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Thread: Stainless steel???

  1. #46
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    Default Myths in the Making

    I can't help but find myself thinking of some of the myths of the infallibility of Japanese Swords and Swordsmen that have been addressed here, and wonder if in several hundred years there are similar myths about the firearm in American society. Four to six generations from now, will scholars be amazed to discover evidence that many firearms, both military and civilian, were poorly made and susceptible to all manner of mechanical failures? Will they discover with some chagrin that many people, even in the armed services and police, were not particularly renowned for their marksmanship? Will they look at the artistic conventions of television and film archives, as pertaining to weapons usage and handling, and suddenly realise that much of what they are seeing is as stylised as an Ichikawa Danjuro play?
    Just a few thoughts.
    Krzysztof M. Mathews
    http://www.firstgearterritories.com

    Every place around the world it seemed the same
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    Lightbulb The future now....

    Dear Mr. Mathews:

    I think the trend you mentioned has already begun There is a distinct subset of vets with whom I work whose Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a function of failing to engage the enemy. I may not have the numbers exactly right but I understand that per DOD statistics some 45% of the individual weapons were identified as not discharged during WW II. This compares to some 35% of the weapons during the Korean conflict and some 15% of the weapons during the Vietnam conflict. Now, I will say again that I may not have the percentages exactly right, and this does not adjust for the nature of the engagement either (ambush vs a wider field of fire). I mention this because there was also the early dysfunction of the M16 due to close tolerances and poor maintainance training. And this is essentially the same weapon which has become the mainstay of the US military today.

    I mention all this trivia only as a way of validating your comment, and supporting the position that we humans often strive to put the best possible spin on the facts. After all do you want to remember the Bushi of ancient Japan as elite warrior-poets or as illiterate grunts of their day? Would you want to remember Audie Murphey as one of the most decorated US soldiers, or as the PTSD neurotic who slept with a loaded 45 under his pillow til the day he died?
    We Martial Artists want badly to be truth seekers and to face reality for what it is, and yet we are tied to our own humanity along with its fears and foibles. The result is an odd collection of ironies and contradictions between what is and how we experience it. Be honest, now, how many of us still refer to the sun "coming up", when it is really the horizon setting. Truth is funny stuff.

    Best Wishes,
    Bruce W Sims
    http://www.midwesthapkido.com
    Bruce W Sims
    www.midwesthapkido.com

  3. #48
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    Default Re: Myths in the Making

    Originally posted by Kolschey
    I can't help but find myself thinking of some of the myths of the infallibility of Japanese Swords and Swordsmen that have been addressed here, and wonder if in several hundred years there are similar myths about the firearm in American society. Four to six generations from now, will scholars be amazed to discover evidence that many firearms, both military and civilian, were poorly made and susceptible to all manner of mechanical failures? Will they discover with some chagrin that many people, even in the armed services and police, were not particularly renowned for their marksmanship? Will they look at the artistic conventions of television and film archives, as pertaining to weapons usage and handling, and suddenly realise that much of what they are seeing is as stylised as an Ichikawa Danjuro play?
    Just a few thoughts.
    I'm no expert on firearm history, but hasn't that already started to happen? Think about the old gunslinger legends of the wild west. According to a report I saw on television (here in germany), People like Bill Hickock (sp?), Doc Holiday and the like were people who were able to hit someone at 20 feet away without shooting to many innocent bystanders. According to the report, most gunshot wounds during that time, even fatal ones, were self-inflicted.
    How does that compare to the image of the wild west gunslinger?
    Joachim Hoss
    Cologne, Germany

    Occam's Razor - A weapon for true martial artists.

  4. #49
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    Hi Guys,
    Interesting discussion. I must agree with most of the conclusions posted here with only one comment.

    I don't believe the miraculous stories that are often attributed to the warrior or hero archetypes in history are necessarily exaggerated in actuality but rather in scope. I don't doubt some of the fantastic stories attributed to samurai, gunslingers or war heroes. It's just that over time and thru history the fantasitic becomes perceived as the norm. The fantastic attributes of the archetype become a perception of what regularly happened. That is generally why we create an archetype. We wish the fantastic was the norm.

    I have seen some fantastic things in my short existence here on earth. Things that years later I thought maybe my mind had exaggerated. Upon further investigation or re-experiencing these events, they are found indeed just as fantastic the second time.

