Taz575

I picked up a cheap wak on Ebay for $400. I knew it had some rust spots and a flaw where the steel grain looks strange pattern wise. I knew this going into it, but it had a cool hamon to it that was different than my other blades for for $400, I was willing to take the chance! Ad said it was professionally polished (not quite! Yokote line points in different directions on each side of the blade, area near a ware was flattened out thru polishing?) and supposedly the dealer said it was a Kanemoto blade (fat chance!), but the rusting doesn't look like an issue. Tang is mumei, but may be suriage? Hamon looks like sanbonsugi, which I was looking for. I was looking for a wak to build up as a archery/hunting theme and one of my spots is in a stand of old cedar trees! My 2nd Ebay wak if you guys remember is somewhat of a toranba hamon like ocean waves, so that one will probably get built up with a fishing/ocean theme. First wak was a wild hamon, wide and fat blade (like me) and theme is night time/stars. 4 nephews, oldest gets the 1st wak (he was always asking where I was because I worked 3rd shift and didn't get to see him much). 2nd loves to fish like I do, so he has the fishing/ocean theme one. 3rd likes animals, so the hunting one goes to him. Need to figure out the 4th still, but he is only 19 months, so I still have time! Each of the blades has a flaw, but are still interesting blades (kinda like telling them they don't have to be perfect). Back to this sword. So the wak came in, rust doesn't look like an issue to have polished out. Nice hamon and nice hatakiri, can't want for the polish! Blade is the shortest and lightest of the 3, feels very nimble, not much sori, either. Narrower than the other two I believe and less taper, but I need to get some measurements. Tang looks darker patina wise, so it may be the oldest of the 3 so far. Overall blade shot. These are the sellers pics from Ebay, mine I took didn't turn out as good yesterday, will retry over the next few days. Ware Pic: So when I checked out the kizu in this pic when I had the sword in hand, I saw someone had polished almost all of the Niku out of the blade trying to remove the ware, so the blade side flattens out there for a bit. It's about 1" or so in front of the end of the habaki. The grain is masame there and I don't see core steel showing thru at all, but it's really flattened. A hair of niku at the actual edge and shingi, but almost dead flat in that area only. The rest of the blade shows a good bit of niku actually! Mokume swirls are seen elsewhere in the hada, but with the cloudy polish, it's hard to be 100%. Hamon pic: I was reading the post on Kanemoto O Wakizashi recently and looked up some of the characteristics of Kanemoto, which somewhat match up to the blade I have (was the seller actually telling the truth on Ebay??). Kinda of a sanbonsugi, but not strictly every 3 is tall, rounded ends, masame and mokume hada. This got me thinking. I believe the blade is already shortened: straight kiri, the kasane looks to be thicker farther back on the nagasa than the current mune machi, no ha machi visible, etc). My original plan was to have the mune machi moved forward a bit so the habaki would cover the flat spot on the blade (or most of it) and possibly trim the nakago back and redrill. From what I am thinking, even if it is a Kanemoto, with the flaw like that in the polishing where it is flattened out like it is, there isn't much collector value since there are better examples in much better condition, but I wanted to run it past the group here first. Would moving the munemachi forward to hide/cover the flaw make sense for a sword with this purpose (study sword for me for now, not resale/collector value, more sentimental value/pass down to nephews later on), or just leave it as is? I wouldn't be doing the work myself, but would go out to be done the right way! Or have it polished to get a better idea of the blade itself, and then make the choice of shortening?

I picked up 2 Wakizashi from Ebay recently that I am very happy with. One was $1040 shipped and the other was around $790 shipped. One is mumei, the other is gimei. I bought each one for having a very active/interesting hamon and ignored the ware/fukure that each had, which are not bad or fatal on either one. One has a small fukure in the hamon and the other has a ware in the shinogi ji area. Neither detract from my enjoyment of either piece. You need to get good pictures of the blades and really look at them. There are some out there that are horribly rusted/corroded or have lots of big openings, etc. Some pictures show this, others do not. Some are in good polish, others have been acid enhanced. I read on here buy the blade, not the mei/signature. I am looking for the next piece, but am looking at places other than just Ebay. I am studying the first 2 blades I got and trying to determine the schools of each so I know what to look closer at because I really like flamboyant, active hamons and activity in the steel itself. You can see the 2 wakizashi I am referring to in the posts in this section about the first and second Ebay wak.

Thanks for the info!

I've found a few other swords lately with similar hamon patterns where the Togari meet up above the rest of the hamon and form a circle of possibly softer steel. One of the ones I found recently was mumei, but looked very similar to mine, but with sets of 3 in the hamon, ie 3 "circle" formations in a row where mine has them mostly on one side of the blade. Is there a particular name for this where 2 togari form a circle?

Well, I worked a bunch of OT this week, so this one will be on it's way to Wally Hostetter for some work! New Habaki, seppa, fitting an antique tsuba to it (not the one it came with), and either a new saya or repair/re lacquer of the old one and possibly a new tsuka/same/blue ito wrap! He will be bringing it to the Orlando show to have the guys do the kantei on it if anyone wants to see it in person.

