Walter Wong said:
Crane, your remounting work looks pretty decent. From the pics they look good. I maybe interested in having my Chinese blades remounted. But just haven't had the time to invest on my Chinese blades yet. Been mostly focusing on Japanese swords and currently working towards having one remounted with a longer handle.
Will you be offering your remounting services for Chinese blades publicly in the future?
I am certainly open to discussing it. I don't have my own workshop at this time so I am limited in my volume of production. Basically I enroll in the class each semester at the Community College and get as much work done as I can during that time period. The teachers are cool about it, and let me do what I want. I definitely need to do a lot of preparation work in between semesters, like the woodworking and the wax models that become the molds for the casting. There are a lot of steps along the way. If I focus entirely on swords, I can probably get about 5 or 6 done in one semester. Scabbards are another matter. I am still experimenting with my techniques for these.
The guards and pommels are cast in one solid piece. Nothing hollow about them. The grip is carved in one piece by hand, with a hole drilled and filed to fit the tang. I secure the blade in the hilt with a series of hex nuts, two stacked at the back of the grip, and hidden under the pommel. Then another hex nut is behind the pommel itself, but the main strength is directly behind the grip. In addition, I epoxy the entire length of the tang under the guard, grip, and pommel for extra security. Basically, you cannot take it apart without destroying it, once it is done.
Since these are solid castings, they definitely increase the weight of the final sword, but the balance is usually much better. Many of the imports have a hollow pommel and guard, or else they are actually made of wood, with a thin sheet of brass covering it. Very cheesy, no strength, and no weight to balance the blade.
I know some of the photos aren't as clean as I would like. I need to start messing around with Photoshop to see if I can do something about that.
If you have something you might want me to work on, send me a PM and we can discuss it.