I'm on kind of a rapier kick, so here's another one. This is a fairly simple style with a pierced clamshell plate, although it took me several attempts on various elements to get things really right. The hilt is all blued steel, and the grip is hardwood wrapped in wire. The shell is reinforced with little plates where its connected to the hilt to keep it from bending under duress….. Its a little longer than the last one I made, with a 38" blade dulled for practice or stage combat, and 44.5" overall. It weights just under 2.5 lbs. and balances immediately in front of the hilt. I also finally tracked down a lathe of my own (an old Dalton-6 from the 19-teens I believe), so this has the distinction of being the first pommel turned on my new lathe. You can't beat old machines.

Its available for sale, so please PM me if you're interested. Eventually it will make its way onto my website : www.jessebelsky.com/stageswords

thanks for looking!

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A few more photos.

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Nice clean work.

I may use yours as a model to re-hilt my practice rapier as my cup hilt was just destroyed sparring... I like this style.

Thanks Scott. You are welcome to it...in truth I borrowed heavily from a weapon of Darkwood Armory's that I liked the look of. I spent a lot of time looking at pappeheimers and bilbos and late-period rapiers with plates, but I couldn't find a historical example that really matches this design idea. It has a pleasing simplicity of form and great hand protection, without all the other connecting bars of a pappenheimer setup.

I experimented with running 3/16 steel rod around the edges of the clamshell (with a slot to accept the plate) but it seemed like overkill on weight and rigidity. I suppose it all depends on what kind of scrapes you are planning on getting into with the weapon. :)

If anyone else has thoughts on the design, I'd be glad to hear them.

Looks Great! I had wondered if you had seen the Darkwood pappeheimers. the one thing I would change is I would swap the phillips screws for Flat head.

All in all looks great keep up the good work.

That's a good point Ryan, thanks. I'll find some more period accurate screws.