Why won't sword makers warrant their swords against breakage?

ERdept

ERdept

Banned
Joined
May 17, 2005
Messages
757
The reason I wonder this is because I noticed on the Busse forum, the AK 47 short sword is torture tested, bent, thrown against things and into trees and used to chop limbs. Then they have a lifetime warranty on the blade and if you don't modify their original blade and break it, they'll basically replace it.

Aren't sword makers confident enough in their products to do such things to their own swords or at least replace them if they break?

not in english, but you get the idea..........http://www.busse-messer.de/infi.html

cliff
 
ERdept said:
The reason I wonder this is because I noticed on the Busse forum, the AK 47 short sword is torture tested, bent, thrown against things and into trees and used to chop limbs. Then they have a lifetime warranty on the blade and if you don't modify their original blade and break it, they'll basically replace it.

Aren't sword makers confident enough in their products to do such things to their own swords or at least replace them if they break?

not in english, but you get the idea..........http://www.busse-messer.de/infi.html

cliff
Click to expand...

Which sword makers are you referring to? Most high end production companies warrant their swords against defects in materials or workmanship. Some even against abuse.
 
I'm referring to most every sword company out there. I understand the warranty against defects. My car tires are warranted against the. What I'm talking about us use, such as against limbs, throwing the sword, basically abuse. Yet no warranty. Yet Busse backs their short sword, the AK47 against breakage of any kind unless the blade is altered.
 
ERdept said:
I'm referring to most every sword company out there. I understand the warranty against defects. My car tires are warranted against the. What I'm talking about us use, such as against limbs, throwing the sword, basically abuse. Yet no warranty. Yet Busse backs their short sword, the AK47 against breakage of any kind unless the blade is altered.
Click to expand...

Ahhh I see. Well I suppose it's a business decision. There is very little understanding in the modern world in many circles as to what a sword should and should not be used for. There are a lot of folks out there that are under the impression that swords can be used to chop down trees, slice boulders, cut engine blocks in half and so forth. Of course a sword is not designed for any of that, things like chainsaws, chisels and cutting torches are. So if you are a manufacturer what do you warrant your product for? Do you warrant it for anything and take a loss when your engine block chopping customer wants his sword replaced? If you do so how much do you have to charge for the sword? Or do you warrant the sword to not break when used like a sword is supposed to be used and then how much do you charge? For the most part high end production sword companies have elected to warrant their swords for reasonable use and charge accordingly. I believe that there are a few outfits (Angelsword comes to mind) that will warrant their products no matter what... and they charge accordingly.

Busse has made a business decision other outfits have made other business decisions. I think it has very little to do with "confidence in their products."
 
How about the fact that not all swords were designed to withstand the abuse that you seem to think they should. Since all you say is "sword" I guess that means you want a thin rapier to be able to cut through logs and be thrown.:jerkit:
 
No, I don't want a thin rapier to cut through logs. No need for that jerk it symbol hostility. It's just a question. Relax and take some calming breaths my fellow bladesman.

It's just a question about why manufacturers don't warrant their "products" for damage. I hope this is a more acceptable term for you than your issues with me using the term sword.

I deeply apologize if I have raised your anger.

Peace be with you brother. It's just a question. I'll just opt out of this thread since it bothers you so much. Have a great day!:)

cliff
 
I think it's really just common sense. For all its coolness, the AK-47 doesn't seem to me to be designed around historical sword specs - it's a large, thick, 47 cm long knife. It isn't as... specialized, I guess. Swords that I have seen run the gamut from wide, long and floppy to short, narrow and stiff. In the context of such specialized forms, it just doesn't make sense for a manufacturer to cover any and all damages when the sword, by design, is so prone to damage when used outside of its scope.

To expand a bit - swords that are meant to be nothing but swords have characteristics which make them poor performers outside their duties of cutting, chopping, cleaving or stabbing people. If you were to thrust the best made, thrust-optimized medieval type sword you could find into a stop sign, you would probably break the tip. Not because of any defects, but simply because the sword wasn't made to do that. An all-around warranty on a blade is great when it's offered, but it just doesn't make sense to do that when that blade is designed around highly specific tasks. The AK-47 looks like it would perform wonderfully at just about any task requiring a blade that long. Swords, however, do poorly when used for anything other than killing or maiming people.

