Hello,

I've been practicing a lot with a large two-handed sword over the summer and I've come to the conclusion that I need to test the actual impact of my powerful swings. The problem is that I need to find a target that will provide resistance while at the same time let me pass through with the sword to "fetch the full circle" before coming around for a second strike. Have there been any historical records of pells or other kind of targets with these qualities?

I was thinking about those modern martial arts dummies with the rounded bottom. If they weigh enough they'd provide some impact with the buoyancy to flip themselves back up after a strike, although I suppose I'd need to pad it substantially to keep it from breaking.

Thanks in advance!

If I had the opportunity, I'd try a hanging metal chain myself. Fixed at top and bottom with some slack, it could offer some resistance and still not swing too wide, letting the sword pass through. Depending on the material of your sword a fabric or carpet cover could be necessary, as a metal chain might damage wooden swords for example.

I think boxing or empty-handed martial arts dummies would get chewed up pretty fast by a two-hander... So you'd need to copy the design but with different material, or reinforce the thing, but then it modifies its balance and behaviour.

Historically, I don't know what they did to practice the impacts of these swings. The historical designs I know of are either fixed posts, which let you hit hard but not follow through, or a sort of hanging pendulum that was apparently used to practice control of the bind, but not really powerful swings.

Regards,

Vincent, thank you for your suggestion. A heavy chain sounds like an interesting target, and not too expensive to set up either.

I would like to use my steel sword that I also use for dry handling. The powerful swings can only truly be made with the real weight behind them.

If anyone has any other ideas please let me know. :)

I have used a Tyre on top of a post as a pell.
I practiced a few things but aside from the ochs to ochs strike ( targeting either side of the head) i found you cant really work up much rythym like you can with a shorter sword.
I know that it does not let you pass through but i believe this is a better simulation of what might happen in real life. Swords don't always pass through their targets.

For best practice at home with longsword i think solo drills will develop more control and accuracy to make a better swordsman ( just like you are doing)

You really dont want to over commit to a strike if you have to. Feigning makes you opponent commit to a block and opens up a target zone to strike. if you can master feigning you will get quite alot of respect from your fellow swordsmen

A question if I may?
Is your sword a sharp or a blunt? If its a sharp, constant striking of hard objects like a chain, log etc, are going to damage your edge.
I use a pell made of a treated log wrapped in carpet and rope , but only with a training blade, since a good (sharp) sword is expensive and should be treated well.If you want it to have some motion and "give" use a shorter section of log, and hang it from a branch or beam.

Aaron,

The kind of swings I want to measure the impact of are those suitable for facing multiple opponents at the same time, when you can't allow for your sword to become trapped by any single opposing weapon. The sword I'm using packs the power for that at six feet in length and nearly eight pounds. :)

You're right that everything doesn't always go to plan. A rigid post will enable other techniques after stopping the sword such as entering into grappling range or a thrust (suitable against a single opponent) or re-accelerating the sword in the other direction with a spin. I'll have to set up both kinds of pells to round things off properly.

Ron,

It's a blunt sword, although it is also quite soft in the metal. If I use a hard material for the pell I will need to pad it somehow. I was also thinking of a hangning tire or something else but I was afraid of a possible pendulum effect after hitting it once and passing through with the sword to come around for another strike from the same direction. I've never used a pell like this before, though, so I don't really know how it would play out.

Wow

That is certainly a big sword.

If you were to hang a tyre from a rafter you could have a rope with quite a heavy weight hanging below the tyre to help combat the pendulum effect

Ok, you say its a "soft metal", is this sword designed to be used ?Or is it decorative? If its decorative it may not, (and probably won't) stand up to the stresses actual impact will cause.

Ron,

Yes, the sword is supposedly made to be used. It's made by Lutel-handicraft and while they say that the sword has been tempered to 50Rc the edge gets beat up rather badly as soon as you make any kind of significant contact with other swords. That's why I'll have to pad either the target or the sword itself with this pell. Or, if all else fails, I'll have to retire this sword to dry handling alone and use something else on the pell.

I'm looking into buying some heavy chain and drawing up a working construction for this.

I suggest you watch this video on you tube, about 4.25 mins in it explains why hitting edge on edge is a bad thing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSoCcvN-4k8

The sword is tempered correctly at 50 Rc, and from everything I've heard Lutel are good blades if used in the way a sword should be used.
The problem , (don't take this the wrong way) is the way your using it. Swords are precision equipment and generally edge on edge blows are going to damage your blade.
Have you had much formal training with the type of sword your using?

actually one design i saw/ heard of i think online.. was a hung tire, and THEN hanging a weight on a secont length of rope or wire, the second weight counteracts the pendulum motion of the tyre

I forgot exactly who suggested it

I do not want to derails Emils threat here but if you haven't done so already, might I suggest a forum search for the topic of edge on edge contact?
It is not quite as black and white as it is made sound sometimes:
http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t...t+parrying

As I said, I do not want to start this discussion here, just wanted to point out that is is a hotly debated question that AFAIK has not been answered yet and probably never will be.

Ron Reimer wrote:

I suggest you watch this video on you tube, about 4.25 mins in it explains why hitting edge on edge is a bad thing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSoCcvN-4k8 The sword is tempered correctly at 50 Rc, and from everything I've heard Lutel are good blades if used in the way a sword should be used. The problem , (don't take this the wrong way) is the way your using it. Swords are precision equipment and generally edge on edge blows are going to damage your blade. Have you had much formal training with the type of sword your using?

