DIY: $200 Katana…sourcing the parts
...what can we build? How does it look? Will it cut?
The MFA in Boston has probably the largest collection of Japanese katanas in the world, including Japan.
The work that goes into each sword component is, in and of itself, a work of art. The price of a handcrafted museum-quality katana starts at $50K and can reach well into the seven figures.
Beautiful – and deadly.
The average person who has an interest in acquiring a quality katana can still manage to do so, IF one is willing cede a certain level of craftsmanship. The price range? Between $1,500- $10K depending on the materials, level of craftsmanship, detailing, etc. While not exactly inexpensive, it is also not completely out of reach.
In order to have a true katana, all of the parts must still be functional. The blade must be made of high carbon steel, the tang must be full, and all of the components must fit together tightly.
To be affordable katana, say in the $200 – $1000 range, something else has to be part of the equation. The only real option for this price range is to use parts are mass produced.
Chinese sword makers have solved this problem by standardizing the sizing of all of the katana pieces (blade, handle, saya, etc.). Different craftsmen can make them however they wish, but they must conform to very specific dimensions. We don’t know when they did this, but this was true ten years ago when we first looked at Chinese-made katanas.
Until recently, the sourcing of these component parts directly from the various craftsmen in China was not practical for an individual, especially one overseas…but no longer!!! Because of marketplaces like Temu and Alibaba, anyone can buy DIRECT and in small quantities…often with FREE SHIPPING. It’s pretty incredible.
Of course, buying anything from China on the Internet is a crap shoot, but we were intrigued enough to give it a try.
Project Budget
As one of the RainyDayProjects for 2025, we are putting $200 on the line to find out if we can assemble a katana with pieces sourced directly from China using their version of Amazon marketplace (Temu and Aliexpress). We will be comparing what we can get/assemble now to the Chinese-made $500 and $1000 katanas we reviewed a decade ago.
It will be interesting to see how they compare now that sourcing all the parts directly is possible!
The budget for the 2025 Katana DIY is:
- $50 for all the components (tsuka, seppa, etc)
- $50 for the saya (lacquered, buffalo horn opening, ray skin cover, etc)
- $100 for the blade (T10 or 1095, folded, clay-hardened, hamon, polished, etc)
The Katana version of “The thigh bone’s connected to the hip bone…” song.
Why $200? That is because the cheapest complete high-carbon steel katana we can find on Ebay which looks safe enough to cut with is around that price point. They are very bare-bones (not folded steel, no hamon, etc), but they definitely are not a “wall-hanger” or for cosplay!
Ordering & Delivery
After all the back and forth, it looks like we’ll be building two katanas. In order to keep the total cost within budget, we had to negotiate a little bit, as well as expand the total outlay, but we did manage to keep the price within the original $200-per-sword target.
What was ordered and total of each order:
- Two naked blades with habaki: $200 including shipping
- Two sayas (one with partial ray skin/buffalo horn parts, one without, both lacquer finished) : $105 including shipping
- One completely finished handle set (handle, seppas, etc): $30 including shipping…yes, we’ll need to order another one.
Lots of vendors, lots of choices.
We are showing the listings from different vendors with their “official” pricing, but no information regarding the source on purpose. We had reached out to quite a number of vendors and suppliers, and while not all of them were willing to negotiate on price, some were. Understandably, none of them were willing to have the negotiated price listed as their “official” price.
So, the best advice we can offer after doing this for a month is…work with your supplier to come to a workable price. Some will be accommodating if you order more than one piece, but unlike the old days, you won’t have to order a hundred 🙂
Most of the items (tsuba, menuki, etc) arrived from the Chinese suppliers/makers in less than two weeks. Many of the items arrived in just 10 days.
Not tofu.
All the items were very securely packaged, well padded, and everything arrived in excellent condition. Not one item was missing or different from what was described in the listing.
The blades had FIVE different export/import/customs clearance labels slapped on it during the course of its journey from China to Boston…including a “red tape” around one end which probably had a meaning all its own!
Note to self: the red tape HAS to have some meaning, so do not dis the red tape.
Naked Blades
We sourced our naked blades from a smith in Longquan China, there are a lot of forges and swordsmiths still plying their respective trades. The qualities have gotten even better since we last looked at them 10 years ago! Amazingly, the price has stayed the same, or is even lower, for the higher quality/more expensive blades (folded, clay-hardened, etc).
A gift if there ever was one.
We ordered one blade made with T10 and one blade made with 1095.
Who knows which is which, the same, or if even what we got is either of the advertised steel. Such is the way of ordering from far away places.
One is one, one is the other…which might be a quote from Buddha, we’re not sure.
With the caveat stated, the blades clearly :
- are made using folded steel,
- have a clear hamon,
- have clean, well-polished surfaces, and
- very nice lines.
At this point, we are extremely satisfied based just on looks alone. We’ll see how they perform in the cutting tests in the Spring 🙂
Sleek and deadly.
Tsuka Pieces
There were a dizzying variety of Chinese parts-vendors to choose from, as well as a large range of prices. Most of them have similar images along with a varied selection of materials, colors, etc.
We finally made our selection of three vendors based on the look of their posted images alone, as long as they are within our price range.
THIS is what you want to have protecting your hand when wielding a sword.
We ordered tsubas, menukis, and other components to see if there were quality differences between vendors at the same price point. What we noticed is that while obviously none of the items are hand-carved, the details and quality of the casting are excellent, the materials used heavy, and the resulting pieces exceeded our expectations!
Very nice.
Very very nice indeed.
After we ordered the individual pieces, one of the vendors said we could also order the entire handle set instead of each individual piece. It was an amazing value at $23+ $5 shipping. Since we really like the quality of the tsuba, we decided it was worth giving the set a look.
The new order also took about 10 days from China. The tsuba is listed as an alloy, but it’s heavy like iron. It is not made of iron as we checked it w/ a magnet. The seppas and habaki are brass…standard size and good quality all around. The pegs are made of bamboo and smooth. We would be hard-pressed to get all of these parts with this quality any cheaper.
Really good quality, really good price points.
The wrap for the handle is VERY tight, absolutely no movement at all, and skillfully finished. The samagawana is synthetic, but expected for the price point. The various fittings (menuki, kashira, etc), while molded, have excellent details.
Really good craftsmanship and attention to detail.
Nice!
What’s next?
The one remaining OFD (Out For Delivery) item is the saya, which is scheduled to arrive in early February. This part is going to be the trickiest to order; we are not sure how one can buy this “blind,” but we’ll see. It is possible that we may end up having to make one.
Once we have everything, we will do a “dry fit,” followed by the drilling of the holes through the tsuka and the blade so we can insert the bamboo pins. The test cutting with be sometime in the Spring!
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