Ask me about swords.

[Androxine Vortex]

You know what thought just occurred to me... what if this whole time Andres was just making all this stuff up XD

(edit: not trying to poke fun at your condition)

 

[Hans]

You know what thought just occurred to me... what if this whole time Andres was just making all this stuff up XD

Unlikely. What he writes seems pretty valid.
If you want to double check with a different source you might follow that link (German forum thread): Waffendesign - Versuch eines Tutorials - Weltenbastel-Theorie - Weltenbastler Forum

 

[Androxine Vortex]

Unlikely. What he writes seems pretty valid.
If you want to double check with a different source you might follow that link (German forum thread): Waffendesign - Versuch eines Tutorials - Weltenbastel-Theorie - Weltenbastler Forum

It was just a joke. Some of the stuff he is saying I have heard before so I have no real reason to doubt or question the guy. A good friend of mine had his same condition but it came to history, especially World War II. His entire bookshelf was nothing but text books.

 

[King Raven Stark]

I'm real interested in started a sword collection but my main concern is where do i get a good one, not that cheap busted crap where it breaks everytime you swing. What do I look for when purchasing one? what are the pros and cons?

Thank You

 

[Anders Ämting]

You know what thought just occurred to me... what if this whole time Andres was just making all this stuff up XD

I think I would try to make my posts shorter if that was the case. -_-

As you may notice, sometimes I have trouble shutting up about swords.

I'm real interested in started a sword collection but my main concern is where do i get a good one, not that cheap busted crap where it breaks everytime you swing. What do I look for when purchasing one? what are the pros and cons?

Well, first of all, go to this forum:

SBG Sword Forum • Index page

These people can help you. It's pretty much what they're all about.

In general though, it comes down to what you are willing to pay, exactly what kind of sword you want, (time period, culture, etc) and how picky you are. Anything stainless is a no go - stainless is too brittle for functional swords and will break dangerously easily. Look for the phrase "battle ready." It usually means that the sword is designed to be used, though it's absolutely not a guarantee for quality. If you find a sword you like, look around for any reviews from people who bought it before you.

In terms of price, functional swords tend to start around $100 and then proceed up to the multiple thousands. In my experience, you should be prepared to shell out at least 200-300 dollars if you want something one might describe as a reliable weapon. You can find the occasional gem for less, but for the most part you get a better sword the more you are willing to spend. Some types of swords are easy to get a hold of - katana are all over the place, for example - while other types are very rare to see reproduced.

Other things to consider is where you live, what kind of laws apply, shipping fees and import taxes, etc.

 

[Ravana]

I'm real interested in started a sword collection but my main concern is where do i get a good one, not that cheap busted crap where it breaks everytime you swing. What do I look for when purchasing one? what are the pros and cons?

In addition to what Anders said, I'd ask the purpose of the collection. If all you want is for it to look cool, go ahead and buy the cheap stuff… or alternately buy expensive museum-replica blades if you're concerned with authenticity, though the metal can still be garbage for all the difference it makes. (If you are after authenticity, you should only buy blades the maker can provide a museum collection reference number on… and which you can verify.)

If you plan to hit things with them, metal quality is of much greater concern—I wouldn't even trust a "battle-ready" label (labels can lie, after all). I'd want to know exactly what kind of metal went into the blade… which also means you'll want to buy from someone you know and trust to tell you the truth about that, or at least from someone recommended by someone you trust. Even this won't matter a whole lot unless you also know which alloy does what, so a passing familiarity with metallurgy would also be in order.

If you want to develop a collection of original blades, you're unlikely to be willing to hit anything with them, no matter the quality of metal or craftsmanship: no matter how careful you are, any blade can be damaged… and historical originals can cost more than Black Lotuses do. (Sometimes. I just looked up the price of Lotuses on ebay. Can't believe I could have stocked up on those for $20 once.…)

And, if like most of us, you plan to mix and match as your resources permit, well… just know which goal you're pursuing with each purchase.

