Cold Steel katana “user”

[David T. MacNeill]

Any Cold Steel katana owners out there care to share their thoughts about them as practical “users” as opposed to safe queens or wall hangers?

 

[Timo Nieminen]

Not too pretty to use (the polish is rather crude, nothing to worry about ruining by cutting something), and relatively cheap, so not even close to being a safe queen.

Functional and easily tough enough to handle use, so not a wallhanger.

As for handling, I can't say anything about their katana, but their "nodachi" (it's more of a baby nagamaki than a nodachi) is fine for what it is.

 

[David T. MacNeill]

That’s pretty much what I expected to hear. People seem quite polarized in their opinions about Cold Steel. One thing you can’t deny: they have their marketing shit together.

 

[Timo Nieminen]

Part of the polarisation is their marketing - attracts some people, and repels others. Part of it is the huge diversity of stuff they sell. Some is good, some is great, some is great value, and some is poor value. Some of their swords are historically very inaccurate, some are pretty good. Some of their swords are clunky overweight lumps, some are underweight, some are the best-handling replicas of their type (though sometimes still not so good - just better than the competition). So different people can have very different Cold Steel experiences, depending on what they buy.

Some of their swords suffered from defects (like fragile threaded rods holding pommels on) in their early versions, and that reputation lingers. Supposedly their early model katanas were hideously ill-balanced and overweight. While they're mainstream enough these days, their early reputation still lingers.

Their katanas are made by Huanuo who do respectably good stuff (they also make most or all of Cold Steel's Chinese swords, and probably some of their European ones). The Warrior series sword are bottom-end Huanuo, but that's still fairly good. Huanuo also make the swords Dynasty Forge sells; DF have a bigger range of Huanuo stuff, quality-wise, from pretty much the same kind of thing as the CS ones, through to fancy (and expensive) versions.

 

[horseclover]

The Warrior series sword are bottom-end Huanuo, but that's still fairly good. Huanuo also make the swords Dynasty Forge sells; DF have a bigger range of Huanuo stuff, quality-wise, from pretty much the same kind of thing as the CS ones, through to fancy (and expensive) versions.

Seems to me that the Cold Steel line began with Rick Barrett's collaboration with Fred Chen. Dynasty Forge, to my knowledge, is the second generation of smiths that were doing work for Fred Chen. The Huanuo forge was comprised of yet another splinter group once working for Fred Chen and presently independent of Fred Chen aka Dynasty Forge.

Cheers

GC

 

[Murman]

Great backyard choppers. A little heavy for elegant manuvers or fighting. Depends on how you are usering it.

 

[David T. MacNeill]

I bought a gently used Hanwei Maru Renshu to practice tameshigiri. Just finished building my stand and I have a crate of cheap pool noodles to show who’s boss. 8~)

 

[Lapedog]

I bought a gently used Hanwei Maru Renshu to practice tameshigiri. Just finished building my stand and I have a crate of cheap pool noodles to show who’s boss. 8~)

The cold steel swords are very awkward in that they do not feel like a katana should in the hand. In my limited experience hanwei makes good stuff.

 

[Murman]

Should be great for that! I had a warrior series for a few years and loved it. I gave it to my tae Kwon do instructor

 

[The Zieg]

CS swords are blade heavy, awkwardly balanced, and ground like knives. I find them not pleasant to use at all.

Zieg