Sword Steel origin.

[Henry Stewart]

Gentlemen;

I have encountered a steel described as follows:- Starts off with single bar of drawn steel,usually used for railway lines (Not Mantetsu). Because its drawn the striations in the steel fabric are already there(this is not deliberate,just a trait of manufacture);

The steel is forge heated and folded several times and then sword shaped,the tempering and hardening is done exactly as a traditional blade and water cooled using "slip",and thus a hamon is forged,which when traditiionally polished stands out exceedingly well (VERY NOTICEABLE).

Whilst I am awaiting photos to publish,has anyone encountered the above mentioned steel and method before. The only reason I am bothering with this is that I have seen the blade and it comes from a previously hitherto unimpeachable scource. He calls it a part gendaito! Made 1930/1940s.

 

Thank you

 

Henry

[paulb]

Henry,

I think what you are describing is the later form of Ko-ishin manufacture. Originally these blades were produced by encasing a soft iron core with steel made from iron sand imported from Manchuria. Later blades were made using mill steel to encase the core.

However according to Fuller and Gregory the later ones were oil quenched rather than water quenched.

regards

Paul

[John A Stuart]

Hi Henry, The rail steel used post 1900 worldwide was pretty much the same. The southern Manchurian railroad and domestic Japanese railroads were all made of a rail steel. This was a pearlitic carbon steel with fairly standard amounts of manganese. As we know pearlite is a mixture of ferrite and cementite which has the ferric carbides. This was a high grade steel that when re-forged and heat treated would create a good sword. I think the steel for the Manchurian rails was made in Japan and there is no difference between mantetsu or any Japanese rail steel. John

[Brian]

Does anyone have a scan of the pages from F&G about the various construction methods?

We like to think of WW2 swords as either mass produced, oil quenched....or fully traditional Gendaito.

In fact there were a host of different methods in between, that can be called semi-Gendaito or whatever takes your fancy.

Many of them can't even be identified from looking. F&G lists quite a few methods of manufacture. Many of these will fit into your description. Am at work now, so don't have access to the book currently.

 

Brian

[paulb]

Brian,

Below is an extract from a paper recently finished. the list is based on the FG definitions.

 

3. Gendai-to. A modern sword made after 1876, but more commonly referring to a blade made during the Showa period, using traditional material (tamahagane) and techniques. It is hand forged, folded and water quenched.

 

3a. Gendai-to made using mill steel. Produced using steel made in a western style smelter but being hammered, folded, drawn and water quenched. Western style steel is more homogenous than traditionally produced tamahagane and cannot therefore be folded without losing grain structure. Smiths compensated for this by adding carbon and folding fewer times. The resultant blades produced hada a hamon in nioi or nie and with all of the activity one would expect to see in a hand forged, water quenched blade.

 

4. Ko-Isshin Mantetsu-to: A sword made using imported Manchurian sand iron. These blades comprised of a soft iron core encased in a harder steel tube. They were made using complex manufacturing techniques but cannot be classed as Gendai-To. However they do exhibit a form of hada, hamon Nie and Nioi and activity within both jigane and hamon.

 

4a later Mantetsu-To made in Manchuria initially they may have used the same methodology as the Ko-Isshin swords but later manufacture used a single piece of rolled steel and oil quenching

(see below)

 

5. Han tanren abura yaki-ire-to. Literally partially forged, i.e folded several times and hardened in oil. Quality varies the better examples exhibit a fine hada and nioi like hamon (but without nie)

 

6. Sunobe abura yaka-ire-to: A sword made from a single piece of bar steel and oil quenched.

 

7. Murata-to machine made from a single piece of steel exhibits a Yakiba but without clearly defined hamon. These blades are regarded as inferior to Mantetsu-to.

 

8. Tai-sabi-ko. Blades made from anti-rust steel primarily for naval swords

 

9. Machine made- produced in an arsenal from a single piece of steel which may be fully quenched in oil (tempered?) without clay coating or allowed to cool in the air. These were general issue swords such as cavalry sabres or NCO swords.