    At forty one I can state that three individuals I have met were capable of repeatedly doing something that was simply so far beyond the norm that you just could not believe your senses. They have changed they way I percieve ability, talent, fortitude and reality.

    The most fantastic of these was the shooting ability of a older cousin of mine. She was crippled by polio as a small child and hunchbacked. She stood no taller than 4'10" and when I was a teenager she was about 55 years old. When I was a kid of maybe 10 she began teaching me how to shoot off the back porch of my familys ranch in Bellevue, Texas. I vividy remember her brushing honey on a piece of plywood and leaning it against a fence in the backyard, and from the porch shooting stationary flys with a 22cal open sights rifle. The distance was about 50 feet! When I was maybe thirteen I saw her shoot a coyote dead in the moonlight at about 200 yards with an old Winchester 30-30 saddle carbine! Being a kid and unaccustom to the realities of ballistics I simply didn't appreciate how utterly impossible this shot was. Years later when I began competitive silhouette pistol shooting I realized that what I had seen could only be achieved in the Twilight Zone. I thought to myself that it must have been a different gun or a much shorter distance than I remembered, or.....or... it simply must have been a figment of my imagination.

    I traveled back to Bellevue, Texas frequently to repair the fences on our family ranch so on one visit I decided to investigate this bizarre memory. I found the exact spot where I remembered the coyote was killed just at the cattle crossing. I then walked the distance to the old ranch house and ... Dang it was more like 225 yards! I visited Florence Jones, my old cousin (then almost 70) and ask about the incident. We drove out to the old house and revisited my memory. She barely remembered the specific incident because she said she did it so often! ( But she added I didn't always kill'em. Sometimes I just nicked'em. I missed a couple of times all togerther, at least twice! ) I was stunned! When we returned to her house in Bowie, I asked to look at the gun and sure enough in her closet was the same old Winchester 30-30 saddle carbine I remembered. Iron sights and the bluing rubbed off where the barrell slipped into a saddle holster that belonged to my great grandfather and traveled with him on his mount around the T.E. ranch.

    Unbelieveable.... fantasatic..... unexplainable....

    Impossible !

    A shot in the dark on a moonlight Texas night. A little 55 year old crippled woman without the knowledge of modern ballistics that said this was impossible, whacked a coyote at 225 yards with iron sights on a 30-30 Winchester saddle carbine from an upstairs window of an old ranch house. This is the stuff of legends and I was there to see it with my own eyes. It is engrained into my memory like a movie.

    So my point here. It is the individual person weilding the weapon that often creates the magic associated with it. And this individual is almost never the norm, but we want them to be the norm. Most often they are an abberation in our reality but occasionally an abberation of truth. Our legends and archetypes are built around these people in the hopes that we can each achieve similar levels of the magic they seem to possess.

    Do the legends that grow up around these individuals exaggerate the truth? Yes and no. But they universally serve to make us strive to find the magic that resides behind the legend. They compel us to investigate and achieve more than we could imagine possible without them. Reality and legend often separate during our journey but it was the legend that made us begin the journey in the first place and it is our mastery of our current reality that will allow us to achieve what will become the legends of the future.

    Who knows Dan, maybe in the future a legend will arise about this fantastic sword developed by an American sword smith named Hardeen who was unknowingly inspired to make swords by a mysterious tengu. The tengu had learned of Viking metal forging techniques while visiting in Denmark and was called to you by the spirit of Amakuni living in your smithy.

    You see, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction and the feats of men and arms are more about the men and less about crummy handles. ( although I do agree about katana handles beings of overall poor design. )

    Great thread guys!

    P.S. My cousin Florence died about 3 years ago well into her 80's. In my mind I knew a real life Annie Oakley. Thanks for the shooting lessons Florence and so much more.

    Tobs




    [Edited by Toby Threadgill on 10-03-2000 at 03:48 PM]

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    Wow what a story! That was great! More, more! Bob Elder
    Rich and Stress Free

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    Wow Toby, great story about your cousin.
    It's because people like her are so rare that they stand out as legends. Keep in mind, too, that the greatest minds -- those great philosophers, teachers and warriors who changed the face of entire cultures and societies -- are even rarer. So rare, in fact, that after their deaths their followers build legends around the truth, until the human being has become a deity capable of the supernatural. The Buddha floating on a cloud...Ueshiba stopping bullets...A system's founder being taught his art or craft by a spirit or tengu...

