[Sander Marechal]

Hi. Has anyone here had issues with the threaded tangs on Hanwei Tinker swords? I'm asking, because I just came back from a pretty depressing WMA training session:



Yup, two Hanwei Tinker early medieval single handed swords bought some 8 weeks ago (during the discount at KoA). Both have a broken tang in the same place. Both happened during tonight's training session. Each sword belongs to a different fighter in out group. I'm a bit miffed about this. People in out group were a tad concerned about threaded tangs but I convinced them that this was something entirely different from a welded-on rat-tail tang you see in wall hangers. I told them it was qualitatively equivalent to peening. Now I;m eating humble pie of course.

I was wondering if anyone else has had issues with this. Also, I was wondering if this could be excessive force. I don't think the people in out group hit hard though (we're nowhere near what happens in Eastern Europe) but it may be that we are one of the harder hitting schools in the region.

I have uploaded some more pictures (see below). These pictures also includes closeups of the break, and photos of the the blade edges. Specifically, it shows the deepest dents I could find in the blade after nearly two months reasonably intensive MS-I.33 training and Hospitaller reenactment. It may provide some insight on whether we hit too hard.

Of course, I will be contacting KoA as well, but I wanted to get some opinions and experiences first.

Pictures:
Sword 1 tang closeup
Sword 1 break closeup
Sword 1 edge closeup

Sword 2 tang closeup
Sword 2 break closeup
Sword 2 edge closeup

[William Frisbee]

I have heard of this happening quite a bit with the Tinker stuff.

Thats why I stuck with my practicals.Been using them now for over a year and the only issue I'm having is that the cross guard now has a slight wiggle to it where the peening of the tang has worked a little lose making all the fitting slightly jiggly.

[Bryce Felperin]

Not to dis Hanwei (though this post suggests a dis session is in the making) but for those who can afford it I suggest what I ended up doing. Namely use Hanwei's for light sparing and drills and use a more robust beater-sword (Albion, AA, Armor Class, etc.) for fights and harder practice. My Albion has held up to a lot of heavy fighting abuse with no handle or cross problems whatsoever. The blade gets dings and notches, but this will happen with any beater you use (especially when fighting in armor).

Just a suggestion. If you doubt a tool's practicality for severe abuse, get a better tool or restrict your tool's use to lighter use so the chances of it getting damaged are less. It sounds to me that you had some doubts to begin with, no disrespect to you.

After taking my Hanwei/Tinker longsword apart I decided it wasn't going to replace my Albion so I decided to only use it as a backup. My group hasn't had any of this happen with those that use Hanwei/Tinkers, but I figure the Tinker Bastard and Longswords probably get more stability in their handles when in use from the two handed grip. Might be a BS theory, but who knows.

Last, I bet Hanwei would replace these if you asked them. After all they want to make a good impression for their products and they don't cost a lot to replace. If you sent them an email and mailed them back they might be inclined to replace the blades. Can't hurt to ask after all.

Best regards, Bryce Felperin

[Sean Flynt]

Sorry to hear that because I love the sharps. Now you have two regular, sturdy blades that are easily re-mounted in historical style.

[Simon G.]

Bummer but not so big a disaster as it may seem...

It's pretty easy to re-weld a tang extension where those two broke. You can put in a bigger, sturdier mild steel bar (even one as wide as the tang itself), widen the pommel holes a bit, then peen. I just did the welded tang extension thing with a oxygene/butane blowtorch I just bought (and I have no experience in soldering)... After four or five failed attempts I managed to understand the principle and get what seems like a good weld

As Sean says, see this as an opportunity!

Aside from the blunt/sharp blade switching, I have never seen the practicality of threaded pommels, anyhow.

[Dustin R. Reagan]

[Luka Borscak]

I cut regularly with my threaded H/T swords and I didn't have any problems. But I don't like threaded tangs and I plan to customize them to be peened...

[Johan Gemvik]

I don't use the threaded version, but choose the full tang viking Tinker version expecting just this result, that I'm also a viking at heart had some part in it of course but the main consideration was to not have a thread there to break. It stands to reason any threaded tang can break at that point given enough stress since threads make for natural notched zones for stress to work into fractures and finally a break.

I've had zero problems with my and my brothers sharp cutters, which are both Hanwei Tinker Viking bare blades made into full tang custom swords. Mine's been through cutting into wood, variuos thickness plastic and rubber bottles, cutting tatamis, cutting into test pieces of various armour, even into a cold rolled mild steel bar with no damage or weakening the soundness of the blade or tang. I couldn't be happier with them really.

So my advice is the same as Seans, re-mount them historically with a full tang. If done properly, they'll do great like that.
To get some tang lenght just carefully and delicately angle grind the bottom of the blade to a shallow rounded cutout on either side about 20-30 mm. This makes the tang intersection stronger while giving you the extra tang length needed to re-pommel and re-peen the swords. Yes it makes the swords a little shorter, but they're fairly long samples to start with anyway so it's probably only going to make them more lively and quick while removing minimal reach.
Or go with Simons suggestion of welding on an extension, that can also work. Just make sure it's a good weld, since obviously this is one of the three main points of stress in a sword, the other two being the tang/blade intersection and the center of percussion. These have held up well enough in those areas, unlike some other swords I have experience with, so I'd say they're keepers, just need a re-tang.

[Mark T]

I've had a similar thing with an H/T sharp bought for 'learner and loaner' cutting ... although, in my case, half of the threaded section of the tang was missing, cut longitudinally (ie, there was just half the length of the 'cylinder' of the threaded section in place!). And this was before I used it.

