Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Jason got a sword.

So Jason got a sword.  Paid a buck for it on EBay, and it still cost him twenty five bucks shipping and duty.  It had a broken tang and some rust.  Just the blade...no handle or scabbard.  It was folded steel though, and the decoration was hand chiseled. 






 




  



  

This caption seems to be hand cut.  They say that this sword was issued to the Imperial Guard.  




 

The fullers are kind of neat.  Not sure of the decoration.  Shayne feels that it is some sort of anime, sword of the daywalker decoration, and proves it to be modern.  I'm okay with that.  Considering that this sword has been heavily abused cutting pumpkins and other things I would hate to think it was an antique!  It isn't.  But, it is a full centimetre wide at the spine, and has a decent taper down towards the tip.  The signs of a well made sword.  Below you can see the warp from the impacts and the nice false edge "feather" down near the tip.

     It will be a bit tricky to take that warp out.  Not impossible.  Its the notches in the blade which are, um, problematic.

The above picture clearly shows the folded steel nature of the sword and the crisp machining.  It has a distal taper, unlike the usual "smoke shop" swords which are just milled out of flat stock, and it does not have a secondary bevel.  Or at least, should not have one...I think the previous owner tried to sharpen it.    Bad idea....


So I was about to sell this sword at fan expo for thirty bucks, and just as I was about to sell it, I realized that this was a folded steel sword.  So I figured that there was enough intrinsic value in this sword to justify welding a tang onto it, and in general, cleaning it up.  I would not bother with a cheap "smoke shop" sword, or one of those steel sword-like objects in the velvet scabbards. 

Watch this space to see what is going to be done with it.

4 comments:

Drackar said...

I always love watching the process of "something with potential" to finished product.

STAG said...

Hello Drackar, welcome to my little corner of the interwebs.
(So many people visit. So few comment!)

Unknown said...

VERY nice! --Any luck in appraising its *actual* value as of yet?? :)

STAG said...

Well, as we all know, it is worth what anyone will pay for it.