[John A Stuart]

I thought Henry was asking about a specific steel that a sword could be made from, rail steel. Manchuria provided iron ore from mines and coking coal incidentally. Would this not also be mantetsu although not produced in a puddler (tatara)? John

[bluboxer]

Hello Henry,

what you may be referring to is rail steel that was produced in small quantities and was limited to areas of high traffic/heavy loads that would necessitate frequent iron rail replacement.Before the introduction of the Bessemer process of producing steel from wrought iron(before the 1860's) this was time consuming and expensive.It required placing bars of wrought iron inside tightly closed stone boxes with charcoal powder,heated for several days,broken up again,re-packed with charcoal and reheated (cementation process).This produced blister steel that had uneven carbon distribution not unlike tamahagane and was forged under the hammer to consolidate the steel and to promote a more even carbon distribution.This produced a grain pattern very similar to a course hada.

When the Bessemer process took over steel production this pattern was lost due to the homogeneous carbon distribution in the steel.The Bessemer process was utilized by all steel producing countries through the early 1900's except for Sweden.The Swedish took their wrought iron from the puddlers and refined it in hearth furnaces with charcoal to produce their higher quality steel and shaped it by hammer forging.Also;the magnetite ores of Sweden are the purest ores that exist in large quantities (they lack sulfur and phosphorus.)

So;we have 2 possible sources for railroad rail steel that can display layered patterns.Pre-1860's steel rail from Europe(most likely GB) or Swedish steel rails from before the 1930's.

Hope this helps,

Alan

[Henry Stewart]

Gentlemen All;

 

My sincere thanks for the input. I now know the specific steel I am after thanks to this veritable wealth of information which has explained to me not only the specifics such as striations,but its treatment of forging to blades. There is much more to this than is first evident. One thing though, how would the learned gentlemen classify such a blade, Nihonto or not. How necessary is it that the blade scource is Tamahagane or Orishagane; In all other respects some of these striated blades were forged and tempered traditionally. I suspect I know the answer but confirmation would be most satisfactory.

 

Henry

[Henry Stewart]

Alan, John, Brian and Paulb

Gentlemen

 

What about No.5 on paulb's list, partialy forged with its promnent hada??

 

Henry

[Henry Stewart]

Gentlemen

 

I now have a photograph of the Kissaki end of the blade and have requested that Brian publish it.

I have also examined the sword furniture carefully,it is I would say all early 1900's and Japanese in orgin. But if it has been specially polished as claimed,for the martial arts, then it would wouldnt it!.

 

 

Henry

[paulb]

Henry,

To play devils advocate if a blade is not made with tamahagane it cannot be clasified as Nihon-To.

That said I think it would be a challenge for most if not all to differentiate between say a Gendaito made with tamahagane and a hand forged blade made using mill steel and added carbon. I am sure there are differences in quality and they can be identified I just dont think it is that easy or straight forward.

However it is also important that as collectors we do not kid ourselves that showa blades are something they are not. The NBTHK was set up for the preservation of Art swords.

Whilst many swords made in the war years using alternative construction methods are good utilitarian work and fit for purpose they are not within the classification of Art Sword which defines the Nihon-To.

.

[Henry Stewart]

Paul;

 

I can understand what you say and to a great extent I agree with the standpoint. I am searching though for a Japanese article I read by a specialist who stated that the patterns formed on the blade were to some serendipidy;I will find it. The patterns were a bye product of the method of forging and not done deliberately and did not dictate that the steel was either good or bad. I wonder if its possible in time to say approximately when the sword changed from a purely battle implement to an art implement, or is it that it was always both,just that different people took a different view. That as it gained popularity many different ways would be found of manufacture.

Some therefore are regarded as a "true sword" and others faithful replicas.

 

Henry

[Jacques D.]

Hi,

 

To play devils advocate if a blade is not made with tamahagane it cannot be clasified as Nihon-To.

