Uhlmann Epee Blades

[veeco]

OK, this is the second time in 2 months this happens to me:

I have bought an Uhlmann FIE epee blade about a month ago, and it broke again at the tang. I'm not talking about breaking at the junction of the blade and the tang, but the blade litterally broke inside the grip (I'm using French).

This really pisses me off, at $100+ per blade, I can't afford this.

Does anyone know of other blades I could try? They should be kinda light, yet rather stiff, and FIE compliant blades. Price is not really an issue here, I'm just looking for something that lasts more than a month and that I can fence a lot with. I tend to fence quite a lot (more than 10 hours per week) so I can understand that my blade consumption is higher that of someone who doesn't fence that much, but I expect blades to last longer than a month.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

[damianip]

From whom did you buy it? I would ask the vendor for some sort of pro-rated refund. A break in the tang would, in my opinion, indicate a defective heat treatment or threading job.

As far as suggestions go since they are both BF "badge engineered" blades, I guess you're not going to be interested in the suggestion of Triplette's BF blades. Their BF maraging blades start at about 70 USD bare.


Paolo

[neevel]

Vnitis aren't light, but they are moderately stiff with a smooth flexion, and tremendously durable. They're also very reasonably priced for FIE blades. One issue might be whether they're available with a full-length tang-- I know their foil blades are made only for pistol grips, but I'm not sure about their epee blades (unlike foil, you do see high-level epeeists using French grips).

You might also try Prieurs, which are similar in weight to BF blades but a bit less stiff, and seem to have had a consistently good reputation over the years-- I believe Zivkovic's carrying them.

-Dave


[This message has been edited by neevel (edited 04-18-2001).]

[flik]

I've had good luck with the Vnitis. They do come with the full length tang, but vendors may not have those in stock (mine came full tang). I think the only vendor that still has the vnitis is Blade. TCA apparently dropped them (a friend of mine got the last one) as did American Fencer (I bought the last two). Both companies said they weren't planning on reordering them anytime soon. Last time I checked, Blade charges about $90 for the bare blade (TCA and AF both charged ~65).