    As for the Great Swordsmith Hardeen, at the dojo we joke all the time about his being coached by a tengu when we know his real teacher was just a short old guy. That just doesn't sound dramatic enough, though!
    Cady Goldfield

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    Default

    Since I am not a metallurgist or a smith, I have been reading this thread with great interest, but avoiding posting. However, a couple of questions have occurred to me.

    In most of Dan's previous posts, he makes the case that Japanese swords were, far from being superior to swords from other places, actually inferior. I have heard of the quality of Viking steeel, and to judge from the exploits of the Vikings, who founded the city of Kiev, thereby laying the foundations for the development of Russia (the name "Rus" comes from the word for "rowers"), sailed to the New World more than 500 years before Columbus, and conquered England in their incarnation as Frankified Normans, there is no good reason to doubt that part of this was due to the quality of their weapons. Since I am a fan of the Vikings from way back, I have no problem believing that their swords were on a par with their other artifacts, their ships and jewelry in particular (ah, their ships. Has anyone ever built something so beautiful, yet so functionally perfect?).

    Anyway, if I understand Dan's posts correctly, the European method for blending the desired qualities, hardness of edge and durability, was case hardening, where the core of the blade would be softer (more ductile?) and the outer steel harder so as to hold an edge. The Japanese, on the other hand, forge welded differing grades of steel and differentially tempered the sword to combine a hard edge and a more durable body. He holds that the European method is superior. Yet, he states that all of his blades have a hamon and that they are, as a result, functionally superior. Since the hamon, so far as I know at any rate, was found on Japanese blades and not on European blades, this seems to me to be an admission that the European method was not as completely superior as he has been maintaining and that some aspects of the Japanese method were, and are, superior to the European. If they were not, I assume that he would not make use of them.

    Regarding the use of the sword in battle, my guess is that the majority of the fighting and dying in Japanese battles was done by the peasant soldier (ashigaru) just as the yeomen and the villeins did most of the dying in European battles. First, peasants have always outnumbered the aristocracy in any time and place, there are more of them available, and they can be coerced by the aristocrats, who were better armed and organized. Second, they were almost certainly equipped with inferior weapons. They're just peasants, right? Third, the aristocrats fought with other aristocrats insofar as they could, leaving the peasants to fight with each other. Poorly trained, terrified peasants armed with inferior weapons are probably going to leave behind a lot of broken and bent swords (as are terrified, poorly trained aristocrats, for that matter). However, since being a well-trained fighter was a bushi's job, he will probably be better at it than an ashigaru. At the same time, his potential opponent will probably have a comparable level of training, so the training levels will cancel each other out.

    I doubt that a beautifully polished, razor sharp sword, of any kind, is going to remain pristine after you bash a guy in the helmet with it a few times. Any weapon to be used against an armored opponent is going to have to rely on a certain amount of mass for effectiveness. Hence, a more robust edge for pitched fighting.

    Regarding how good people actually were at fighting, Toby's story reminded me of something. Even people who have not read Herrigel's "Zen in the Art of Archery" are probably familiar with the story of how Herrigel's teacher, Awa Kenzo, shot at a target in the dead of night, hitting it in the dead center with his first shot, and how he then hit the nock of his first arrow with his second.

    This is even better than Robin Hood, since it was at night and he couldn't see the target, right? Obviously, Japanese archery is better than western archery, right? Because of his mystical Zen enlightenment, Awa was able to tap into the Power of the Universe (read: "the Force") which guided his arrows and allowed him to do feats of magic unknown in the West, right?

    Wrong.

    Awa later confided to one of his senior disciples that this was a complete coincidence, and that he never intended to demonstrate such a thing. Herrigel, credulous neophyte mystic that he was, thought that he had seen a mysterious, magical feat that could only be explained by reference to some mysterious, unknowable, universal essence that he mistakenly referred to as "It" (which Lucas later turned into "The Force"). Awa was a very skillful archer who achieved his skill after very dilligent and protracted practice. In such a skillful person, there is what seems to be a magical quality far beyond the ken of mere mortals. But you only get that way if you have inborn ability (the "knack"), access to expert instruction, supreme self-confidence (not the same as egotism or arrogance) and the fire in the belly to practice your guts out. Most of us are not on this level, so we think some people are magicians and wish we could be the same. Unfortunately, for every tengu there are a million Joe Blows.

    Unfortunately, the Joe Blows are the ones that get the lousy swords that we then bend over somebody's iron hat.