How do we sign up for kantei service? I am sending one of my wakizashi's down to Wally Hostetter in Florida to have some work done and he is willing to bring my Wak to have it checked out in person by you guys. Also, how can I do a donation? I would love to go down there myself, but work gets in the way

http://www.jssus.org/nkp/kanji_for_tsuba.html This link gives the kanji for the major tsuba schools towards the bottom of the page. The Kanji Pages under the Research Links above have helped me a lot!

I have one that is very similar and it's signed shoami.

Nice to see others who buy pieces simply for the Hamon! Very nice piece!

Yeah, there is a lot of Nie on the habuchi, but it may be partly because of the acid etched hamon? There are little clouds of nie right on top of or below the habuchi, too, like in the straight section near the monouchi where it's a nearly straight line w/o any ups and downs; there is nie all thru that line. I am on the wait list to get a better polish. I've been going thru your books Markus! I got the 4 Kantei books in paperback form and the E book of the hamon/boshi. Hatakeda Moriie seemed the closest hamon wise, but I don't think the sword is that old. Musashi no Daijō Korekazu and Dewa no Daijo Kunimichi were the next 2 I saw in the Hamon/Boshi Kantei book that were somewhat close. I'm still working my way thru the Shinto and ShinShinto Kantei books and reading the descriptions to see what matches up. I picked up another wakizashi recently and am trying to pin that one down (http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/19554-2nd-ebay-wak/), too. It's signed, but we think it is gimei (Bicchu no kami Tachibana Yasuhiro). The kantei books have been a lot of fun! The nakago is weird; not sure if it was a double or triple kesho to begin with and the polish went too far back, from the loose tsuba or something from when the mune machi was moved forward?

After seeing how the Ebay measurements were off in the ad, I redid them all with the habaki removed. Width at Munemachi: 31.14mm Kasane at Munemachi: 6.65mm Shinogi at Munemachi: 7.54mm Width at the Yokote: 21.8mm Kasane at Yokote: 5.5mm Shinogi at Yokote: 6.01mm Kissaki length is 29.7mm Sori is 9.9mm Weight of bare blade w/o habaki is 667gr.

Got some better measurements today. Width at Munemachi: 29.9mm Kasane at Munemachi: 6mm Shinogi atMunemachi: 6.9mm Width at Yokote: 21.1mm Kasane at Yokote: 4.5mm Shinogi at Yokote: 4.9mm Sori is 15.3mm Kissaki is 37mm long Weight of the bare blade is 527grams. My attempt at an Oshigata:

Thanks! The camera picked up a lot of very fine Ji Nie sprinkled through a lot of the blade, which I didn't see in my first Wakizashi. It's interesting comparing these two blades and seeing different things in each and the different polishes. I was very lucky rolling the dice on 2 Ebay wakizashi's, not sure I want to tempt a 3rd time or not! The signature on this one was Bicchu no Kami Tachibana Yasuhiro and looks to be Gimei, so I will be starting my Kantei on this one soon. I ordered Markus Sesko's Kantei books...all 4 of them and I already have the hamon/boshi E book from him as well. This one has togari, crab claw hamon (some of the crab claws touch, forming circles, is there a name for this?) and is generally notare. Still trying to figure out the boshi type since it is very difficult to see. It looks close to a Jizo Boshi, Ko maru or taki no otoshi. On the boshi pics I took, the mune has a silvery hamon look to it where the kaeri goes back past the yokote. Kissaki on this one is a bit longer than on my other one and I like the look of it. I may try doing an oshigata on this one like I did with the first one. Am I seeing some Fumbari in this one? I don't know if my eyes are playing tricks on me or not. This blade feels much lighter and nimble in the hand, the other feels more powerful.

Yes, but its very difficult to see, let alone photograph. There is a hazy spot on the mune that looks to be part of it that goes past the yokote. http://www.ncjsc.org/gloss_boshi-1.html Kaeri Fukai is close, but the turn back is a little lower in the kissaki and there is a little more angle to the kaeri going back to the spine area. Other side, the turn back is near that dark spot and turns to the silver mune yaki:

Got my 2nd wak yesterday. 19.75" from tip to mune machi. More sori than the first one. This one is signed, but looks to be gimei. The blade is more slender than my first one and has a totally different feel to it. This one is in a shirasaya and the shirasaya and habaki seem to fit much better and go with this blade. Looks to be copper with Gold Foil over it. Hamon is interesting, some crab claws and other activity: Boshi has a nice turn back and extends past the yokote: The finish on this one makes it much harder to get good pic of the hamon and stuff, so I will keep trying. It has a small ware on the shinogi, but the rest of the blade is pretty nice. Very happy with this new study blade!

