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Sword received back from chris bowen


jeremy

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Hey guys

 

Just received my shinsakuto back from Chris. Just wanted to say he's one of the best I've dealt with in the sword business.  Quick service and good communication.  I sent my sword to get a bohi carved into it, it came back beautiful and even better than I expected.  It will be a joy go go back to training again !  If I've posted this in the wrong place please feel free to move this thread. 

 

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21 minutes ago, Bruce Pennington said:

We thrive on pictures, Jeremy.  None of us really like reading, it's just a path that gets us to the pictures!

Sure. It's only a training blade , so it's not in an art polish. But I'll post some pics nonetheless 

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Nothing much to see. It's in user polish but I bet this blade would be absolutely stunning if ever polished , nice itame hada and suguha hamon. But the bohi is very well done. The whole sword weighed 1345 grams with koshirae without saya , now it weighs 1174 grams. 2-6-5 length. Alot easier to use with my aging sore arms! 

20211028_154745.jpg

20211028_154736.jpg

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9 minutes ago, Brian said:

Nicely done, and good to hear it can often be done post manufacture. Enjoy, I think a good hi adds to a sword's aesthetics.

I definitely agree about the aesthetics . It changed the sori by about 1mm-2mm but nothing drastic. All in all, very happy with it

20211028_174154.jpg

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I agree with Jeremy H. one of my best swords has a double hi (one large and one small) and it makes for a nice aesthetic note to long sword. Great you had a good experience dealing with Chris Bowen. I have deal with him and the NTHK-NPO and he has always been great to deal with.

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On 10/28/2021 at 7:44 AM, jeremy said:

It changed the sori by about 1mm-2mm but nothing drastic.

 

Did it increase or decrease the sori, Jeremy?  (After overthinking this for a while, I've managed to provide myself with a good argument for either/both!)

 

Jon

 

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5 hours ago, FZ1 said:

 

Did it increase or decrease the sori, Jeremy?  (After overthinking this for a while, I've managed to provide myself with a good argument for either/both!)

 

Jon

 

To be honest i can't tell if it increased or decreased the sori. How I know the sori changed is because Chris told me, and that the blade is ever so slightly tighter to fit back into the saya.  Logic however tells me that I'm more inclined to think that it decreased the sori. The original sori was 18mm before sending it off, I would say its between 16-17mm now. 

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1 hour ago, Jean said:

I wonder why the sori changed, it should not have taking into account how it is done.

It's not the first time i have heard the sori changes when putting a bohi.  I read it on another Japanese sword site. I will try to find the link and post it here

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19 hours ago, Jean said:

I wonder why the sori changed, it should not have taking into account how it is done.

I imagine that removing the softer steel from the inside of the curve of the blade must relieve forging stress in some fashion… I look forward to more informed opinions though. 

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My opinion is that you should not modify antique blades to suit your aesthetics. There are modern swords you can do that with.

 

If it is shinshinto period, leave it be. Restore it and leave it.

 

Now we have a thread here on the board encouraging this behavior.

 

Why does it modify the sugata?

 

When the hamon expands the mune goes into tension. The hamon pushes back on the extremes of the blade and this creates the curve. The mune and shinogi-ji are the part of the sword that resists this pressure. This pre-stressing helps the sword keep its shape.

 

Now you go and cut out a bunch of the meat that was doing the resisting, so there is less there to resist. As a result the hamon is able to more overpower the mune and the sugata changes. The pressure in the ha is released somewhat as well and the blade is going to have new characteristics after the hi goes in.

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4 hours ago, Darcy said:

My opinion is that you should not modify antique blades to suit your aesthetics. There are modern swords you can do that with.

 

If it is shinshinto period, leave it be. Restore it and leave it.

 

Now we have a thread here on the board encouraging this behavior.


No Darcy. The sword is a shinsakuto used by him just for sport. Therefore modifying it to suit him is perfectly ok. It isn't a Shinshinto.
No-one here advocated doing this to swords of any age. Cutting hi into an antique would be condemned by just about every member here, since we constantly have a go at people using antique swords for martial arts.
 

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On 11/2/2021 at 1:05 PM, Darcy said:

My opinion is that you should not modify antique blades to suit your aesthetics. There are modern swords you can do that with.

 

If it is shinshinto period, leave it be. Restore it and leave it.

 

Now we have a thread here on the board encouraging this behavior.

 

Why does it modify the sugata?

 

When the hamon expands the mune goes into tension. The hamon pushes back on the extremes of the blade and this creates the curve. The mune and shinogi-ji are the part of the sword that resists this pressure. This pre-stressing helps the sword keep its shape.

 

Now you go and cut out a bunch of the meat that was doing the resisting, so there is less there to resist. As a result the hamon is able to more overpower the mune and the sugata changes. The pressure in the ha is released somewhat as well and the blade is going to have new characteristics after the hi goes in.

Thank you for this explanation.  Very educating.  No antique here. Only a shinsakuto made for training purposes.  

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On 11/2/2021 at 2:58 PM, PNSSHOGUN said:

Somewhat related/similar story on this page: http://www.ksky.ne.jp/~sumie99/episodes.html

 

2039591841_Screenshot2021-11-02at14-57-25episodesbykokaji.thumb.png.a2f2902aa4da17ce11c7f72d61febf71.png

That is super interesting . Even over polishing a blade can change the sori. And he wanted to do that just to lighten the blade,  cutting a bohi would've been the better route I think . 

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On 11/2/2021 at 5:47 PM, Brian said:


No Darcy. The sword is a shinsakuto used by him just for sport. Therefore modifying it to suit him is perfectly ok. It isn't a Shinshinto.
No-one here advocated doing this to swords of any age. Cutting hi into an antique would be condemned by just about every member here, since we constantly have a go at people using antique swords for martial arts.
 

Totally agree here. I would never dream about cutting a bohi into an antique blade !

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On 10/30/2021 at 3:59 PM, Soshin said:

I agree with Jeremy H. one of my best swords has a double hi (one large and one small) and it makes for a nice aesthetic note to long sword. Great you had a good experience dealing with Chris Bowen. I have deal with him and the NTHK-NPO and he has always been great to deal with.

Guess I'm in the minority actually appreciating a blade without horimono or bohi, mainly when katana or tachi. Many times I've seen bohi where I thought how the blade would look without. 

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18 hours ago, Fuuten said:

Guess I'm in the minority actually appreciating a blade without horimono or bohi, mainly when katana or tachi. Many times I've seen bohi where I thought how the blade would look without. 

It should be noted so that there is not confusion that my katana had a double bohi cut into the blade during the late Muromachi Period. It was not recently done by anyone.    

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Hi David, 

 

I didn't think you meant it in that way. I should've expanded my post a little, adding that especially on longer blades bohi had the primary (or secondary depending on your point of view), function to lighten a blade (I'm of the opinion that the I beam functionality was a secondary thing). Which makes me think a blade without bohi particularly would be closer to perfection in the eyes of the smith. One could counter with one intending bohi from the start thus forging a beefier form. It's I guess something that one might, with more study change his or her opinion on later. I suppose I'm also biased having no swords with any carving (apart from a signature🙃), not to mention I know next to nothing.

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  • 1 year later...

Hi Jeremy, 

 

I recently commissioned a shinsakuto through Chris Bowen & was wondering if you wouldn't mind sharing more photos w me & specs on your lovely sword. Mainly curious about it's length (blade & tsuka) & the hamon. I'm very tall so I requested a 2.6 shaku blade w a 2cm sori. Feel free to pm. 

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