It's confusing as I bought it secondhand, but I trust the seller implicitly. And it looks like a manufacturing flaw, rather than a recent break, because the exposed / broken section is of similar colour to the rest of the tang (ie, it's not bare/shiny metal one would expect to see in a break that exposes this much surface area. However, the piece was an 'aftermarket', with some hand-done mods by Tinker, including a new or altered pommel ... so, I don't know what to think, and the economics and difficulty in tracing the cause of the flaw are not worth attempting a return.

Sounds like I'll be joining the rest of you in some welding experiments!

[Sander Marechal]

Thanks for the advice everyone! PS: I updated my original post. My link to the extra pictures caused a 403 error, and I'd still like to know if you think that we're a hard hitting group from the edge damage.

I wish I had known about this earlier. From all the positive reviews about H/T an VA swords I gathered that these threaded tangs were no problem. Luckily the father of the guy who owns the second sword is a metal worker. He was thinking about welding a thicker rod on there but I will tell him about the tang extension & peening.

What would be a good way to widen the pommel hole though? I hope there's a better way than using a small hand file?

[Allen Stell]

I've seen several H/T swords owned by others break at the tang and have broken one myself. The one I broke was a factory second sold by Hanwei and the others I've seen were purchased through dealers during a sale that took place directly after Hanwei's factory second sale. I'm forced to conclude that it isn't the H/T line itself that's the problem, just that some that are out there may not be to the standard that they should be.

[Aleksei Sosnovski]

Threaded tang is not worse than peened one if done properly. When I was making a custom hilt for a Hanwei practical longsword (not Tinker line) I ground the end of the tang until it was 8 mm wide (and 6 mm thick), rounded corners and cut 8 mm thread. Has held for a long time and is still as strong as ever. You can cut a slot in the tang, weld in a piece of mild steel bolt (let's say 8 mm thick), grind two of its sides so that they are flat with the tang (or you won't be able to put crossguard and grip on), widen hole in the pommel so that thicker tang end and nut would fit in (you would only need a drill for this) and voila! Just remember to use welding technique appropriate for high-carbon steel (pre -and postheating, special electrodes/wire, etc). Also keep in mind that rattling pommel would break your tang faster than a solid one so keep your handle tight. To make things stronger make only that part of the "tang tail" threaded that the nut would go on to. You can also use rod without thread, cylinder instead of nut and peen the tang. Or you can peen over the nut.

My reason for making threaded pommels is that I can have my pommels turned, but I cannot get them milled. So symmetrical pommels that can be screwed on are pretty much my only reasonable choice for self-made swords. Making pommels with proper rectangular holes is unfortunately a royal pain in the back for me.

[M van Dongen]

KoA is pretty reasonable when it comes to replacements, I suggest you contact em.

[Johan Gemvik]

I edited the post since it's pointless.

[Johan Gemvik]

[Craig Shackleton]

I don't think that the edge damage is excessive for serious training with real intent. I won't get into an edge versus flat parry debate, but I've put much deeper notches on tinker hanwei longswords, and I don't think we hit too hard.

It's not easy to judge just based on edge damage though. I have two of the longswords, bought at the same time, and used almost exclusively against each other, and one of them consistently gets much more chewed up than the other.

Also, I've heard many reports of folks using the longswords and the edges looking like a saw blade afterwards.

As always, YMMV.

[Greg Heim]

You shouldn't need to widen the pommel hole, unless you just want to. But if he can welt a mild steel rod onto the end of the tang, preferably a "hole and pin" weld, then you can just peen the pommel on (assuming he uses the same diameter of rod as the pommel hole)

Let me know if you need some diagrams to show you what I mean by "hole and pin" weld.

Otherwise, just drill it out. You don't even need a drill press if there is already a pilot hole.

Oh, and remember, do not quench the weld. It needs to cool slowly to allow the metal to be softer... so this doesn't happen again

[J R Johnson]

I would be interested to know what you were striking with the edges of your swords to cause such damage to the edge. I can't speak to the damage to the threaded portion of the tang as you didn't disclose all the details of your cutting session. I own several H/T swords with the hex nut pommel (Great Sword of War, Longsword, and the Valiant Armoury type XII "Castile" sword which has the identical hex nut pommel setup), have cut bottles filled with water, and melons including large watermelons and large pumpkins. Never any problems with hilts or damage to blades. On the contrary. The only very slight issue I've experienced is that after heavy use, occasionally the hex nut will need tightening. May I suggest, for reenactment purposes, the blunt versions of your sword types of choice, and for "training" purposes, wooden wasters as the knights of old used. For recreational cutting purposes, the media mentioned above will not cause damage to tang or blade of a properly constructed sword, either peened or threaded in the manner of the H/T swords. That has been my personal experience, as for hearsay, I have not heard of any of these swords being damaged when used against the proper targets.

[Julien M]

Hi Sander,

Havea look at this post from the EMA group scola gladiatoria:

http://www.fioredeiliberi.org/phpBB3/viewtopi...p;start=80

they broke plenty of those and if I remember correctly they were all replaced...and they should be really, as they are made for the very purpose of training and sparring. I would contact Hanwei and also TInker himself if need be to advise on the best way to deal with the issue. Both Hanwei and Tinker are well aware of the threaded tang problem I believe.

I am also planning to get sharp HT at some point. I have inspected the replacement viking and was very impressed with it all together, but again, full tang ones.

J

[Nathan Robinson]

So the question is: are the swords that were sold at Kult of Athena on discount actually factory seconds or what?