Sometime last week, while looking through the Instructables email that had arrived in my inbox, my eyes fell apon this instructable about making mini weapons out of nails and scrap metal. A few day later, I had an empty Saturday afternoon, so I gathered tools and set to work making a sword. I didn't have everything mentioned in the instructable, but I did have files, a torch, hammer, some old nails (Cut square nails from our house, actually), and a section of old rail to use as my anvil. After a few hours worth of work, and much heating, hammering, grinding, filing, and sanding, (Plus a bit of thread wrapping), here's the finished result:
The minisword! All earwigs and earthworms beware!
As you might be able to see, it's a but rough, and the hilt is somewhat crooked from the blade, but for only a few hours of work, I'm quite pleased with the result. I didn't originally intend for it to be curved either, but thanks to my low blacksmithing skills, it turned out that way. It doesn't look that bad, either.
A closeup of the hilt and base of the blade.
The wrapping is just some black thread, carefully knotted on either end and also Elmer's glued on. In the instructable, the author uses super glue to hold the thread on, but I wanted something different. I did use superglue to affix the hilt guard though, which I hammered, filed, ground and sanded, and drilled out of another piece of nail.
Who knows, maybe you could slay a lizard with it...
And no, it isn't sharp enough to cut more than warm butter, but the tip is sharp enough to stab into things. I could sharpen it if I wanted, but...