    Earl

    [Edited by Earl Hartman on 10-03-2000 at 05:12 PM]
    Earl Hartman

  8. #53
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    Default so what steel is the best for the $$$$$

    Ok I've read all this with great intrest and have wondered just what is the best steel for someone who will be practicing iaido mostly with an occasional try and cutting. I'm not looking for a supercalafragalistice artistic blade just something that looks good and is well made preferable by a US smith. I've been to japan and seen the wares of the smiths there, nice but so far beyod what I want to spend that I almost ran screaming from the shop. I've read the various types of steels described, L-6, tools steel, Swedish powered, etc used but know little of what that means as far as looks and performance. what I want is just some thing in the $1000-$1500 range for a blade and I'm wondering what I'm looking for. This right now is just speculating as I am probably not good enough to keep from cutting a finger off with a real blade but I am looking at get a "Real Sword" in a year or two...until then my aluminum iai will do.
    Suck, Squeeze, Bang, Blow...
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    Default Once and Future Sword

    Dear Tony:

    I personally have decided to stay with the sword I picked-up during a recent trip to England. Found sticking out of a rock (of all places) somewhere in the Glastonbury area. Cuts well, handles nicely, and except for an odd compunction to sit around circular rather than square tables with my friends, there have been no actual problems.

    Best Wishes,

    Bruce
    Bruce W Sims
    www.midwesthapkido.com

  10. #55
    Dan Harden Guest

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    Toby

    What a shame. That story should be published somewhere. I agree that there are things I have seen that defied my sensibilities. As far as unkowns go. It is my opinion that there are many people of amazing abilities out there who are unheralded and largely unknown. That goes for these things we call martial arts, particularly well.
    The incredible "Harden" blade.
    Yes I have made many. and am still researching and trying to improve.

    At a knife show many years ago Yoshindo Yoshihara kept coming back to a table where my Katana was displayed. He was quite taken by the grain and the Choji Hamon. Honestly I think it was the most perfeclty formed Choji I have ever done. The ashi matched so well. I was quite taken with it myself.
    I "heard" he kept returning to the table. Hopefully not out of boredom. He finally asked to see the tang. Upon seeing it, he said something like
    "An american made this?"
    There were several American smiths who got sort of a kick at this.
    Jimmy Fikes did much the same thing to a Japanese collector about twenty years ago. They made a tanto out of the worst crap they coud find. An old cast iron pan and some scrap wrought iron, I think it was. After many folds they got it right. They showed it to this Japanese guy at some event and he went nuts. Then they told him how it was made. Supposedly he cracked up and they all had a good laugh. Then he Bought it!!
    ********************************

    [QUOTE]Originally posted by Earl Hartman

    [B]Since I am not a metallurgist or a smith, I have been reading this thread with great interest, but avoiding posting. However, a couple of questions have occurred to me.

    In most of Dan's previous posts, he makes the case that Japanese swords were, far from being superior to swords from other places, actually inferior.

    Earl
    Please re-read my posts. My argument is that there were indeed significant metalurgical advances made by OTHER cultures (in fact, I was respondng to a pointed question in that regard).
    I believe the Japanese sword as a TOTAL instrument is an excellent weapon and piece of art. For its time, its manufacture was an excellent attempt at meeting the parameters of the tool. It is just that more nonsense has been written about it, as to do IT and other indigenous peoples efforts a disservice.
    I won't repeat my several comments that support my statements here, as they are in my previous posts. Perhaps you misunderstood the strength of my response.
    I responded so strongly for the simple reason that there is so much MIS-understanding about the Japanese sword. As a matter of fact I think MORE credit should be given to the Japanese smiths who have made such strides in the face of inferior steel and restrictive, recidivist, thinking in their own country. Their skills are so refined that I can only imagine what they could do with better materials.

    ***************************
    Earl writes
    I have heard of the quality of Viking steeel, and to judge from the exploits of the Vikings, who founded the city of Kiev, thereby laying the foundations for the development of Russia (the name "Rus" comes from the word for "rowers"), sailed to the New World more than 500 years before Columbus, and conquered England in their incarnation as Frankified Normans, there is no good reason to doubt that part of this was due to the quality of their weapons. Since I am a fan of the Vikings from way back, I have no problem believing that their swords were on a par with their other artifacts, their ships and jewelry in particular (ah, their ships. Has anyone ever built something so beautiful, yet so functionally perfect?).

