Tsukamaki project - hilt rebuild on my rapier katana

[Saionji Shonagon]

Description and photos can be found at my Dreamwidth journal.
gurdymonkey.dreamwidth.org/833876.html

[Deleted]

Nov 27, 2017 12:55:40 GMT -5 Saionji Shonagon said:

Description and photos can be found at my Dreamwidth journal.
gurdymonkey.dreamwidth.org/833876.html

Next step, braiding your own ito. I have a really good pattern for a flat twill braid with 17 elements that can be done on a marudai. About how much ito did you wind up using?

[Saionji Shonagon]

Making string into bigger string is not something I've ever had much patience with. I ordered ten feet of ito for this project and because I used a style that didn't get folded over, I have about three feet left - unfortunately it's in two pieces, or I might be able to do my wakizashi with it. Or not.

[thomas]

Why didnt U use the fuchi? All japanese swords has a fuchi and a kashira.
Your ito-maki will unwrap over time when used. It has a lot of issues.
Its possible to do itomaki with out a stand, I did that for many years.
Did You use glue on the sides of the tsuka to hold ito?

Nice green color

[Saionji Shonagon]

It's a rapier, not a true katana. Sam Kovic of Castille Armory (blade, tsuba) and James the Just, who built the original tsuka, did not incorporate fuchi and kashira into their build. I do not have the metalworking skills to try to either modify or make them. I also need to be able to easily access the hex nut which holds the tang for maintenance purposes (rust never sleeps, you know), so the end knot is deliberately fudged somewhat.

I did not use glue because if I ever *do* have to adjust the wrap I can. I also need to be able to get to the hex nut embedded in the I used a small piece of double sided craft tape to anchor the ito at the center of the omote side. I also used small pieces of the same craft tape on the back of the menuki, again to help keep it in place until I got the ito around it.

EDIT: castillearmory.com/complete-katana/ will show you more on what this is.

[Saionji Shonagon]

I'm back - and now I have a wakizashi to go with the katana, courtesy of the nice folks at Castille Armory. For grins I asked them to send it to me with an unfinished tsuka so I could try to match the wrap on my katana. I even put it in my kingdom's virtual A&S display in June of this year. Details are at the link below. 

sites.google.com/westkingdom.org/wreath-of-athena-june-2021/wreath-of-athena-displays/saionji-no-hana?authuser=0

[Please Delete]

I have one katana and two wakizashi blades waiting for something like this. I need to but the bullet and get all the supplies. I'm also looking to see if I can't add a habaki, as that is missing from the blades, currently, and I've never quite liked not having one there.

[Takeda Akimasa]

I really need to do a Japanese fencing kit... Sadly the wait list for blades is now really long.