Seeing as how this seems to be a bit more serious forum... I thought I'd release this a bit early. This is a work in progress, in which I've finally started to actually make a bit of progress. Manoucher asked me to post it after I'd shown it to him, and I initially hesitated, as it's simply not finished yet.
After much consideration, I've decided to go ahead and post.. The link below represents the current status of the project.
Briefly, what I've got, is a webpage somewhat chronicling the rebuild of a M1860 US Light Cav sabre blade, purchased in M1904 Hungarian fittings, as part of the Hollywood Costume buyout, which I in turn purchased on Ebay.
I was looking for an ambidextrous sabre, with an antique blade, so as to have something that my sabre students could learn to cut with, as well as to be able to let those in the kenjutsu dojo I am a part of, have the opportunity to cut with an authentic western weapon.
I knew that to get something I would be happy with, and that would meet my criteria, I'd either have to spring for a nice, Caucasian shashqa, or modify something existing. I did not want to destroy a historical piece, so I decided that a bare blade was the way to go.
About this time, the hollywood costume selloff was going on on ebay, and I purchased this sabre, which was apparently used in "Charge of the Light Brigade" Finally, over the last two years I've worked on it a bit between other projects, and have finally started to make real progress.
Now i need to find someone to do some simple lost wax casting for me, to create hilt fittings, and to assemble them onto the sword.
As it stands, the sword is solid, properly weighted and balanced, and is quite sharp. I have cut up to 2 inch green bamboo with it, and have been amazed at how well it performs. Oh.. yeah. reference that... It cuts better than my PK or Golden Oriole, and is lighter, faster, and far more alive feeling than either of them.
Please take a look at the following: http://www.geocities.com/moniteur12/myshashqapage.html
Comments of course, are welcome.
Thanks all
Chris
Edit: I cleaned up the webpage a bit to more correctly illustrate my thoughts, and to make sure that it matched what I said here. sigh. I have brain cells.. really... :confused:
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