I'm NOT trying to derail this thread, and I have edge blocked myself ,(been fighting steel on steel for over 10 years), but I also don't expect my blade to come through undamaged .Its not the blades fault when that happens, its mine. And in my opinion 50 Rc is not too soft for a sword, too hard means too brittle in a long blade.
As for his question re. a pell I explained one of the types I used earlier.

Terribly sorry Ron, I did not mean to imply you wanted to or had derailed the threat. I just wanted to make clear that it was not my intention either. My apologies, English is not my native language and I fear I phrased this wrong.

Ron Reimer wrote:

I'm NOT trying to derail this thread, and I have edge blocked myself ,(been fighting steel on steel for over 10 years), but I also don't expect my blade to come through undamaged .Its not the blades fault when that happens, its mine. And in my opinion 50 Rc is not too soft for a sword, too hard means too brittle in a long blade. As for his question re. a pell I explained one of the types I used earlier.

No offence taken or intended. I was merely trying to illustrate why its not a good idea to deliberately bang edges together. Most, if not all quality swords, even the rebated (blunt), swords aren't really made to take what is in effect abuse(IMHO).

And back on topic Emil, I would suggest that striking a chain repeatedly, will, over time damage your blade, and I would advise contacting the maker by email (or phone) and asking their advice on this subject.The reason I use padded wood is because it is less likely to damage the blade.

Another you tube video illustrates something similar to the swing log I've used sometimes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOeB2yMU_q8

Ron and P. Frank,

Thanks for the input, but I would be surprised if my sword isn't at least slightly softer than is usual today. We've only had slow-going drills due to the weight of this sword but it does come out worse for wear against every other blade I've tried it against from a half-dozen different makers. The sword itself is a very solid construction but since the weight of it makes it unsafe for any kind of free practice with others the softness of the blade doesn't bother me much.

I also agree with the point that William raises, that edge-on-edge contact isn't always avoidable. I know that Di Grassi wrote that a recommended parry with a two-handed sword was to beat the opponent's weapon away with a forehand strike, and edge contact is bound to happen at some point there. But this is beyond the scope of this thread.

Vincent,

Since you suggested striking a chain, what dimensions of the chain did you have in mind? I guess it would need to be a rather large one, like an anchor chain.

William,

Aaron made that suggestion just a little higher up in this thread. I think it's a good idea but something about hitting a large and heavy chain just speaks to me, so I think I'll be trying that out first.

Thanks again for your input, everyone. :)

Edit:

Ron,

I saw your last post just now, and I must say that the swinging log pell looks like a lot of fun. I'm sure that'll be a useful training tool as well, albeit I'd probably make it a little heavier than what they're using.

Hello Emil,

Can't say I've worked out the dimensions of the chain, and I actually thought of that for lighter and shorter swords. I don't think it would have to be that big: remember that when hitting it's not just the weight of one link that resists, but that of the whole chain (well, a fraction of it but much bigger than a single link). If it is too big it just won't give... I'd probably pick something in steel, 1cm wire thickness. If it really was too flimsy, I'd rather hang several length of such chain, separated in some way so as to build a bigger target, rather than pick a much bigger chain.

Sorry I can't help you more, I really have no appropriate place to try this out as of now, and so it remained something of an idle thought. If you get around to doing it I'd be very interested in hearing what you think of it, and how it can be improved!

Regards,

Another idea for the chain would be to dip it in tool dip to provide a coating that will absorb some of the abuse. I saw some child's swing chains that were dipped and they seemed to work just fine yet.

You could also put the chain inside loosely fitting rubber tubing or hose, or use thick rope instead of chain. You can find places that sell 4" rope by googling for it, and if that's still not heavy enough you can hang a weight at the bottom end. My gut feeling says heavy chain would actually resist and yield in a fairly realistic manner, though...

BTW, the actual hardness of the sword doesn't matter nearly as much as its hardness relative to the objects it encounters: a sword hardened to 50 RC will get chewed up if you use it against swords hardened to 55 RC (well, more chewed up, that is; any training sword in active use will get chewed up, period, the only real variation is how fast it happens). Some manufacturers make their blunts harder than others - I think e.g. Albions and Regenyei feders are some of the harder ones out there - and some are downright notorious for messing up other, softer brands in a hurry. IMO, it's always a good idea to try and match trainers of the same hardness instead of just mixing them all blindly.

More on topic, this also means that the hardness of the chain you would use matters: if it was sufficiently below 50 RC, you wouldn't necessarily need any padding at all.

I would recommend a tyre pell. It's perfect for your needs.

In my area tyre shops have stacks and stacks of old tyres, and mostly they will just give them away, because they want rid of them. It seems to me that this would be the same just about everywhere.

You could sink a decently thick pole into the ground, to about average male human height, so say 6 foot maybe... And then stack up the tyres over the pole, right to the top, maybe just a bit over for the overhead downwards blows. I'm not at home, so I can't show you a photo of what I mean, but it doesn't take much of an imagination.

Not the prettiest piece of equipment, but I personally 100% swear by mine. I can leave it outside, it doesn't take much to clean it if it gets dirty, and if I damage the tyres, the replacements are free... I was lucky and my awesome 20cm diameter wooden pole was donated by a friend, but the only costs are the pole and the concrete to hold it into the ground.

If you hit it on the edge wrong, you'll know. And you can hit it pretty much as hard as you want. I use mine for Battle of the Nations training every day, sabres, axes, and I even hit it full force with the edge of a buckler and kick it full force with bare shins and feet.

And it cost me all of about $20 NZD, which is $16 USD.