Backyard swordsmith?

[Sparv]

I was hunting backyard samourais on myspace, and i suddenly found this guy (http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=156893934). Once all the picts of his marriage and cats are gone, you can see some pictures of his backyard smithy.

Who want a new shinken :) ?

BTW, myspace seems to be a promising hunting ground.

[Kenzan]

"hello, my name is Matt Baldwin and I am a warehouse worker, land lord and sword smith."

FUN FACT: Warehouse workers and sushi chefs always make the best swords.
(Translate "Land-Lord" into "The guy who gets 20 bucks knocked off his rent for having a mail slot on his front door for rent drop-off.)

I give him props for effort though.
At least he seems to be ganbatte.
:)

[samurai80]

When I first saw the picture of a bird poop-stained barbacue grill, I thought "surely he's just showing pictures around his house, like the pet pics with random marriage pictures thrown in between." No. I was very wrong. It was a "forge". Nice job on purchasing 20 bricks, and throwing some charcoal in the middle.

"Well samurai80, what do you know about sword smithing?"

I know that it isn't in that video.

[Ignatz]

Some years ago I visited a famous swordmaker in Japan. At the time he was getting about $25,000 for a blade. I'm pretty sure he is now a national tresure.
His forge was pretty much a pile of charcoal on the floor with a bellows. I think he also has a power hammer

Of course the heat treating was done at night so as to see the color changes but it is a relatively unsophisticated deal.

I don't know if this guy can make blades or not but your time would be better spent getting yourselves squared away.

[ScottUK]

I have to agree with Ignatz - I like to amuse myself at the expense of idiots, but I have given up hunting them down.

The sword issue is pretty volatile here in the UK, and if I come across someone who is doing potential harm to JSA here (like TPRoach), I will do what I can to get the guy off the nutter radar and into a dojo.