rkg

I seem to be late to the party, as usual. First off, if you can, stop using preypal for foreign transactions. Not only do they stick you with some pretty stiff transaction fees, but they also give you a crummy exchange rate - and.... the sellers often add a fee on top of that, since they don't want to pay for preypal either and they often expect you to. If your brokerage will do international wire transfers that works, but for the smaller amounts the people here seem to want to spend, you should contact your agent and see if they can use wise for transactions. the fees are like less than 1% and you get an excellent exchange rate (forex usually - really close to spot). Second, if you're treasure hunting, you should be hunting treasures. It is distressing to see particularly new (and sometimes not-so-new) collectors putting up pieces that are not well composed or executed, have poor workmanship, or bad condition problems (a coating of thick corrosion is generally not a good thing (except when it is - and ya gotta know when not to touch it - I have seen lovely ko-kinko pieces converted into pieces of indeterminate age by extreme cleaning - terrible)), etc. Diatribe about various cleaning, etc you can and really can't get away with (finished product will look "bad" when compared to a cared for one) omitted. You can go down the whole dark path with "fixer uppers", but really, it is better to just avoid them. There are a surprising number of pieces out there that are never going to be worth a lot, but they are in good condition, are well executed, etc - Rich Turner always called these "cheap and cheerful pieces". And there is a surprising number of these up almost all the time (with no or very very small problems). You can also get a deal if you are looking for a certain group or design or style of piece by buying what the Japanese don't want (wakizashi or tanto sized pieces, unsigned kinko that shouldn't be, etc). There is a difference between wabi sabi and corroded wrecks that are best given to the scrap man... I hate to say it, but this comes back to not knowing what good piece looks like. you can look in a book, but you would probably do better to try and see Known Good pieces in hand (go to shows, good museum collections, other collectors, etc. Third, fakes.. There are a lot of them, including several sellers on Yahoo!Japan that are selling complete fabrications - pieces that must be made by weekend warrior amateur tsuba makers they are usually a little "off" compared to what they are aiming for, have weird looking sekigane, etc - and sometimes these get bid up to crazy prices. And... there are a couple of sellers who seem to get ahold of old pieces, ruin them, and throw them up on YJ (they are the real deal, but they appear to have been sanded down, have an awful patina, etc)... Discouraging. On top of that, most of the volume sellers are dealers now, and they mostly know how to photograph stuff - to minimize or outright hide problems (not really a fake problem, but the pieces look far different in hand or when photographed to show everything). Getting borderline dross is just a waste of your money IMHO. Earlier in the year I actually bot some lower cost pieces mostly for photo testing. A lot of them are in a condition where I can't sell them in good conscience - and I'll probably just give them away soon - maybe on the NMB for shipping and a donation to the NMB or something. Just because I gotta put up an obligatory image, here's one. I bought the piece as a "catch and release" testing mei shooting on funky surfaces, etc. From the auction pictures you couldn't tell that the webs were partially eaten away, the surface has a pretty violent tsuchime - it looks like somebody took a punch or a hammer to the surface (it is "supposed" to be hammer work, but I've never seen something like this), you could not see the amida bori, etc. this is similar to a piece posted earlier in this thread: and maybe I should have put up a bigger version... oh well Best, rkg (Richard George)

Grev, Excellent Idea, fwiw. I've thought a book (or file) with kao and associated names would be extremely handy. Good Luck with your endeavor. Best, rkg (Richard George)

And here's a kamakura tsuba I just came across that is apparently cut down: https://page.auction.../auction/e1156532313 And here is an image I snarfed from the auction, saved for posterity. I don't own the image (or piece) and I am presenting it for educational purposes only... And actually, if you look at the bottom of the piece you can see a little "keyway" on the bottom in the edge of the mimi that is usually an indicator that there was a fukurin on the piece at some point. Best, rkg (Richard George)

Here's a pre-edo Kamakura tsuba: Best, rkg (Richard George)

Curran, The piece came with that monster shingen I have - the nakago ana are identical so it would appear they were possibly made for the same sword. Dimensions: 99.8mm H X 99.8mm W X 11.5mm T Not meaning to threadjack, but here's a couple of posts on this on FB https://www.facebook...et=a.266009073454448 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid02mtsns6mZqhsn3EacvX6d5EuHWjQTFLDrTEyUEzpdGGTRWkzSCUmKVrh6fTQYQ8Efl&id=266005023454853&__cft__[0]=AZU8RA2JpUMk9mCEIqS5_ppmy6tJmF0NBsV6rdhVv4J2aX4Wkqlccf7MSBXltg8qoQUew794vtZIJd6T6XpwyrVH4Dk14QuAtC5ULOMcYPkwGczKVDqauSxpxrEdnbHbSZohTByXnWD8uE-Y1k7GLCRcdIrXrUzocXHl44DOVl9iXyUndMXq1aAdUN88wC7MRjQ&__tn__=%2CO%2CP-R rkg

I have a brass tsuba that weighs 672 grams: Best, rkg (Richard George)

Congratulations! Best, rkg (Richard George)

Here ya go - I hope it helps... Best, rkg (Richard George)

I have one similar to this that I got not too long ago, but I haven't photographed it yet. Here is an image from the auction: Best, rkg (Richard George)

Mauro and everybody else who replied - thanks! Best, rkg (Richard George)

I haven't been able to shoot anything for over a year due to health issues - but I FINALLY got the studio cleared out, the various wind up stands in place, figured out how photoshop photoshop had screwed up my workflow (and workarounds), etc, and... Just for grins, here's a couple of images of a ko-tosho (or at least that is what the NBTHK thought it was, FWIW) I picked up off of yahoo!Japan not too long ago. I am not sure what the theme is, comments about what it might be are appreciated. The little beastie has a black coating - when I get some more time I will have to ascertain if it's black lacquer (I that might be what is going on) or if somebody put black wax or something on it. I need to pull down the microscope and fix that workflow next, thought that might take a while as I have a whole bunch of other fittings to try imaging. The piece measures74.2mm(H) X 73.3mm(W). It measures 2.9mm(max) at the seppa area and tapers to 2.3mm (max) at the mimi. rkg (Richard George)

That would be the arsenic leaching out of the lead Best, rkg (Richard George)

you might as well use copper or silver. As an aside, does anybody use copper pennies (if you're us based) for this, or do you scare up pure copper or yamagane? (not that I'm suggesting defacing US currency as that would be illegal, but...) Best, rkg (Richard George)

Another pervasive surface hack used on iron pieces like yours is the dreaded "brown wax". A lot of material coming out of Japan these days suffers from this and sometimes the wax is laid on like putty to hide a multitude of sins. you can use some high test isopropyl alcohol on a q-tip somewhere inconspicuous, and if it comes off brown... Clear wax over a good surface with no active rust is a personal choice (and it does make a lot of pieces look better), but the hackers often use the brown stuff to hide active rust issues, deep pitting, areas of corrosion (that look like sandpaper), cracks, even out botched repatination, etc. This is bad because the corrosion continues under the surface - wax is permeable and the rust can still get what it needs to continue reacting. The sad part is that sometimes they'll use the brown wax even when there's nothing to hide - just as part of their rework process - I guess they think it makes the piece look better And.. you often can't just clean it off because it opens a whole can of worms to try and conserve the result. Best, rkg (Richard George)