[Anders Backlund]

The two first "real" swords I ever got a hold of (and in fact the only real one ones in my collection as of this moment) are a pair of sabers from India that my brother picked up for me on some flee market for two hundred crowns a piece. They resemble cavalry sabers but going by the etchings on the blades I suspect they have actually been Sikh procession swords. (We've found other such sabers since then but most of it was basically junk.)

Though I was thrilled to own something not made out of soft iron or stainless steel, I was never satisfied with how they handled. The grips are covered by some kind of slick synthetic and with poor ergonomy, leading to a lot of slippage of the hand when I try to use them. Plus, they twist on their tangs with strong swings, badly misaligning the blades. They also lack any sort of counterweight in the guard save a metal cap forming a sort of rudimentary pommel: made to hold the grip together more then anything. And the guards are just thin sheet metal cutouts, one of which had actually been slightly mangled during the fright when I finally got them. In other words, the hilts struck me as almost completely useless.

The blades, on the other hand, are pretty nice. They have decent geometry and seem to have been heat-treated. So today, as I was feeling a bit blue and needed something to do, I decided to go through with one of my wilder ideas: modify one of the blades and make a new hilt for it.

So I wrapped the blade in a wet towel, took my handy multitool and stuck a cutting disc on it, and went to work. It was easier then I had expected and it only took a few hours to cut away roughly two inches of metal on either side of the base of the blade. (The blade had a decimeter-long ricasso that wasn't doing anything.) This gives me a much longer tang to work with and reduced to length of the blade to a range I honestly feel more comfortable with.

Tomorrow I might find a camera and snap some photos of it all to illustrate the process. Then I'll finish off the rough edges on the tang and the shoulders with a grinding wheel or a file. After that I'll heat the tang and bend it somewhat since I intend to fit it with a pistol-ish grip. Then I should be ready to get started on the new hilt, provided I can get a hold of suitable materials.

I hope this will be an interesting project. So far it's been pretty fun.

[Allen Andrews]

This sounds interesting, I will look forward to watching the progress.

[Shahril Dzulkifli]

Anders,
When your creation is finished don't forget to post its photos.

[Anders Backlund]

I'll try to snap some photos today.. (I would have done it yesterday but I hadn't slept at all the previous night and was kinda out of it.) Tomorrow I hope to go to town and pick up some materials for the hilt.

[Anders Backlund]

Alrigth, here we go.



What the original hilt was like. (It's worse then it looks.)



The blade after cutting.



The new tang compared to that of the other sword. Ironically, the two blades ended up nearly exactly the same lenght after this modification.



Shot of the full blade.

[Lafayette C Curtis]

Urrgh. The original grip looks almost like it was made ugly on purpose. Add me to the list of people cheering you on, Anders.

[Anders Backlund]

[Stephanie Maks]

May I ask, what technique you used to do the cutting? You indicate it took a few hours, was that in lots of light passes from the side down, or going straight in, edge-on as it were?

Thanks!

-Stephanie

[Anders Backlund]