Hada question?

[Edward Mahle]

Do different Hada’s have anything to offer against one another? Other than appearance. Did some smiths think one style of Hada had greater strength, flexibility things like that? 
 

 

Edward T 

[DirkO]

https://www.nihontoc...hinshi_Masahide.html

 

Suishinsi Masahide actually did some testing on this, albeit more towards hamon.

[ROKUJURO]

Edward,

as far as I know, all forms of HADA have been proven useful in combat, so there is no difference or preference per se. But the quality of the forging can make a big difference as less careful and hasty work as we see on many SENGOKU era swords can lead to failure. 
 

[Edward Mahle]

Thanks guys for the input, something I’ve been researching for a few weeks now. Haven’t really found any info on the subject. I like the article about the hamon, that was interesting. 

For whatever reason I would’ve thought different folding techniques would bring different characteristics to the sword. 

 

[Mikaveli]

Well, maybe a pertinent question:

 

Are there any examples of masame (straight) hada that runs perpendicular to the nagasa of the blade?

[ROKUJURO]

Michael,

you can see that in Western style Damascus blades, but twisting and vertical folding have no tradition in Japanese forging. 

[GeorgeLuucas]

I would think if one jihada were superior to others, then it would have been slowly adopted by most smiths. I personally view it as an artistic or traditional feature before a practical one

I really like mokume hada 

Best of luck,
-Sam

 

[Toryu2020]

Pure masame with a suguha hamon is prone to vertical breakage - so we are told that adding a bit of gunome/ashi reduced the propagation of longer "chips". Add to that a mokume or itame matrix and the cutting edge is much stronger, chipping is less likely. Pure masame also is prone to kitae-ware so difficult to do well...

 

-t

[Mikaveli]

4 hours ago, ROKUJURO said:

Michael,

you can see that in Western style Damascus blades, but twisting and vertical folding have no tradition in Japanese forging. 

Indeed, that was kinda the point.

 

What I take from that, is that the hada absolutely has a functional effect on the strength and pliability of the blade.

 

If it was merely artistic preference, we'd potentially see more variations.

[Jacques D.]

You can have masame, or itame and mokume with one and the same starter kit. You have itame on the top and bottom face and masame on the sides. For mokume, the itame is hammered to round it off.

[Rivkin]

Generally any hada related kizu is not lethal. There are plenty of blades with fukure or large ware which saw combat over and over and survived.

Lethal damage is either bending, which is not common in Japanese tradition or chipping. Since objectively Nihonto is by far the hardest heat treated mass produced sword in the world and therefore its chipping issues are incomparably worse compared to any other. Irrespective of hada.

There are traditions which forge in more or less pure masame, you find such things in Tibet and quite a few other places. Mokume is however very seldom observed outside Japan as well as all its relatives such as matsukawa.