Jason Anstey
Yudansha

thx dude

Hello, I am new member here. I see you posted good content in this forum. May i be your friend?
Btw, this is my blogs: MMA Pound For Pound - Astaga.com lifestyle on the net - Astaga.com lifestyle on the net
can i know your blogs?

Thanks for +rep;

I do not often get into discussions concerning Jo - - but this one drifted towards gradings - a subject on which Andy, Peter and I have had several discussions....

thanks for the posrep,

lee

I have tried emailing Rick couple of times, and demand an explanation, but he has ignored all my attempts of communication with him. I have spoken to a couple of other "unhappy" customers of Rick, so I am definitely not alone in this. I know there are two sides of a story, and i would love to know Ricks side to this story

With all the said, the tsuka and tsukamaki is superbly done, no problem with that at all. But I didnt pay $8600USD for a nice tsuka, did I? Also, i realised that this blade wasnt made by Kanetsugu-san but by his son Mitsuhiro who is a lesser, younger swordsmith. So, I was deceived with two things. The blade specs were entirely wrong, and the mei was incorrect. If the blade had cost me only a couple of hundred $$$, I couldve "gotten over it", but $8600USD is a lot of money for a struggling worker like me, so i expect to get what i pay for.

Five months ago, I ordered a custom shinken. I told Rick specifically that the shinken was to be used for cutting, mainly bamboo tameshigiri. He told me that he would have a blade made for me by Kanetsugu-san, and the blade would be thick, heavy with plenty of haniku to ensure the edge was appropriate for such cutting. I received the blade not too long ago only to find the blade was everything opposite to what i asked for. The blade is thin, light, and hardly no haniku at all to support the edge. I attempted cutting with the blade to see what it was made of. The blade chipped on first contact with green bamboo. I have been cutting bamboo for 5 years now, never had a blade chip before, even with mass produced Chinese made swords. I showed my instructor the sword to which he commented " this blade is only good for mat cutting, and nothing else".