 

[Sheilawisz]

@Raven Stark: Laws and weapon regulations vary widely between countries, and sadly this has a tendency to include swords for some odd reason (yeah, like swords would be a threat to a country's national security!!) and if you want to purchase swords from somewhere, first you need to be sure that you will have no trouble with the laws.

For example, where I live I cannot import swords from Canada or the US (or anywhere else) because they are stopped at the customs and then you need a special permit from the military forces to claim your sword, which is not so easy to obtain as far as I know- There are other ways to get swords here, but it's way more difficult than for someone living in the US =(

You can also make your own swords!! Please check my thread Aluminum Swordmaking at the Chit Chat forum.

Aluminum swords are not so difficult to make, they look great, it's very easy to keep them looking good and also they are fast and can be powerful enough to cut and stab soft targets, if that's what you want to do =)

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

Question: When the gunpowder age dawned on the battlefield & started to become a force, what type of swords were being carried? Also, why were these designs preferred?

I'm mainly talking about the period of early mechanical firearms like wheel-locks & matchlocks.

Thanks.

 

[Anders Ämting]

Question: When the gunpowder age dawned on the battlefield & started to become a force, what type of swords were being carried? Also, why were these designs preferred?

I'm mainly talking about the period of early mechanical firearms like wheel-locks & matchlocks.

Thanks.

The earliest guns started showing up in the 1400:s, when plate armor was still in use and various styles of the medieval sword were carried on the battlefield. I mentioned this before, but it's important to remember that the introduction and development of firearms and armor going out of style was a rather gradual process. What gunpowder weapons did first and foremost was to change battle tactics, armors and swords followed that.

This process continued into the Renaissance in the 1500s. You would still see some body armor around that time but it had been rendered much less useful. But íf anything, the fact that it was no longer as important to take armor into account when picking a sword led to a much wider variety of swords being used - to the point were it's actually hard to point at a single type of sword as representative for the whole period.

Just to mention a few examples: The last holdout of the old medieval style sword was the Type XXI and XXII swords, broad at the base with multiple fullers, often highly decorated. They saw a lot of influence from the Italian cinquedea daggers, short broad blades inspired by the Renaissance ideal of emulating the classical styles of Rome and Ancient Greece.

One of the most successful sword types was the XIX, which appeared in the fourteenth century and endured all the way into the seventeenth. It is characterized by a fuller running down the first half of a hexagonal blade, but could otherwise be found in a very broad range of dimensions - some were large and long, some were unusually short. They started out with simple cruciform hilts, then developed finger rings, side rings, knucklebows, etc, eventually becoming true complex hilted swords.

Likewise, the classic longsword was a popular weapon of the early Renaissance. In time they were replaced by the long, complex-hilted bastard swords, many of which had Type XIX blades.

In Spain the civilian espada ropera appeared and quickly evolved into the rapier and its sibling the sidesword. In Germany common knives became longer and more combat oriented, resulting the very varied messer family of swords which notably included the falchion-like grosse messer and the large, two-handed kriegsmesser. A similar weapon was the Swiss saber, which was basically a bastard sword with a saber blade. The landsknecht mercenaries carried the short, cutting specialized katzbalger with it's characteristic hilt, which itself became more and more complex until they turned into true baskethilt swords. And so on, and so forth, etc, etc.

And this is just the swords that can actually be considered distinct styles - there was also a lot of oddities and hybrids being used. People of the time were happy to experiement and go with whatever they found worked best.

So I'm not sure it's possible to give a straight answer to your question. It would be a lot easier to narrow down what swords were the most typical for a certain region or in a certain context.

 

[Ankari]

Wait....You brought in some terminology that made me scratch my head. Type XIX and type XXI blades didn't process in my mind. Where can I find a gallery of swords with descriptions? If its online, cool. If its a book, cool too.

 

[Sheilawisz]

@Ankari: Check this out: Oakeshott typology.

 

[Anders Ämting]

Wait....You brought in some terminology that made me scratch my head. Type XIX and type XXI blades didn't process in my mind. Where can I find a gallery of swords with descriptions? If its online, cool. If its a book, cool too.

@Ankari: Check this out: Oakeshott typology.

