Once we had our blades heat treated and machine ground to 400 grit, we moved to hilt making. The guards were forged from a 3/4" square bar of mild steel. The pommels were made from slices off of a 2" round bar. The handles were made from walnut scales, slotted and fit to the tangs. Handle shapes and dimensions are planned on paper using the whole number ratio design method by Swedish swordsmith and historian, Peter Johnsson.

My handle design.

The guards were forged from 3/4" square bar and will be hot fit to the tang. This is accomplished by making a hot punch to match the tang and shoulders of the blade. After hot slitting the bar, the guard is forged to shape and the hot punch is pushed through the slot to shape the guard to fit the tang. Then it is hot-fit to the tang to get the final seating. Here is my hot punch made from a piece of old leaf spring.

After shaping the guard and mechanically sanding to 400 grit, a small piece of threaded rod is brazed onto the end of the tang.

The handle wood is slotted and fit tight to the tang behind the guard and glued together.

The pommel is bored and slotted to fit the tang, counter bored to accept a threaded pommel nut, and shaped on the grinder to 400 grit. Then the handle is shaped to final fit with the pommel and guard. Then the handle is ready for wrapping with cord and leather.

My finished Falchion.

I still have a bunch of finish hand-sanding and polishing to do, but with Matt's take-down method, I can dismantle the entire sword and work on each piece separately.

Double post.

thank you for posting Josh! I was.going to try and get some photos edited to post when I got home, thank you for saving me the trouble.

MP

Feel free to add whatever you like Matthew

Nice work Joshua. Cool class Matt. I am really interested in "whole number ratio design method by Swedish swordsmith and historian, Peter Johnsson". Is there a book or something on this design method that I can check out?

|quoted:

Nice work Joshua. Cool class Matt. I am really interested in "whole number ratio design method by Swedish swordsmith and historian, Peter Johnsson". Is there a book or something on this design method that I can check out?

there is a write up detailing the concept in "sword Form and thought" the catalog from the exhibition of the same name. The second printing is available now from the deutsches klingenmuseum, well worth picking up.

MP

Joshua that looks really good. I envy you for taking that class.

|quoted:

Joshua that looks really good. I envy you for taking that class.

I have to say that this is the second class I have taken with Matthew and he is a superb instructor. I think he is going to make the "Winter class in Phoenix" a bi-annual event! So, keep checking for it, they fill up fast.

Sweet looking sword!

This was such a fun class. The instruction was some of the best. But also the students were great too. It was very interesting to how many different styles were made by the one concept of sword. Like Matt would say you could easliy go down a rabbit hole with this sword. Thanks again Matt and Grizz for putting this together, and Josh for posting. should I post some of my pictures on this post?

|quoted:

This was such a fun class. The instruction was some of the best. But also the students were great too. It was very interesting to how many different styles were made by the one concept of sword. Like Matt would say you could easliy go down a rabbit hole with this sword. Thanks again Matt and Grizz for putting this together, and Josh for posting. should I post some of my pictures on this post?

show us!!

|quoted:

should I post some of my pictures on this post?

Absolutely! Feel free to add whatever you like.

Warning: This might start to sound like an add for Matt and the class.

So let me set the stage. I've been wanting to take a class from Matt for a while because he's awesome....Am I right?

Matt has his sword and it's parts, books, and other things. I like to forge, but Matt says we will forge and profile our swords by the end of the day. He's got high hopes I see that ought to push me a bit and remembering what his looks like I figure that we aren't going for a great looking sword, just a hunk of metal; he just brought this so we could see what we should aspire to.
Then he showed us what he was looking for and the start shape.

Here's Josh and then my sword...

This is how we ended the first day, swords forged and ground clean to 120 grit