I recently purchased the Hand and a Half swor by Hanwei / Paul Chen / Cas Iberia. Does anyone know how solidly built it is? I noticed at the Pomel where the tang comes through it is very small. It looks like rat tail tang construction, because of how small the tang protrudes where it is peened over. Are there any additional methods used to secure the handle or pommel to the tang on this sword?

I've never handled this particular sword so I can't comment on it specifically. However, the size of the tang end, whether secured by a nut, peened, etc., isn't neccesarily an indication of the tangs width.

In this photo you can see the end of the tang as it has been peened over on this sword by Vince Evans.
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No one will claim that Vince makes shoddy work. The end of the tang is often narrowed down in it's width for the last bit, so that peening or threading can be achieved.

Thanks for the response, tomorrow I will list some photos of the hand and a half sword, so others can see what I am talking about. I'm almost sure that the tang isn't rat tail constructed. It feels too solid, and I know at the price of it, much more detail was put into it than just an average wall hanger. Are there any origional photos of the Albrecht II sword showing the pommel and how it was peened over? I would be interested to see if mine is accurate in that aspect of the sword.

On all the hanwei swords that we took the pommel apart, they all had hollow pommel...casted in cheap stainless metal. In the other hand, the blade of the ALbrecht II is really interresting has Bryce said. I never had ormblems with hanwei swords and we fight a lot with those.

[quote="Marc-Antoine Jean"]On all the hanwei swords that we took the pommel apart, they all had hollow pommel...

How was the tang on the pomels you took apart? On mine it is really small and round. Did Hanwei use any method other that peening to fasten the grip and pomel to the blade?

I have some photos from an ancient project.

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What specific type of sword is this from? And how hard was it to remove the grip? Did the grip slip inside of the hollow space of the pommel?

yup, the grip was slipped inside the pommel. All the grip was glued to the tang with some sort of epoxy. Now you know why hanwei are that cheap (O: Great blades mounted with a cheap way (O:

it seems that hanwei uses soft woods such as poplar or basswood to make the handle. The use of harder wood such as hard canadian maple or oak is really better to prevent the loose in the handle and the guard.
We made some modifications on some hanwei swords like on their german longsword and on the practical hand and half like changing the pommel and the handle and now we do extreme fighting with them and I can assure you that hanwei blades are really really great.
Before those changes the guard of the practical get loose really quickly (one month of fighting). I never get that problem with the sh2250 bastard sword. We change the handle and pommel on that one because of its original poor balancement. it seems that on the beter lives the guard is fixed with more care, but the pommels are just the same shit as the practical series, just like the epoxy in the handle; crap!

So, the Berne flag is really great (O:

Thanks for the fun information, where did you get replacement pomels for the practical series? I might have a new project in the new future. Also did you notice that on Cas Iberia's announcement page that they recently updated their practical swords to have stronger tangs. They said they made them more durable, but I am not sure about the pommel.

I like the Berne canton flag, because I was able to trace my ancestory back to the 1400's in Berne Switzerland. If anyone wants to know where a good place to research family ancestory for free, let me know, and I will tell you how.