Thanks for covering that, Sheilawisz.

The funny thing about swords is that people tended to not really categorize them at all - in medieval times a sword was just a sword. So when talking about distinct types today, all we really have to go by is the numbers Ewart Oakeshott assigned them.

 

[Androxine Vortex]

Not sure if this has been asked but is it possible to melt down swords (and armor) and then make stronger swords (and armor) out of it? It might sound like a weird question, I know.

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

Not sure if this has been asked but is it possible to melt down swords (and armor) and then make stronger swords (and armor) out of it? It might sound like a weird question, I know.

You can certainly melt them down but the quality of the next item you make with them will depend on the qualities of the original metals and the technique of the craftsman.

 

[Androxine Vortex]

You can certainly melt them down but the quality of the next item you make with them will depend on the qualities of the original metals and the technique of the craftsman.

But would the new sword be necessarily stronger because it was made from already refined metal?

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

But would the new sword be necessarily stronger because it was made from already refined metal?

No... Not necessarily.. It would be the overall chemical content of the combined, smelted metals.

It could be stronger if the combination was superior (the combination of different grades of metals). Some steels have higher carbon counts, some have more chromium, etc. it's the final metal composition that matters most.

You can refine crap metal all you want, you'll end up with refined crap metal.

 

[Ravana]

But would the new sword be necessarily stronger because it was made from already refined metal?

What he said. ↑↑

It could just as easily be weaker, depending on what kind of metal you're talking about, and what processes you're using, since reworking steel will change the carbon content… and while you do generally want some, you don't want a whole lot. In fact, normal processes of turning iron ore into steel involve adding more carbon than is desirable (to remove the oxygen from the ore); a certain amount needs to be removed again in subsequent processes to get it down to the desired ratio. Any reheating will almost invariably add carbon again, as most normal fuels will be carbon-based.

Depending on what you mean by "melting" them down, it could completely change the amount of trace metals in any alloy, as some of the ones with lower melting points separate from others. The metal could pick up other trace elements in the process—which will often be the case if you are using the same crucible, forge, etc. for more than one kind of metal, or even different samples of the same metal. Or it could pick them up from other components in the process: the fuel, as mentioned, or even the atmosphere. Or it could burn them off.

If you're talking about completely liquefying it, you've essentially started all over again—metal can't "remember" what it was previously. (Though note that liquefying iron is beyond the capabilities of most pre-industrial settings.) And even that is assuming you're starting with metal that's all the same quality… which, in pre-industrial settings, is almost never the case: no matter how good your quality controls, each batch will be marginally different. At best, what you're going to do is save some intermediary steps, if you're using metal that has all originated from the same processor using ore that is all from the same location.

Note also that, at least for steel, and at least for blades, the metal was probably hardened after being shaped: the outer layer will be chemically different from the bulk of the piece, due to the introduction of new elements (mostly carbon) in the finishing processes. The core of the item remains lower-carbon, and thus generally tougher, while a thin surface layer is of a higher-carbon alloy, which will be harder—note that "harder" and "tougher" are not synonymous when discussing materials properties: "tough" is the opposite of "brittle," whereas the harder something is, the more brittle it is: tough bends, hard breaks. The upshot being that something that might have been a wonderful sword would, after being melted down, be nothing more than decent mild steel… at least until it is shaped and hardened again.

Which, essentially, is why no one ever does what you're suggesting: they take whatever metal of the correct type can be found, throw it all in together, and start over from the beginning.

 

[Ankari]

When you engrave a sword does it weaken the blade?

 

[Ravana]

When you engrave a sword does it weaken the blade?

Only if you do it wrong.

The depth of engraving is so minimal it should never make any difference. Yes, you're removing a tiny bit of the metal… but only along flat surfaces. The chances of this mattering are far lower than, for instance, the chances of the blade having any number of hidden defects: one microscopic hairline flaw in the blade will be far more likely to cause catastrophic failure (i.e. breaking) than any amount of properly-done etching ever could.

 

[Jabrosky]

Could a machete function effectively as a sword, especially against other swords?