snort

Chris, I feel your pain. Mirror like objects are very difficult. A polarizing lens will help cut down on reflections. Use soft lighting (bounce light off white reflector) from two angles. Grev is correct, a dark background for shiny things is best. Photoshop is great (used it for years & years) but will not rescue images that have not been adequately staged. george

I can't tell, David. I have no idea what the part that was there looked like. I thought it was a threaded screw but, like I said in post #3, there doesn't seem to be any threaded section in the second hole (furthest from the tsuba). Is what you have pictured a two part threaded connector? george

Plastic. That would be sacrilege. JMSO, george

Hummmmm On closer inspection I can see that there is no threads in the second hole. Your chopstick suggestion is looking better, Ray. tnx, george

I need one also. The one that remains in my sword measures at about metric 0.062, or close a TPI measurement of 28. The tapered neck would be a problem as would finding a metric die the correct size, but beyond that making my own seems like the only solution at this point in time. I'll probably try brass for construction, would be easiest to work with. george

One of the threaded pins that fasten the Tsuka on my koshirae. Where can I research and purchase a replacement? Please excuse my ignorance, I have very little background in this area. (mods, move to the correct forum if necessary) TIA, george

Yeah, Ken, I want to try a few swings with it myself, looks like a damned good stress relief exercise. Where do you get condemned criminals to try it out? I'm kinda new at this. I thought rabbits would be a good test, but TETSUGENDO chastised me severely for mentioning it, so I guess rabbits are out. And I thought they would be really good practice too, what with them all hoppin around and such. I have to get my sense of humor in alignment with the board here if I'm gonna stick around. <heh> george

Just testin the waters, TETSUGENDO no offense intended I'm lookin for the level of acceptable humor on this forum. please bear with me one needs to understand the forum members before one can participate, no? george

OOOO — don't rabbits make good edge testers? Hippity hop SWOOSH!! Oh no, I gotta finds some graphics... george

Oh yeah.

Unh... isin't the Hasaki the bottom part near the end? The, a, Kissaki is the center, right? And it's about 10 cm down the edge from the point. ​About the diameter of a pencil lead and about five mm from Hasaki george

Yes, sir, I respect your explanation but, ya see, I'm just one of them 'citizens' out there that is not a member of this worthy group. Out here in Podunk they call 'em all SAMURAI swords (I think ya can thank hollyweird for that). If I were to refer to this blade as a Koshirae (is that the correct name for what I have?) my peers would be quick to tell me I was wrong, that it was a samurai sword and do their best to make me feel the fool. <grin> Anyhow, I'm glad I dropped by to pay ya'll a visit. I have learned a bunch since I registered (despite the agony of the registration itself). Thank everyone who has volunteered their opinion and while I do recognize that they are opinions, I will regard it as good information. My main propose for coming here was to learn about my blade. I now know much more than I did yesterday and I'm sure there's a ton of stuff yet to learn, in matter of fact this could become another very expensive hobby. An I ain't goin there. No, no, this ain't goodbye, I just want to add to my introduction I did a couple hours ago. I will for sure stick around for at least six months and see if I fit in anywhere here. As usual collectors come from ALL walks of life and the personalities in collector's forums are always — uhm, to say — interesting <grin>. Tnx again, george

That 'scratch' down on the Hasaki is not a scratch. It is a divot. Completely thru the blade, about the diameter of a pencil lead. Looks like someone used it to bridge across 220 volts — it's clean, like it was put there on propose. george

No, that was not the price, sir, I got the guy to reduce it by $100. If you want to know what I paid for it I can PM you but I'm not going to post it here. Just me — I guess. george

Yeah. vajo, I agree. But it was what enabled me to bring the asking price down $100 george

I was trying to reply (and quote) vajo's post to ask if he needed a closeup of the Kashira and to add a photo of the Hamon and the damaged end george ps: My last four post should be only one post <heh>

This photo posting stuff sucks!!!!! WHY doesn't the option to 'attach files' show up until I select "other options? Then what you've just spent fifteen minutes composing just disappears and when return all you have is the photos and no text

damn!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A few months ago at a swap meet I saw a Katana for sale. I'm always on the lookout for low priced antiques to add to my collection and I always wanted a "samurai sword" so we haggled a bit I I bought it from him. He told me that he had inherited it from his grandfather who brought it home after WWII. That was his story, anyhow. After researching around on the interwebs I discovered there was a lot more to these things than I realized. And that cheap copies from China abound — did I just buy a costly reproduction? Or is it the real deal? I removed the Tsuka to see if it was signed and found these markings. I copied them as well as I could because I didn't want to clean off any of the scale & rust until I knew more about cleaning — they don't show up clearly in a photo at all. If possible, could someone help me identify exactly what I have here? I want to know what this is, it is for my own knowledge, I am a collector, I don't sell my stuff, I'll let the wife do that when I'm gone. TIA george

Dang! This might not be a good forum for me, I'm a little coarse and unrefined. And I'm not specifically a sword collector, edged weapons and weapons in general interest me. But, probably like some of you here, I have collections of many varied and interesting objects; from minerals to artwork and beyond. Usually I peruse a forum for months, years even before I join, but I bought a Katana a few months ago and a brother on a forum suggest I come here when I started asking around if anyone could help me identify my new blade. So here I am. After the torturous registration process I was about worn out. Then when I tried to post a photo the helpful forum decided that I wanted to throw away the last three paragraphs I just typed and it dumped me back to the main page. I hate it when things do that. I'm over 70, retired and enjoying it every day the good Lord allows me to wake up to. Beauty can be found everywhere, and I often think we collectors collect beautiful things to relive the stresses we encounter in life. How often have you caressed one of your collection in order to calm yourself? Or just looked at them and just breathed. OK, OK, enough of that philosophical BS — I'm George, how are ya'll this mornin'? george