    Anyway, if I understand Dan's posts correctly, the European method for blending the desired qualities, hardness of edge and durability, was case hardening, where the core of the blade would be softer (more ductile?) and the outer steel harder so as to hold an edge.


    No, No, Earl!!
    If you reread, you will see that I mentioned a lower layer, low carbon (damascus type) steel core that is twisted and then folded back upon itelf. This produces an EXPOSED central core that had a visible chevron pattern. Again, the pattern was VISIBLE. And yet Again!! This is telling in that the structure served a preminate place in the FUNCTION of the blade. BUT! It was also twisted and folded to appear beautiful. The twist and fold to produce the chevron was entirely an affectation for beauty. This is similar to the Gassan filing method, used to produce an undulating grain. Completely pointless except for looks.

    **It should be noted here that the entirety of the process far surpassed the welding requirements of a Katana. The methods used were a testement to the highest levels of smithing skills.

    Now to be clear, this center core was exposed!!! it was wrapped with an edge steel AROUND the outer edge of the core. Picture it this way. Lay the blade flat on the table. The edges are to the left and right. The core is the body of the blade facing down ON the table and the other side facing UP. The wrapped area is the edges. This was made from medium and high carbon steels in a layered, folded pattern (at least in some of the blades recovered).

    Thusly, it was a medium to high carbon edge that was quenched and hardened then tempered. There was no significant hardening of the core since it was low carbon steel leaving the center medium or soft. Viola!! Differential hardening without clay!
    There was no case hardening at all.

    *note
    Case hardening is accompished by taking a piece of low carbon steel and placing it in a reducing atmosphere in the presence of carbon. This can be done in a sealed crucible or done in a commercial gas carborizng tank. I have done this and have taught other smiths how to do it in their forges. In fact, I taught a fellow how to do it in his forge with meteorite. He called me all weekend to get tips and time tables. When done, he took pictures of the process and the steel. A year later I see an article in a well known knife journal with his knives. NO CREDITS TO ME at all!!

    People!
    you gotta love em


    ********************
    Earl writes
    The Japanese, on the other hand, forge welded differing grades of steel and differentially tempered the sword to combine a hard edge and a more durable body. He holds that the European method is superior.

    Where did I say that Earl?

    I said the Wootz steel was A (A) superior steel. Perhaps the best performing steel of any indiginous people. Wootz is and was NOT! European. In fact, the Europeans failed misreably in their attempts to forge it.


    Earl again
    Yet, he states that all of his blades have a hamon and that they are, as a result, functionally superior. Since the hamon, so far as I know at any rate, was found on Japanese blades and not on European blades, this seems to me to be an admission that the European method was not as completely superior as he has been maintaining and that some aspects of the Japanese method were, and are, superior to the European. If they were not, I assume that he would not make use of them.

    Earl
    What I said was, The viking method used different steels to produce a differentially hardened blade. So did the Wootz smelting process (in a way. There is allotto say here aboout pearlite, cementite and what not. But, I fear I am wearing out my welcome).
    Differential hardening is and was a significant factor in the performance of tools and weapons. There were and are many ways to get there. In simple steels it is in a clay method. I happen to like the look of a hamon. But I do not *NEED* to produce a hamon to get differential hardening. I could and have used an air hardening steel or a Stainless deep hardening steel and drawn it back to produce a spring body and hard edge. Many of these steels will outperform plain carbon. It just isn't as pretty!!
    I want it all!!


    ****************************

    Earl again

    Regarding the use of the sword in battle, my guess is that the majority of the fighting and dying in Japanese battles was done by the peasant soldier (ashigaru) just as the yeomen and the villeins did most of the dying in European battles. First, peasants have always outnumbered the aristocracy in any time and place, there are more of them available, and they can be coerced by the aristocrats, who were better armed and organized. Second, they were almost certainly equipped with inferior weapons. They're just peasants, right? Third, the aristocrats fought with other aristocrats insofar as they could, leaving the peasants to fight with each other. Poorly trained, terrified peasants armed with inferior weapons are probably going to leave behind a lot of broken and bent swords (as are terrified, poorly trained aristocrats, for that matter). However, since being a well-trained fighter was a bushi's job, he will probably be better at it than an ashigaru. At the same time, his potential opponent will probably have a comparable level of training, so the training levels will cancel each other out.

    Me
    I suspect that Japanese fighting was as dirty and unequal as every other culture.

