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Silver Soldering Habaki with a Charcoal Forge & Fuigo
A clip from yesterday’s work: silver soldering a habaki with the charcoal forge & fuigo box bellows. Watch the machigane area and you can see the solder begin to melt and flow around 0:40 until it is pulled out to stop the heating. The fuigo allows very precise air mix and heat control. When soldering […]
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Tanto Forging Practice: Railroad Spike
Hand forging a classical tanto style blade study from a reclaimed railroad spike and a tsuba from the spike head…a serious letter opener? The goal is to use all of the steel efficiently by moving it into place and end up with classical tanto proportions and form. Serious students of the forge can watch the […]
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Making Sekigane for a Wrought Iron Tsuba
Guards for classical Japanese style takedown knives are generally formed as variations of flat discs that slide over the tang. When working with wrought iron or steel, small copper inserts called sekigane (責金) are often used to prevent contact between the blade and the tsuba. This photo essay will attempt to portray a simple approach […]
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Making Sokui (Rice Paste Glue)
Sokui (続飯) is a simple starch-based wood glue that is traditionally used for joining wood to wood or paper to wood. Its uses span from tsuka making to sliding panel shoji and it particularly shines in joinery where it serves as a lubricant when inserting tenons as well as the adhesive to keep them in […]
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Making an Outdoor Knife
The Japanese swordsmithing tradition has been in place for generations and many of the design elements have been tested and refined for centuries. With careful study and practice, this can be a solid foundation for today’s bladesmiths and knifemakers to build their work upon. This article will provide an overview of the process and cover […]
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Making a Bamboo Water Scoop for Water Forging
Forging with a thin film of water on the anvil and hammer prevents forge scale or oxide from being hammered into the surface of the steel. The hot steel instantly vaporizes the water and the resulting steam explosion blows the scale off of the work, keeping it clean as it is worked. This type of […]
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A Japanese Media Visit to the Forge
We had a visit from a crew filming for TV Tokyo today. They were interested in some footage of the workshop and a brief interview. A great group of guys to meet and work with, we covered a lot of ground in a few hours and they probably learned more about steel than they bargained […]
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Case Study: Making a Hon-Yaki Nata
Nata (屶, directly translated “mountain sword”, or 鉈) come in various sizes and shapes, but the type most familiar in the west does the duty of a light brush hatchet or heavy camp knife. Common characteristics include thick spines and heavy blades, often with single beveled edges similar to Japanese wood chisels. This type work […]
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Classical Tanto Construction: Habaki の Machigane
Habaki is a non-ferrous collar for the blade that strengthens the base of the tang and holds the blade tightly in the scabbard. Often made of copper, it is composed of a large jacket and a small wedge that are forged and filed to shape and then soldered together before polishing and patinating. The topic […]
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Classical Tanto Geometry: Blade & Kissaki
The geometry of a tanto blade is simpler to describe than the tang, though it has more subtleties and nuances. The three main characteristics I want to focus on are tip shape, spine thickness, and bevel geometry. While kata document the profile of a blade, they leave much to be desired in terms of creating […]
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Classical Tanto Geometry: Nakago & Machi
The geometry of the nakago (tang) is very important as the assembly of the knife hinges on the correct form and construction of the tang. Viewed from the spine, the thickest part of the blade is at the machi (notches) and there is a distal taper towards the tip of the blade and towards the […]
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On Forging, Temperature, & Grain Size
In a sentence, thermal cycling, or normalizing, is the metallurgical technique of reducing visible grain size by repeated cycling of steel from near its critical temperature to ambient temperature. Several years ago I wondered how traditional Japanese smiths were able to produce such fine grain size even in cases when normalizing was not officially part […]
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Opening Shirasaya
1. Never pull or jerk the blade out with the power of your arms or you will lose control of the blade and possibly damage the saya (scabbard), yourself, or others. Use only small hand muscle movements to loosen it before drawing. 2. When unsheathing, make sure the edge is up, then pull just enough […]
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Aizu Shintogo Kunimitsu Tanto Kata
A kata is a pattern or form used for study or reference when creating an utsushi blade. The exercise of accurately making kata based on the work of historical smiths is an excellent way to train the eyes, mind, and body to create proper forms. This particular kata is based on a beautiful tanto made […]
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Sokui (Rice Paste Glue) Strength Testing
This is an experiment I did as part of a prototyping project, and was intended to satisfy my curiosity on the performance of sokui (続飯) or rice paste glue. The natural glue contains nothing but delicious Japanese rice and a little bit of water. Usually sokui is used as part of a system that also […]