Katana Rebuild

Nerd weapon!!

A little over a decade ago I bought a katana (from Harbor Freight of all places).
The steel was pretty good, but the handle was meep. It broke off in...
...Well, it broke.
So I shaved some of the cutting edge off to make more handle and turned it into a cavalry saber:



It then sat in my room for years as a "get up to check on that noise" instrument.

I've been thinking though;
A long sword is a meep-poor home defense weapon.
(Before you start in on bringing a knife to a gun fight, YES I have a gun for the noises that sound especially urgent.)

Anyway for casual intruders, a saber with a short handle that gives you no leverage is no good since you'll need room to swing it.
Therefore I'm changing it back into a Katana.
More of a wakizashi, really. (The whole thing is 34" long.)

The steel is still good enough to strip the teeth off a hacksaw blade:



So I use my trusty edge grinder to shave the blade up a bit to give myself 9" of handle and 25" of blade:




I have a thing for the old hammer handles that were made by stacking leather disks.


Those things were tight-fitting and lasted ages.
I'm gonna do that again.

Now to find a design for the meep.....

Decider: LORDKAHUNA

bobacus

GrapeApe

ghostrider

dragonstaff

HOBO

sunny77

LORDKAHUNA

  • MstrLance

  • Feb19 '11

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I know where you can find instructions for a cool tiger-design tsuba.

I was thinking about that one.
I really don't feel like smelting bronze and inlaying brass and having to go through all the chisel work.
I was planning on just hitting the B&B Surplus for a piece of 1/4" X 3" brass flat stock and machining it into something passable.

It then sat in my room for years as a "get up to check on that noise" instrument.

Haha, I killed a raccoon with a similar instrument

I have always loved the stacked leather handles on Kabar knives. Those pommels were always very durable as well.

  • flake

  • Feb21 '11

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you need to stop posting projects before completion. the anticipation always kills me.

^I know how you feel. I think Wotak's punishing me for taking so long in getting the Telemeep body done.
Or he's just lazy. (Hisses the word "lazy")

Word is that his workshop was taken over by crickets.

$15 worth of brass from B&B Surplus:



Ain't much to look at now, but we can take care of that.

BTW, I'm totally open to suggestions for this meep.
I have absolutely no idea what I want to do yet.

  • Whittey

  • Feb25 '11

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Something like this with the symbols (minus metal) milled out in relief on a round-cornered rectangular guard with a good rolled lip on the edge. Maybe scallop the edge if you're bored.

I kinda like the Kanji, but everybody seems to be doing it.
I'm thinking more along the lines of a traditional round(ish) meep with hollowed accents and a bas-relief animal or demon circling the blade.

Okay, sorry for the delay.
My work schedule has totally changed. (I have nowhere near as much free time now.)

I need a new.... :looks up name:
....Habaki-thingy.
So I took some brass flat stock:


And cut it into a strip about the right width. (1"X4"):


...File a notch and bend it around the sword:


-And it looks like we're all set to solder!(That was easy.)


...

...

Fark! Sonofafreaking....



:sigh:

All right.

Starting over:











There we go. (Break now you meep)



Fits pretty good.



And here's how it'll look to a home intruder:

The guard(tsuba) on this thing isn't gonna be nearly as much of a pain in the meep as the last bit.
I'm feeling pretty confident.

The towel as soft jaws on your vice must be a pain in the meep. I have always used a couple of bits of aluminium angle as soft jaws. It works real well for brass etc.

Good idea.
I've got some aluminum angle somewhere...

@spankerchief

Beats having all that rag getting in the way. Works just as well on threaded parts to protect the thread, and will protect the polish on your sword blade as well.



New soft-jaws thanks to DS's meddling:








Sorry again about how long it's taking.

I'm pretty swamped with household meep this weekend and I'm having to fight off an attack of lazy.






Yeah, it's pretty sloppy.
I'm still just getting the basic shape cut out.

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Cleaning the garage this morning so's I have room to build. I gritted my teeth and threw out all the old bits of armor, too-heavy maille(10-12 gauge) and a sword blank I'll never get around to beveling.
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