To sum it up, if a manufacturer of fine tableware offered a Busse-style warranty, that'd be really cool. But I wouldn't hold anything against them if they decided that using a silver coffee-stirring spoon to mix concrete fell outside whatever guarantees they offered. There are swords that can handle a lot of abuse, but in my opinion, it's really asking too much to expect a warranty that ignores limitations in the design of a product.

Too long a post?
 
The subject of sword design (particularly European medieval) is of special interest to me.
As others have said, historical swords are designed for very specialized tasks. The traditional forms of European sword have litterally evolved over millennia. Looking at an fine authentic broadsword ... say a type XI by Oakeshott's nomenclature, you will notice that the weapon is extremely lightweight (usually not much more than 2 pounds for a 31 inch long, 2-inch wide-at-the-hilt form. Blade thickness at in the fuller and out toward the tip is often around 3mm. The blades are most often very thin, very fast, with very steep, keen edges (especially for the last third of the blade length). Oakeshott describes edges on finer boadswords as being like those of a carving knife.
These were not sharpened crowbars as we see in the movies. They were specialized to inflict damage FIRST.
The modern or non-classical "swordmaker" is not constrained by design necessities of medieval combat, so it shouldn't be a surprise, if the only consideration is to make an extremely tough sword-like chopper, it can be done with relative ease. Things like "handling," harmonic ballance, COG, COP, etc. are not relevant to such products. Plus, the shorter and thicker a sword, the stronger it becomes exponentially. It's also slower and has less reach, which is a huge consideration if you're swinging the thing for your life all day against similarly armed folks.
Why companies that make neo-tactical swords (actual competitors with the AK-47) don't offer this or that warrantee, I don't know. Why folks like Angus Trim or Albion wouldn't warrantee against gross abuse, to me, is understandable considering the colossal ignorace of swords and their handling in general.
Right now, the steels used by the better production swords (and there really aren't that many) are 1075 and 5160. Hardness is often in the mid 50s RC. The richer alloys have generally proven undesirable for swords.
It would be interesting to get some of this INFI material to somone like Angus to build an authentic broadsword form for abuse-testing.
 
ERdept said:
The reason I wonder this is because I noticed on the Busse forum, the AK 47 short sword is torture tested, bent, thrown against things and into trees and used to chop limbs. Then they have a lifetime warranty on the blade and if you don't modify their original blade and break it, they'll basically replace it.

Aren't sword makers confident enough in their products to do such things to their own swords or at least replace them if they break?

not in english, but you get the idea..........http://www.busse-messer.de/infi.html

cliff
Click to expand...

Swords are not supposed to be thrown, they are not designed to chop through hard objects; and, manufactureres should not try to warrant these things as long as there are people who think swords should be "thrown against things and into trees and used to chop limbs". Swords were very high technology products of their day; designed to be used by highly trained swordsmen. They were made for speed, accuracy, energy conservation, and cutting efficiency. Throwing them against trees makes about as much sense as throwing your computer against a tree. Would you want Dell to warrant your computer if you use it to pound boulders into rubble?:eek:

n2s
 
The reason most sword makers do not offer unlimited warranty on their products is simple. They know the products would break. Traditional handle fittings will not do well getting bashed on stuff, and even though many high quality blades could withstand flexing and chopping hard wood- few companies seem to want to take a chance of losing the money. Angel Sword seems to be a company that you could at least chop on wood with their blades and be covered by the warranty. This is a somewhat ambiguous warranty, so they could cut you off if they wanted to, but some of their swords are made from S7 and I have no doubt they are tough (they do cost over twice as much as a AK47, however)

As far as tactical or non-traditional sword makers not offering a good warranty, I don't know- haven't really seen very many tactical swords around- only one that comes to mind is the Mad Dog, which would not be covered by any sort of decent warranty. Anyone have links to similar tactical type swords?



As to the part about thrusting into a stop sign breaking the tip of a medieval thrusting sword, a Stop sign is made of aluminum, and they made swords for piercing armor, which I have to assume is harder than aluminum. Might break the tip of a rapier, however.
 
Rat Finkenstein said:
As to the part about thrusting into a stop sign breaking the tip of a medieval thrusting sword, a Stop sign is made of aluminum, and they made swords for piercing armor, which I have to assume is harder than aluminum. Might break the tip of a rapier, however.
Click to expand...

