traditional tools for blade making

[ausjulius]

Originally Posted by Iain

Just to point out that grind wheels were also standard in medieval Europe as the attached 14th century illustrations from the Romance of Alexander and English Luttrell Psalter attest to.

Differing tools existed for final polishing and beveling edges which seem more similar to the tool you are referring to.

a grind wheel is not used for a plane and plane is not used for a grind wheel.

ok i shall explain how these are used .. its two different process for the making of the sword...

people forgot the use of the plane first as the mills that were mechanical and also very accurate rolled forging for sword blades replaced this.

now our belt sanders and cnc mills fill the place making both the planer or shaper and the water wheel redundant so people forget how they were used

firstly you shall not use a plane on a hardened blade
medival images of planes being used on hardened blades are misinterpretations.
it is a polisher on a planer handle being used and hard to interpretate in a crude artwork.. but when ever you see a handle on the sword its a hard blade and is having the fullers polished
or just a lazy artist.

the water wheel is used on the blade when it is both hard or soft depending on the wheel

how swords were made then and even now in some more isolated parts of the world is first rough form is made

the it is either filed... or previously worked on a very very coarse stone .. or in europe a water wheel
this removed the forging scale and highlights the bevel for the edge
this bevel is rough and not defined.. as you can not put a straight grind on a round stone it will always have dips and hollows.
then the soft white blade is put into a special harness like a shave horse.
a very hard steel plane is applied to the surfaces to make the bevels all flat and perfect and make all flat surfaces true and remove grinding marks.

then..
the blade is painted and the fuller or grooves are scribed with a sharp pointy scribe plane with a gauge .. and using a gauge with a little hard plane blade make to the shape of the fuller the fuller is cut.
some fullers can be preforged depending the shape and size.
a rough polish is applied to all surfaces to make sure all gouges and such are gone before it is hard.

now the blade is annealed equalized ect then quenched

cleaned breifly on a fine water wheel to remove the scale on the bevels then tempered.. ..
then back to the stone of a finer grade to clean everything up (stones dont make things flat the plane must)
the flat surfaces are rubbed with a stone of different grades by hand to
remove the grinding, including the cleaning of the fullers to a fine satin finish and to draw the edge together

and then a plane is used with a nonmetallic tip wood or leather powder from the stone to polish the fuller more and the finally it is ready to be used


and thats how you do a sword. unless you are form a culture that has neither metal planes nor files and water wheels in which case its .. well lots of rubbing on a stone .. naga is one that comes to mind, ifugao.. dayaks as well .

the medival pictures of grind of the already handled swords are either poor depictions or the blade is being reshaped due to some damage .. broken tip or such and the handle is to nice to remove.

im sure people didnt take such care for the knife they used in the market to cut meat.. just grinding wheel and wet stone
but words were weapons and symbols of status not agricultural tools

the process i have described has been used right up until the 21 century in some parts of the world to make sword blades

[Iain]

Originally Posted by ausjulius

a grind wheel is not used for a plane and plane is not used for a grind wheel.

ok i shall explain how these are used .. its two different process for the making of the sword...

Thanks, I'm well aware of the process.

The images depicting swords with hilts can of course be simply interpretation and don't necessarily reflect in anyway tempered blades being ground (i.e. grinding the profile, not sharpening). As noted in my post the second series of tools in the images I posted are not analogous to stone grinding wheels, but used defining the profile and polishing, again artistic license can be shown with respect to hilts and as you noted makes it hard to ascertain the exact part of the process depicted.

Perhaps you misunderstood my post which was simply to add some interesting and relevant illustration, I understand the distinction in the tools you are making.

In any case, don't let me distract from the thread by going further into medieval forging and grinding techniques. But since you obviously have an interest in blade production you might enjoy some other threads on the European section, I think I started one a while ago regarding trip hammers and other water powered medieval forges.

[ausjulius]

Originally Posted by Iain

Thanks, I'm well aware of the process.
The images depicting swords with hilts can of course be simply interpretation and don't necessarily reflect in anyway tempered blades being ground (i.e. grinding the profile, not sharpening). As noted in my post the second series of tools in the images I posted are not analogous to stone grinding wheels, but used defining the profile and polishing, again artistic license can be shown with respect to hilts and as you noted makes it hard to ascertain the exact part of the process depicted.

Perhaps you misunderstood my post which was simply to add some interesting and relevant illustration, I understand the distinction in the tools you are making.

In any case, don't let me distract from the thread by going further into medieval forging and grinding techniques. But since you obviously have an interest in blade production you might enjoy some other threads on the European section, I think I started one a while ago regarding trip hammers and other water powered medieval forges.

no problem. i just wanted to make clear the images are confusing as they dont really show what is actually being used, they are infact sharpening and polishing the blades with mounted stones and leather and wooden bits in what would normally be a metal plane handle. .

the cutting tools for planing are only ever used with a steel edge on soft blades.. they were always used with a grinding wheel but not a wheel alone by its self .
in the modern era wevhave belt sanders, mills ect and such machines to make a flat surface but in the past the only way to make it truly flat is with a plane.

the images are probably more likely .. lazy artist skipping on detail or people of the time just knew what the process as and understood the image.

there is a good german 16th century set of images on the internet floating round showing the polishing planes being used and there it can be more clearly seen that are not metal planes but tools of wood or leather bit in them.

the water wheel can not make smooth flat surfaces not matter how hard you try


the reason for posting an image of this tool is that i have never seen one discussed on the internet.... and outside of medieval images from europe i have never seen them depicted... and yet in tibet or isolated parts of the sudan i could just buy one for 10 or 15 $,

i own several of these.

i wounder when was the last time these were used in europe.. and where are the images of their use??
i just find it odd such a useful and cheap tool vanished so long ago..