Looking at Shinto swordsmiths, I found a few that did a "double kesho": http://www.sho-shin.com/osaka-tsuda.html Sukehiro and Sukenao are the two swordsmiths listed that did the double kesho, so I am going to start with those and look for other related smiths to see if I can match anything else up. I need to go over my numbers again for length and dimensions. Some were taken from the Ebay listing, but I think the blade length is longer than the 19.96" listed; I thought it was around 22" from tip to munemachi when I had measuring tape out at one point? Yup, 22.25", 56.8cm tip to mune machi. The 2nd wakizashi came in yesterday. I will start a new thread for that one when I get home from work and take some pics. First impressions; totally different feel than this blade! Dimensions are close, but they each have their own personality. The 1st one is beefy and hefty feeling, this one feels much more nimble in the hand. The Shirasaya is so MUCH more robust than I had imagined it; the saya for this one feels thin and frail and the shirasaya feels very robust in comparison. I can see the hada better on the new one, but the hada above the shinogi is very difficult to see and its nearly mirror finish. The activity is a bit different in this sword as you see different activity when you shift the blade around and the overall polish is different, too. Very happy with my first 2 purchases so far!

Working on a Kantei sheet. So far I have: Wakizashi, Mumei Sugata Shingi-zukuri 76.5cm total length 50.7cm Nagasa length Moto Kasane: 6.9 cm Motohaba 3.1 cm Sakihaba: 2.23 cm Menuki ana: 1 Sori: .8 cm type torii-zori Chu kissaki? (around 3.18 cm long?) Iori Mune Boshi: Yakizume Hamon: Choji? Lots of ashi, ko ashi, some sunagashi, nijuba? (pools of nie above/below the nioiguchi line?). Tobiyaki and yo inside of and above hamon, togari. Utsuri and possible mune yaki as well. Hada: Masame on shinogi ji, possibly masame (may be sunagashi, hard to tell) at edge, ko itame in the middle? Nakago: Iriyama gata, but the top end is straight, but bottom piece is curved. Almost Ha Agari Kurijiri? Yasurime is Kesho, but strangely done.

http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/9648-yasurime-puzzle/ When searching "strange yasurime", this topic popped up. Check out the hamon pic in post #6. Mine is a bit taller, but looks very similar to this pattern.

That's what it looks like! The next question is why weld an old, unsigned tang to a blade like this? Did some more checking. Habaki fit is much tighter near where it looks like the orig mune machi may have been. Also, where the yasurime is worn and the black line shows, its right under the very loose tsuba. The tsuka core is a very tight fit to the nakago.

Still raining, so I got a couple of inside pics: Guessing that straight black line would be the weld line if there was one? The munemachi isn't cut straight, either; it is at a slight angle (not perpendicular to the blade) and it's not as deep on one side, either.

I will try to get some better pics when I get home from work. The Tsuba I got from the Classifieds here should be here today, so I will get some pics with that tsuba and better pics of the tang areas. With the dimensions of this blade, it is over 3cm at the top of the Habaki, not the munemachi even, so it's a wide blade, tapers to 22mm, so it is close to 30% taper from munemachi to kissaki as I have heard was the norm tapering from some videos and I think one of the books I read? I don't think it was a longer blade sword that was shortened because if it was, it would have been a very wide blade! Rewelding was often done to put a real signature tang piece on a cheaper sword from what I have read, but there is no signature on this one? I will measure when I get home, but it looks like the current munemachi is a hair narrower than from what I think is the original munemachi, where it seems to be the thickest. On the left side of the blade, there is an ugly section, maybe a forging flaw or something and I wonder if that was seen after a few (or original) polishings and the blade shortened by moving the munemachi forward so the habaki would cover the ugly spot? I'm not seeing any mekugi ana holes welded up, either. There is a different color to the rust/patina right at the edge of the weird file marks where it's more black than red rust and there are some deeper grooves along the edges of the file work, so I am not sure if thats the mark of rewelding or not? It may have been where the polisher went past that area or something? Maybe it had a longer tang that was completely reworked or another tang welded on to this one? It doesn't show any re tempering signs and the hamon trails off the blade past the current munemachi area. This sword has been a mystery, which was a bit of it's draw! I am debating sending it to a Shinsa to find out the maker/time period, but if it's a re welded tang, I don't think they would be able to determine that, so I don't want to waste the money on it if that's the case! Still really enjoy the blade, lots of activity to look at and study in the blade, which was the point of this one in the first place!

I found a pic of the area, but it's not the best. I put the arrow in where I think the original mune machi was; the area to the left of the arrow is where the newer filing marks are. The tang sides have the same slanting file marks until that area and it's where the weird kesho yasurime starts.

Yeah, but Kesho is usually 1 piece of the contrasting file mark, not like 2 or 3 full sets. The tang looks to be modified; I will try to get pics whenever the sun comes out here next. Looks like there is 1" or so of the tang that was filed more recently like the tang was lengthened by 1" at some point.

Yeah, those look deeper and crisper!

Purchased a Wakizashi online today because I liked the hamon on it (I Know, I'm a Hamon Junky!) Yes, I got it knowing it may be gimei because I liked the hamon pics! It is listed as Bicchu no kami Tachibana Yasuhiro, but I have some doubts from when I was comparing the mei from other swords to this one. Placement looks OK, but it's that third character down from the top. On the 3rd character from the top, the leg on the left goes out instead of going in towards the vertical stroke in the middle. Anything else to show its a gimei signature? Closer shot: Other side of the tang, no chrysanthemum: Overall shot: And the crazy Hamon that gets me every time!