Kris Cutlery Katana

By WarAngel

Katana 29" - Overall: 39-1/2" - Handle: 10-1/2" - Wt.: 2-1/4 lbs.
Katana 26" - Overall: 36-1/4" - Handle: 9-7/8" - Wt.: 2-1/2 lbs.

If there is one thing that sets Cecil B. Quirino's work apart from his competitors in the Philippines, Pakistan, Taiwan or India, it is the care to heat treating that he dedicates to his handforged swords. Heat treating, as you may know, is a time consuming process where a blade's toughness and edge-holding capabilities are arrived at. It is also where many of Cecil's competitor's skip on to reduce costs to produce a cheaper sword.

Lack of heat treating can produce an inferior sword, regardless of what kind of superior steel you are using.

Cecil uses AISI 5160 steel, which means his weapons require oiling or waxing as part of sword care, like traditional swords. While this katana is neither crafted in the fashion of traditional Japanese katanas, nor is it differentially heat tempered such that it would have a hamon (cloud temper line), these swords can cut and can take quite a beating, as attested to by our Japanese Sword Editor, Christopher Lau, who holds a Shodan ranking in the art known as Iaido.

The katana comes in 29 inch and 26 inch versions, amounting to approximately US$175 and US$155 respectively. The handles are bound with a thin cotton cord and lacquered black to prevent the wood from splitting. The simple brass guard (or "tsuba") has two half-moon shaped openings on either side of the blade . The generous length handle is made of hardwood and is permanently attached to the tang and pinned. The tang is traditionally-shaped, versus the "rat tail" tang as found in many replica swords made in Spain.

Featured left is a close up of the undecorated brass tsuba. The handle has brass hubcaps (fuchi-kashira) and the wooden scabbard sports a brass throat piece. The scabbard is a hardwood.

The tangs were originally 7" long in older models. One recent model we managed to examine (and break open) revealed a 5" tang. It's advisable to check with Kris Cutlery to confirm the advertised tang length.

We in North America often have a "full tang" mentality. Traditional Japanese swords did not always have a full tang according to our definitions but would span two-thirds to three-quarters of a handle length. Also, traditional Japanese katana handles comprised a non-resinous hardwood, and it was pinnacle to have them extremely well made so as to share in impact absorption and shock tolerance. In essence, the traditional Japanese handle functioned in unison with the tang.

The Kris Cutlery katana's permanantly-attached handle is extremely solid. The photo to the right shows the wood beneath the non-traditional cotton spiral wrap.

Some readers have asked us what blade length they should select. The best way to determine the ideal length is to make sure when you hold the katana downwards that it doesn't touch the ground with your arm fully extended.

Note that the cross sectional shape of the Kris Cutlery katana is a non-traditional hollow grind with a beveled edge. Traditional Japanese swords feature a more curved edge called a Moran edge or a Cannel grind. While it is not advisable for any traditional Japanese sword to be sharpened at home (especially with diamond hones, mechanical sharpeners, belt grinders, etc. because they destroy not only the cross sectional geometry but ruin the temper, and further devalue the sword, especially in the case of rare antiques), the non-traditional shape of the Kris Cutlery katana allows for simple touch-ups to the edge with a diamond hone file without the same concerns as one would have with a traditional Japanese katana.

Final words: this sword is good value as a "beater" - i.e. something to bash around. They are not "combat ready". What beaters are good for is learning to use a sword. Inexpensive swords are not as sharp as a real katana, and they really force you to use good technique. If you really screw up, they can take the abuse, and even if you do manage to damage them, their cost was low enough to be disposable. They're also good if you want to do some stage combat as they can take a fair bit of abuse.

Editor's Note: Since the completion of this article, I had received an "updated" version of the blade. This one features more of a saber grind rather than a hollow grind. While the edge is not quite convex like that of a traditional sword, this new cross-sectional geometry is most certainly headed in the right direction. The sword blade was somewhat on the heavy side. However, Cecil Quierno indicated that the blade edge featured a higher Rockwell hardness and the back a lower hardness in his attempts to approximate the effects of a traditional Japanese sword's differential hardening. He related that the newest batch of swords would be lighter than my evaluation blade.

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