were often scented with clove or other fragrences to reduce the blood stenched and thought to be purifying of evil biles. Awkward bit of trivia there.

If the blade is presented by itself renaissance wax is pretty and works wonders.

When i did HVAC for a few years about 1 in 4 houses interestingly enough had a mounted sword with pitting from rust and negligence, even stainless ones. 1095 being the common dirt cheap steel rusts really badly so it needs extra care.
 
Joseph Gardner said:
Honestly theres a misconception about smithing, you can forge a masterpiece in a dirt ditch filled with charcoal. the forge doesnt mean shit really, its the quality of the metal and where its located, just as well for the purpose of swords, ore made into steel is far superior to any spring steel. Just saying.

Try W2 for the sabers, its better.
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Sorry, but this statement makes ZERO sense. Where the hell do you think spring steel came from? The tooth fairy? "Spring ore"?
 
zzyzzogeton said:
Sorry, but this statement makes ZERO sense. Where the hell do you think spring steel came from? The tooth fairy? "Spring ore"?
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My favorite is where he says Japanese swords are etched in oil. :p

I think what he was trying to say there is that taking ore and smelting it into your own lump of steel is far superior for making swords than using steel from a technologically advanced steel-making operation.
 
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The qualities of actual swords are documented and studied as a science. The key difference really is just wrought iron as opposed to modern steels which are made from purified content in exact recipe.

Not to say an ancient blade would out preform a steel intentionally made to work other steel, the price difference to make a blank cut and grind away costs more then what you might sell a 10XX blade for and you cant get accurate sword metal for historical recreations unless you make it.
 
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Mecha said:
My favorite is where he says Japanese swords are etched in oil.
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While we are now wildly off topic to the original topic, there were some blades quenched in oil but generally only the machine made blades of all the nco, as well as some parade and dress swords. The naval stainless blades of the WWII period another example. As to "etched", mebbe just more babble speak.

As to Gardner's general babbling, just a case of time wasting in reading any of it or responding directly to. Let him starve and maybe he'll find some other purpose in life.

I still look forward to seeing the finished sword that spidey began.
Cheers
GC
 
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