Sean H

1. Alex Middleton 2. Cory LA 3. Conner Michaux 4. billyO 5. Ted Stocksdale 6. Geoff Keyes 7. Brian Dougherty 8. Pieter-Paul Derks 9. Robert Dowse 10. Gary LT 11. Bruno 12.Jaron Martindale 13. Doug Webster 14: Sean Hollowood.

Actually Chris gave me the most advice about the attempt at Urnes style art. The leuku was mostly do to Brandon

It has been quite some time since i posted, but my friends and colleagues have been pushing me to put out better work.So here we go, The first a pair of utility knives in 1075, started out with 3/16" stock, put a simple curves on them and a nice bevel with the file. The first of the 2 is actually a gift for a close friend and business partner, with cocobolo scales, and a leather sheath. Tstar leather has been indispensable in making the sheathe a success always there to answer questions and offer advice. It is 4-6oz vege tan lan leather, a medium brown dye, and antique finish. Josh Fikentsher heat treated these for me with his new kiln heat treat rig and they turned out great . The second is the same knife with the bevel on the opposite side for me, i have been learning to join and something to cut lines will help out immensely. The wood is lacewood, found something interesting out when sanding this, the red brillow pads will strip the softer inner pith of lacewood leaving a really nice dimple texture on the lacewood. The final and knife i have worked the hardest on is a big leuku i made for myself as a camp and work knife, they are apparently based on older Sami from Scandinavia, short thick bevels, little to no distal taper, and a swell towards the tip creates a heavy chopping blade. 1075 blade with a redheart wood handle and copper fittings, same 4-6 oz leather and same dyes. I spent days on the dragon drawing trying to get the curves and proportions right, in the end still not too happy with it. the carving and drawing skilsets still have a long ways to go... I wanna take a moment to thank my local circle of smiths and friends, your input advice and help has been instrumental. Chris Price, Josh Fickentsher, Brandon Sines, and Brett Smith at Tstar you all are amazing.

@Wes Detrick Thank you!!!

Monticello has a particularly fearsome looking one on the walls if you havent seen it before.

Keep us posted! Haven't processed any bog iron personally so follow anyone else's advice.

I really like your fuller scraping jig, would you mind sharing details?

Ive wanted to see someone try pattern welded Armour for a while. Good job, have you made the arming points for the spaulders as well?

First off mind listing your resources for these design concepts? Second if you wanna do historical worm set a limit for yourself about what constitutes historical. for some that means appropriate materials, design and techniques, others it's just design, and other just simply site influences. Now others on this site will hopefully correct me, but so far as I know bazelards were double edged and featured a promenent swelling both forward and behind the hand. Forming an I shape this doesn't seem to feature that at all. In fact this comes closer to a balloon dagger or rondelle in my mind. I'd suggest checking the Wallace collection, and some the German museums for examples to work off of.

Well my next projects are messers, one kreigsmesser, and one close to the marxbruders messers you see running around.

Kevin given how much i pestered about this i don't mind at all, actually the recurve is an artefact of the quench, Sam quenched this in parks 50 for me spine first, and the recurve just formed. Initially i had a little bit of sori, so I am guessing a vertical quench might have been better. I didn't base it on any particular artefact but other images on this forum hint at a slight recurve, not sure if that is a result of constant sharpening or forming that way. As for the slab handles, i don't care for the full wrap around style associated with this, so i wanted to settle on something in between. I took the blade up to 500 or so several times. and hey being asked questions helps me learn as much as asking questions

It is just under 2lbs, but due to the lack of taper its one hell of a chopper, but from what i researched some of these had taper others did not. Thanks JJ

This has been more than a little while in the making, i think about 2 years now? I got the bug when Raymond Luebke posted his heptseax here three years ago, from there it was a hop skip and a jump in research and i found the vimose bog seaxes and fell in love with them. I did some research, asked a lot of questions and settled on a blade with little to no distal taper, about 1.5" wide, by a little under 24" long, 1075 steel for the material, with a 100+ year old cut walnut for the slabs. Its been a long road, with a lot of learning, but i would not trade it for anything. Thanks to Chris Price for putting up with me, Sam Salvati for helping me heat treat it, and the rest of you who have been pestered with incessant questions.

Can't wait to be there guys, anybody gonna have some antique swords and such up for handling/show/discussion?

Can't wait guys!