This depends upon the form. As you may recall, the earlier forms (LaTene I through Type X, which includes many, many swords through about 11th C.) were not thrusting weapons at all. Not particularly stiff with a very thin spatula-shaped point. These would likely be damaged with a strong trust against something like a stop sign.
As Rat says, however, there are medieval forms (particularly those later swords) that were not so broad, stiffer, and with a stonger point for thrusting.

Still, I think it wasn't until the 20th C that rural Americans perfected the piercing of stop signs without damage to their weapons.
 
Rat Finkenstein said:
....As to the part about thrusting into a stop sign breaking the tip of a medieval thrusting sword, a Stop sign is made of aluminum, and they made swords for piercing armor, which I have to assume is harder than aluminum. ....
Click to expand...

Most swords were made for piercing unarmored, or lightly armored, peasants. there were better weapons for use against plate and mail. At range it would have been the lance or spear, then the various pole arms, maces, and hammers. The concept that swords were used in clad heavily armored combat is largely fiction.

n2s
 
Guess rural Americans, in the spirit of heartiness and toughness that made America what it is as we grew as a nation, just want something that works.

Seems a specialized weapon like a rapier or broadsword is just meant to be used for speacialized purposes by experts in those fields agains soft targets, like the human flesh, as stated by the epert above.

So, If in battling another person and you mis-strike them and hit a castle wall, a tree limb or a stone, I suppose your sword wasn't mean to take that kind of abuse and just break. Since they are for just cutting soft human flesh.

So, if I had a choice between something that was specialized to cut human flesh and not hit anything else or a sword that was meant to cut everything hard that the other swords weren't meant to cut, and I could also use it on the soft human flesh....

I would prefer the tougher of the two. I really wish they would make a rapier or broadsword in infi steel and have a go at it.


This was an interesting discussion indeed. I enjoyed the opinions very much, including the attack on me. Take care fellers and have other great discussions.

cliff:D
 
not2sharp said:
Most swords were made for piercing unarmored, or lightly armored, peasants. there were better weapons for use against plate and mail. At range it would have been the lance or spear, then the various pole arms, maces, and hammers. The concept that swords were used in clad heavily armored combat is largely fiction.

n2s
Click to expand...

I was talking about the swords used to dispatch armored knights, when they were laying on the ground I believe. They were shorter, and designed to pierce armor plate. Not by any means a sword expert, but I like to read about history. Perhaps you know the name of the sword? IIRC, it had a tapered blade with fullers and a strong point.
 
Rat Finkenstein said:
I was talking about the swords used to dispatch armored knights, when they were laying on the ground I believe. They were shorter, and designed to pierce armor plate. Not by any means a sword expert, but I like to read about history. Perhaps you know the name of the sword? IIRC, it had a tapered blade with fullers and a strong point.
Click to expand...

There were swords designed to be more effective against armor including the Oakeshott type XVs, XVIs and XVIIs also there was something called an estoc which is basically a sharpened crowbar. Having said that there were few swords that were very good against plate hence as has been noted the increasing reliance on various hammers, and polearms after the development of full plate... Now someone quote me so Mr. Finkenstein will see it since I believe I'm on his ignore list... :)
 
ERdept said:
So, If in battling another person and you mis-strike them and hit a castle wall, a tree limb or a stone, I suppose your sword wasn't mean to take that kind of abuse and just break. Since they are for just cutting soft human flesh.
cliff:D
Click to expand...

If you miss that big, you're probably dead. If you swing like a baseball bat, you're dead. Thus the development of weapons that handle a certain way. Remember, the other guy might well have a pointy thing to stick you with before you finish you're missed swing (bigger, Hollywood axe-swinging moves are slow and easy to 'read'. Real fencing/combat doesn't look much like Hollywood. It's a lot quicker and more efficient.
 
Triton said:
There were swords designed to be more effective against armor including the Oakeshott type XVs, XVIs and XVIIs also there was something called an estoc which is basically a sharpened crowbar. Having said that there were few swords that were very good against plate hence as has been noted the increasing reliance on various hammers, and polearms after the development of full plate... Now someone quote me so Mr. Finkenstein will see it since I believe I'm on his ignore list... :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info ;) If I can track down the pic or illustration of the sword I saw, I will post it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top