[Dmitry Sokolov]

Greetings to all!

I am hoping for advice on the following issue (in case some of you have encountered it before):

About a week ago I oiled the sword with CLP break free (did not leave any oil excess anywhere), including a tiny amount of oil on the wire wrap, cross and pommel, and put it on the display hooks.

Yesterday I took it in my hands for the first time since that oiling and noticed a strange crackly sound.
I heard (and "felt" with my pommel hand) it first upon practicing Zwerchau, when I suddenly heard "crack-crack" from within the hilt, somewhere underneath my pommel-grabbing left hand.

This sound also arises, if the sword is held straight by the pommel.
There is no notable pommel or cross movement.

I am quite concerned as to what may be the cause for it.
Now even swinging the sword with both hands on the hilt causes this sound (first it was just with the left hand gripping the pommel).
And the general feeling about the hilt is "unpleasant", not solid any more.

I recorded a short video in which the sound can be clearly heard several times.
It is 99 mb large, therefore I uploaded it to Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o85NnLjDVEE

To be honest, I used the sword only for a single swordplay, and also very rarely - maybe a dozen times since the purchase.
Never in the moist/rain, never for cutting/thrusting exercises, and kept it in a dry room on display hooks, oiling every 6 months.

Any advice most appreciated!

[Johannes Zenker]

I am pretty sure that either the pommel, guard or the handle has loosened slightly. A very common issue with simple compression-fitted constructions. The crispness of the click is likely due to the hilt only having a miniscule amount of play and not more.

I have a similar issue with my custom Danelli longsword (threaded construction with a nut at the end though) and one of my JINO reenactment fighting longswords.

It's generally not problematic in terms of the sword falling apart and happens over time with compression-fit swords, usually through either break-in by use or shrinkage of the handle's wood due to climatic changes.

To avoid it the maker would have to follow Albion's approach and hammer the guard into place with a lot of friction (or follow the Czech method of welding/brazing the guard in place), epoxy-gluing the handle scales onto the tang and hot-peening the pommel so the material of the tang and pommel basically fuse (as seen in their swords without a seperate peen-block).

[Mark Tan]

I would suspect that the wooden grip core has loosened from the tang, creating that noise as it shifts over the tang. I had 2 del tins with the same problem, model 2142 and 5140. I fixed them by dripping liquid epoxy glue down the fullers. I have an albion ringeck with the same problem upon delivery. No fullers, so i bought loctite 290 and wicked it into the tiny gaps between the blade and guard, letting it flow towards the pommel and progressively adding more. This method works for me and stops the sound

[Dmitry Sokolov]

Many thanks, Johannes and Mark!

I will probably try out the loctite option (no fullers) and see if it helps to recfity the matter.
Will report the outcome.

Any other suggestions welcome!

P.S.: I also emailed Fulvio Del Tin a few days ago but have not heard from him yet.

[Dmitry Sokolov]

[Mark Tan]

[Zach Gordon]

This can happen with Albions too.. any time there is wood involved a slight expansion/contraction due to weather change, humidity change, temperature, etc can cause a slight 'clicking' sound from movement. It doesn't effect the swords handling at all, and probably happened a lot in period.. but I agree.. its really annoying.
Z

[William Swiger]

I have had this on quite a few swords over the years. Sometimes just adding some oil down into the grip will work as the wood sometimes expands and contracts. With the oil, let the sword sit with the pommel on the floor blade up.

If the oil does not work, I do the same procedure with whatever glue I have on hand which is usually crazy glue of some type. Used Gorilla Glue once not knowing it would expand so much and had to cut the glue off level with the cross guard...lol....

On an A&A sword, I had to drill a couple small holes into the grip to fill with glue. Of course this requires a rewrap of the grip.

[Dmitry Sokolov]

PROBLEM SOLVED

Dear all,

Thanks for your input and advice!
Fulvio Del Tin got back to me and recommended three simple actions:
1. cold repeen (as described here http://www.foxtail.nu/bjorn/bonk_eng.htm)
2. oil removal
3. a drop of superglue x2
(please see the image attached)

He also was not too optimistic about low viscosity adhesive (see his reply below).

So, I thought I should try superglue before peening, and it actually worked well.
I removed the oil from the sutures between the wooden grip and the cross/pommel with a thin paper towel and added a drop of superglue at each side.
The handle is not making a crackling noise any more.

Surely, this may be just temporary fix. In case the porblem recurs, I will then repeen.

Hope somebody else may find this handy!



On 27 Jun 2017, at 08:31, Fulvio Del Tin <fulvio@deltin.net> wrote:

Hello Dmitry,

Occasionally it happen that the grip become loose after some time, the grip is made in wood. I suggest to repeen the tand in the top of the pommel and normally this is enough to solve the problem.
As I told you before, two drops of superglue are also helpful.

I have never used low viscosity adhesive inside the grip and do not suggest you to put much of this glue inside the grip since the sword could not be disassembled easily in case of exceptional maintenance work. But you can eventually try to put just a small quantity of this adhesive after you reppened the sword.

[Jean Thibodeau]

Dmitry, I'm glad that you found a good solution to the problem and for general interest I might add my personal experience and suggestions/comments.

A) Superglue: Chose a very liquid kind that will flow more easily and not use more viscous gap filing superglue unless you do have a wide gap to fill.

If the guard opening at the blade shoulders are fairly wide holding the sword point upward I would add some superglue to this gap .... mostly one drop at a time and waiting to see if it's working, I would then add a few more drops giving some time for previous drops to cure.

If the blade has a fuller extending into the tang the superglue will be even more likely to reach the space between the inner surface of the wood core handle and the outside of the steel tang.

Masking taping the blade and guard to keep the superglue off the surfaces you don't want to have to clean up.

B) If the guard/sword tang gap is very wide I might use epoxy pushed in under the guard using a toothpick to push it in deep. Use slow curing epoxy so that you have lots of time to work the glue into the gap. ( After using the superglue and mostly to secure a still loose guard )

C) A more historically appropriate solution is forcing in wedges of wood into the guard gap, but I would cheat by still having some epoxy on the wood wedges.

This is a good fix, at least it's been for me, with a loose guard and may also help with a loose handle.

D) Cold Peening is also something I did successfully with a Del Tin, but one should not overdo it if a few hammer taps doesn't do the job: Too much peening may crack the steel if it created metal fatigue.

QUOTE from Fluvio:

[Dmitry Sokolov]

Dear Jean,

Thank you for a nice summary of options!
I am sure it will be useful to both myself and all other "option-seekers" with crackly handles out there!

And thanks everyone for their input!

Hope my quick superglue fix lasts a while.

Best wishes to all,

Dmitry