 

Why not? Nihon-tô (日本刀) literally means Japanese sword; it is a generic term including all the swords made by and for the Japanese warriors. Showa-tô are Nihon-tô, Gunto are Nihon-tô as well as kazuuchi-mono or artistic swords.

[paulb]

Jacques,

I am aware of the literal meaning of Nihon-To, but thank you for pointing it out again. You will also be aware that the NBTHK as per their own website define themselves as "The Society for Preservation of Japanese Art Swords".

What I was saying is that if a blade is not made using traditional methods and materials it cannot be classed as a true Nihon-To. This debate has been going on throughout the life of this board and I am sure long before. I am not agreeing with the definition I am just saying that this is the current conscensus.

What I do disagree with is the implication in your argument that seems to suggest that because a sword was the tool of a warrior it is worthy of appreciation. Sorry I do not agree.

A warrior could use a farm tool to kill an opponent. While this may be historically significant it does not make the farm tool something worthy of appreciation. What makes an art sword different is the way a skilled smith has worked with the material to achieve an end result that is not only fit for purpose but also aesthetically appealing and a thing of beauty.

of course not every sword made using traditional methods and material fall in to this catagory. Many Japanese authorities (Sato, Kozon etc) are dismissive of the mass produced blades produced in Seki and Osafune. However these must be one step closer to art swords than those made in the 20th century using non traditional material.

[Jacques D.]

Hi,

 

The Society for Preservation of Japanese Art Swords

 

All Japanese art swords are nihon-tô, but all nihon-tô are not art sword.

 

 

This is my opinion. :D

[paulb]

I think we agree

[bluboxer]

Henry,

I think that no 5 would be an excellent combat weapon and that is all.The creation of the striations or visible layers are created through loss of carbon at the surface of the hot steel rather than the spreading out and blending of distinct areas of varying carbon composition.Therefore it would not display activity associated with traditional nihon-to.The fact that no.5 was quenched in oil would also point to a modern high carbon steel with some manganese in it;such a steel is more easily hardened and would have a lesser chance of surviving a water quench.

 

All Japanese art swords are nihon-tô, but all nihon-tô are not art sword.

I wholeheartedly agree.

 

Alan

[dkirkpatrick]

Hey guys, Doug here, just thought I would jump into the fray. Interesting topic to talk about, even if, as said it has been addressed often. Intuitively, it would seem wrong to exclude a sword as being a true nihonto because it is not comprised of tamahaganae. If this were true, then would'nt we have to disqualify Hizen Yukihiro's swords forged with orando-tetsu or " Holland steel"? I'd tend not to think so. Also I found a cool link that many of you may have already read about Masahide and his use of the "barbarian iron"...a nice read. I'm not coming down hard either way, just think it is a fun topic to banty about. Heres the link:

http://www.k3.dion.ne.jp/~j-gunto/gunto_146.htm

[Henry Stewart]

blueboxer,Doug, Jaques.Stephen,

Gentlemen;

My sincere thanks for your contributions,I intend they do not disappear into the aether so have taken,, I hope with your permission, hard copy of each,to be printed as the explanation; This especially for persons new to our fascinating hobby. To this end I would invite further comment so I would be able to get as wide a view as possible.This will greatly aide me in my studies of this particular area and oblige. A glossary of attribution will be maintained.

 

Thank you

 

Henry.

[paulb]

Doug,

I may be working from opinion rather than fact here, but my understanding of those smiths such as Yukhide who used foreign steel was that they used it in combination with tamahagane not instead of it, whereas the showa blades were exclusively mill steel.

Therefore Yukhides balde would still qualify as using traditional methods and material.

[Guido]

... using traditional methods and material.

That's exactly what it boils down to.

 

As was mentioned by others, and especially Ted more recently, WWII mass-produced swords are of interest to militaria collectors. And why not, to each his own. It just so happens that those swords are not the focus of this message board. "Nihontô" is commonly understood as being a Japanese edged weapon made using traditional methods and material, all semantics not withstanding. The Japanese language and its context-driven, connotation-rich nature is not subject to a poll among the forumites here to re-define it, that would be insanly silly.