    *********************************
    Earl
    I doubt that a beautifully polished, razor sharp sword, of any kind, is going to remain pristine after you bash a guy in the helmet with it a few times. Any weapon to be used against an armored opponent is going to have to rely on a certain amount of mass for effectiveness. Hence, a more robust edge for pitched fighting.

    Me
    edge geometry is a study unto itself. That said, some of us
    smiths are rather "out there" when it comes to the study and research of the performance curve of their blades.


    Dann
    "who wishes he could communicate better these days"











    [Edited by Dan Harden on 10-03-2000 at 10:44 PM]

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    If Yoshindo Yoshiwara likes your swords, man, that's heavy. Yoshindo Yoshiwara is nobody to sneeze at. He's heavy artillery. My sword teacher let me use one he owns in a Chi Chi Bu tai kai 4 or 5 yrs ago. I had been using the famous multi bent Mr. Ono sword till then but Japanese police confiscated it at Narita. So anyway when I picked up the Yoshiwara blade I knew I could do no wrong. It was fairly thick and heavy and had little sori. But I'm telling you the thing had its own energy. Because of it I ot 2 nd place in nidan / sandan cutting right out of teh gate. and I'm not that good. Bob Elder
    Rich and Stress Free

  12. #57
    Dan Harden Guest

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    Hi Bob

    I don't know much about the man. I do know that a few Japanese and several American collectors have enjoyed the look of my swords. And I do have failures like everyone else.
    As well, I have probably done more cutting with them (I have nine acres of missing trees and plenty of cut up elevator cable) then perhaps most people. I have learned a thing or two about steel over decades of forging and I have learned a thing or two about fighting with them in a Koryu sword art.
    One guy, a recent "return-ey" who lived in Japan for a while and studied Iai. Also hung out with a Japanese smith. He discredited my honorable mention by Yoshihara. Telling me that Yoshihara was a nobody and that many of the Japanese smiths don't think much of him. He also said that Yoshihara was probably just being "Japanese" and polite. The story I got from the smiths present, was that he was genuenly shocked.

    Dan
    "Who lives in the woods, doesn't get out much, and just keeps trying to get better"

    [Edited by Dan Harden on 10-03-2000 at 11:45 PM]
    Last edited by Dan Harden; 2nd April 2001 at 11:55.

  13. #58
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    Question

    Originally posted by Dan Harden
    Krzysztof,

    Sorry not to get back I have been away again

    I am in central Mass.
    Was the Madison group the TSKSR study group I heard of out that way?
    Anyway. Perhaps you could come for forging and train with us as well after. I will endevour to to insure that evertyone gets to hammer red to white hot metal.
    [snip]
    [Edited by Dan Harden on 10-03-2000 at 12:38 AM]
    Dan,

    I've been waiting for four years for you to do this... is that invitation still open?

    Be well,
    Jigme
    Last edited by kenkyusha; 2nd April 2001 at 12:26.
    Jigme Chobang Daniels
    aoikoyamakan at gmail dot com

  14. #59
    Dan Harden Guest

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    Dan,

    I've been waiting for four years for you to do this... is that invitation still open?

    Be well,
    Jigme
    __________________
    Jigme Chobang
    Kenkyusha@bigfoot.com

    You know. I love your name. I have told people...
    I know this guy named Jigme Chobang! How's that for a handle
    I heard you were into Kempo Now.... Neh?


    Of course you would be invited. We talked about it tonight at the Dojo. I moved you know. I got out of the commercial Judo Dojo and renovated a barn on my own property. Dojo upstairs, smithy and wood shop down stairs. Now I just walk out my front door.
    We were thinking about a forging and training weekend. I have had several private replies. I must confess, I don't see the "draw." Do you have any idea how hot a smithy is?
    I figured I would set up a few welds. set up a blade and clay coat it. Then quench it temper it and clean it up to see the hamon. Next I figure we could burn a piece (always an exciting sparkler!) Then we could get everyone to hammer a few. With the finish being some cutting.




    [Edited by Dan Harden on 10-04-2000 at 09:34 PM]
    Last edited by Dan Harden; 2nd April 2001 at 11:39.

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    Oy. It's getting mighty crowded in Dan's tiny forge! We got Matt, Chris, Rich, me, Bob E. and his 2 guys, Krzysztov and Jigme. Might need to knock out a wall...
    Last edited by Cady Goldfield; 3rd April 2001 at 14:29.
    Cady Goldfield

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