can u make ur own weapons?

[Thenewguy?]

hey i'm new and all i just recently joined a fencing club and i was wondering can u make ur own blades and grips for sabre or foil as long as they do not exceed there length or weight limit?

[Morion]

The blades are forged from rather specific types of steel. If you are thinking of making your own blades out of scrap metal then no. Such blades at best would be useless and at worst extremely dangerous. If you are talking about buying parts and building weapons to your taste then yes people do that all of the time.

[Morion]

BTW l33t sp33k is looked down upon here. u and ur will get you flamed by some of the regulars.

[KD5MDK]

I'm not aware of any particular regulations on sabre grips. Read the material rules, section M of the rulebook (available from the USFA website). If your homemade product conforms to those, it will be ok. However, that's rather difficult to do on your own.

[Purple Fencer]

BTW l33t sp33k is looked down upon here. u and ur will get you flamed by some of the regulars.

When did you start chanelling Jason Grey, dude???

[Morion]

But it's true!!!! Fear the wrath of crusty old fencers!

[rcmatthews]

One of my coaches has a grip for foil that he carved out of wood. i don't know anything about its legality, but it feels amazing in your hand.

[Craig]

hey i'm new and all i just recently joined a fencing club and i was wondering can u make ur own blades and grips for sabre or foil as long as they do not exceed there length or weight limit?

Hey there newguy - You can make (assemble) your own weapon out of existing blades, guards, etc.

If you have a forge and want to forge a blade, there really isn't anything stopping you from doing so. I expect that you would be better served spending the $20 on a basic blade and assembling that and the other parts than trying to make your own from scratch.

Grips are the one thing that can (and sometimes are) be custom made by a fencer. Most of the time it will be wooden grips like rcmatthews refers to, but if you know how to cast metal or epoxy you could make your own orthopedic (pistol) grips as well.

On language/typing: Morion is correct. This is a discussion forum, not SMS text messaging so using full works and not AIM-speak is greatly encouraged.

Cheers,
Craig

[Larrison]

I've got a couple of older wooden saber grips in my bag -- they work quite well, as they are 'checkered' for a good grip. Don't see any reason that you couldn't make your own grips from plastic or wood or similar -- as long as it met the basic requirements.

[KD5MDK]

One of my coaches has a grip for foil that he carved out of wood. i don't know anything about its legality, but it feels amazing in your hand.

Is it a "french" grip? Then yes.
Is it an "orthopedic" grip? Then it must fix the hand in only one position (somehow).

That's pretty much it.

[Amadeus]

BTW l33t sp33k is looked down upon here. u and ur will get you flamed by some of the regulars.

or non-regulars with self respect

[JackOfHearts]

BTW l33t sp33k is looked down upon here. u and ur will get you flamed by some of the regulars.

Well in all fairness, there is a thread for this in the water cooler.

Hrm... anybody got any links to pics of custom grips? It'd be interesting to see what some people have come up with.

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!


In my club, we have a member who started training 1937.

He told me that in his previous fencing tenure (before 1962), they would save broken blades, and hard-solder the broken-off foible to the forte, since blades were then extremely costly, and very hard to get. He still has his mask from his start - I think that it would pass punch test, but the bib is a bit on the small side.

So it has been done, in a way. However, that would not be accepted today.


Have a nice time!

Peter Gustafsson

[Jay Kominek]

Even with the appropriate tools to machine a blade already in my possession, I'd never consider doing it, even if I could buy bar stock of the appropriate steel for less than the cost of a finished blade. There would be significant safety issues in using the final result, and it would take a rather long time to do. Commerical products have mass production and quality control going for them.

All the bits around your hand are probably open to making at home, though. A guard made out of brass or copper might be attractive. If you know how to mix color into rigid plastic to get nice patterns, you could maybe make a neat sabre pommel, too. Grips were already mentioned.

[civ4ec]

but if you could make your own blade. Does anyone know which are the fie testing methods or requirements that a blade (itself) must meet?

[KD5MDK]

As I said, they're all listed in the material (m) section of the rules. Some of those do not apply to USFA competition, and actually I can't think of any (other than curvature and stiffness) that the USFA enforces at all, besides the S2000 designation on sabre blades. The FIE of course is a whole different story.

[rcmatthews]

Is it a "french" grip? Then yes.
Is it an "orthopedic" grip? Then it must fix the hand in only one position (somehow).

That's pretty much it.

But see, the problem is that its kind of a cross between the two, and I think it could be debated as to whether or not the hand was fixed in one position like with a true pistol grip.

[KD5MDK]

Then I'd be dubious.

[rcmatthews]

That's my point, I guess. it feels amazing though.

[KD5MDK]

If it's a cross between the two, then it's probably illegal. Which doesn't say you can't make your own grips, just that they need to conform to so (rather restrictive) rules. I wonder what might be done to make it legal.