FWF Chevalier foil & epee blades

[twisterfencing]

Recently I ordered a batch of Chevalier FIE blades from FWF. I was oddly surprised at how light these things were. Has anyone else used or had any experience with these blades?

Gary Spruill

[erooMynohtnA]

Yeah, in foil at least they're pretty light and really flexible. I think it's the same for epee. Not the greatest reputation for durability.

[catwood1]

I've always seen them very light. Old ones I used to have were flexible, more recent ones (still 2 or 3 years ago) were very stiff. YMMV

[twisterfencing]

catwood1:

Have to agree with you. These things are super light, yet they are also stiff as heck! For those that like a piece of rebar, this blade is going to be their newest best friend.

Gary Spruill

I've always seen them very light. Old ones I used to have were flexible, more recent ones (still 2 or 3 years ago) were very stiff. YMMV

[Emfuser]

Recently I ordered a batch of Chevalier FIE blades from FWF. I was oddly surprised at how light these things were. Has anyone else used or had any experience with these blades?

Gary Spruill

I put my hands on a whole bunch of their foils. I liked the feel of the blades, but those things are unusually stiff. I only found a few that had flexibility I liked. I ended up buying BF blades because I couldn't find much user feedback about the things and didn't want any more high performance, short life blades like my Absolute FIE foils.

[twisterfencing]

Emfuser:

This is the exact reason for my question/post/thread

I have about 25 foils and the same for epee and wanted to get a general idea from the population on what they thought of them.

I may just have to grab my mask, fasten one together, and go out and bang on someone with it to find out for myself. Too funny!

According to a few close friends, they tell me they really like them? Personally, I have no clue.

Hope the best for me. Some kid might just decide to take out his anger on me

Gary Spruill

I put my hands on a whole bunch of their foils. I liked the feel of the blades, but those things are unusually stiff. I only found a few that had flexibility I liked. I ended up buying BF blades because I couldn't find much user feedback about the things and didn't want any more high performance, short life blades like my Absolute FIE foils.

[yearsofwisdom]

Just wondering, how long do you get out of your short life absolute FIE foils? i get like 2-3 months but thats cause i have a bad sense of distance..

[the ancient one]

The foil blades can get really bad compound bends almost immediately when you use them on opponents that like to crash into you. After learning that, I save them for my more controlled opponents.

One of the 5 that I have owned took a 90 degree bend upwards. I got the bend out and just used it for wall targets for months and I realized that the bend was not coming back. After I was confident that it wasn't at high risk of breaking I put it back into bouting and competition for about 8 months before it broke in another spot, so they can be fairly tough.

They get a bit whippy and in a phrase with hard blade contact the point may not be where you need it at the moment you need it is still "vibrating". For example you have to be more careful about how and where you beat to avoid large amplitude displacements of the point.

[twisterfencing]

Just some quick thoughts:

Went out with an epee, used some 15 year old kid to beat on.

Point control is excellent! Understand its a new blade
Weight is great: feels almost like an STM type blade with the balance
No bends, no breaks, couple of knicks from my beat attacks yet took a lick'in and keep on ticking.

I would give this blade a 3 1/2 star rating of 5 stars.

Type of blade: FWF Chevalier Blue Epee, Point & Wire: FWF


Gary Spruill

[DangerMouse]

When Prieur first bought the FL forge and started putting these out, I bought a few that were really stiff and light. I loved the way those blades felt and they would hold up well until the first really hard hit, when they would kink. I think they lasted me an average of a little over a month each. Great feel, but too expensive for the durability. If they've fixed the durability, I'll be buying some more.

[Wetmelon]

I used some foil blades made by WKC (Solingen). SOOO light. I was actually HIT really hard with one, should have made the blade kink, but it just bent in a nice 180 degree and came straight back to a normal curve...