Posted on 12/27/2008 6:39:09 AM PST by decimon
I knew that.
“How’s your Rolex?” ping
That would stink, now wouldn’t it...
"If I ever get my hands on the #$%$^$%^ who sold me this..."
Either way, I bet not too many customers made it back to complain!
That’s just like a Viking.....bring a sword to a culverin fight.............
O.K., sword shattering like glass in battle is a bad thing. Got it.
“You really didn’t want to have that happen,”
I knew that.
__________
Former life?
Yes, I used to have a life. Now it's all internet.
I wonder if there has been any study of transition temperature of the material in the “good” vs “bad” swords. Viking swords were probably used at lower temperatures a good bit of the time.
Sword ping
Buying swords from a guy selling them out of the back of his wagon!
It seems most of the fake ones have been found, shattered, in graves.
Caveat emptor.
Historical evidence the Vikings had extensive trade with China....
Thanks! Pinging the sword ping list...
Thanks for the sword ping!
The equivalent of some person buying what we now call a 'sword like object' (better known as a wall-hanger, those 'swords' one can buy from a Mall for 50 bucks).
The problem is, using a sword-like-object in real combat against someone with a real sword must have been a very quick way to die.
Maybe that's why in times of yore Japanese sword smiths would have their Katanas tested by seeing how many arms it could cut through at a time (gladly provided by prisoners ....the very best were allegedly tested using torsos). But then again, Katanas were never used for sword-against-sword combat ...it would be rare for Samurai to clash blade against blade, if at all. European swords on the other hand not only did meet blade to blade sometimes, but there was also the whole armor issue. A weak sword would not have lasted long.
The interesting thing from the article, for me anyways, was the part where they said the best swords then had much more carbon steel than the inferior ones (an obvious point), BUT ALSO that MODERN carbon steel is twice as better as that in the best olden swords. I am assuming that means that a well-made modern carbon steel swords (not a 'sword like object,' but rather one of the few pieces made by the few modern swordsmiths that go for a pretty penny) would be substantially better than the best legacy blades (be they japanese or Damascus or whatever) from olden times.
If they used low carbon steel, quenched it, and didn’t temper it at all it would shatter. I found that out early on (14) in my knife making days. Of course the steel I was using such as railroad spikes and springs from rail cars were much better steel than they used.
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