Featured School
Caring For your Katana: A brief guide to cleaning your blade
Property Type: How To
Whether you’re a collector of Japanese swords, or a budo practitioner, proper maintenance of your swords is paramount to keeping them in good shape. It would be a shame to have that new katana, which cost you $1000, to become useless because of rust or a cracking handle. Fortunately proper sword care is not difficult, and it needn’t take hours of your time.
If you use your sword, you should clean the blade after every use. Every time you touch the blade of your samurai sword, your fingers leave behind salts and oils that can promote rust. If you are a collector, you should clean your katana ever 3 weeks, or anytime you handle the blade of the sword. Cleaning your blade will only take you a few minutes, but the time spent will add years to the life of your blade.
WHAT NOT TO DO
Before we talk about how to clean your blade, let’s talk about some things you shouldn’t do.
- Never attempt to sharpen your blade. The use of abrasive sharpeners or grinding wheels can utterly destroy your blade. It takes special tools and training to sharpen a samurai sword.
- Do not use abrasive cleaner or chemical cleaners on your blade. They will damage the blade. This includes metal cleaners, polishes, and chemical based cleaners. Really you should only use the tools provided in a proper maintenance kit.
- Do not directly handle the blade of your sword when cleaning (especially when reapplying the oil). Use a cloth to hold the blade instead. Care should be taken since this can make the blade slippery.
HOW TO CLEAN YOUR BLADE
To begin with you should purchase a sword maintenance kit. A traditional kit includes blade oil, rice papers, an oiling cloth, a powder ball, and a brass awl and hammer. For blade cleaning we will be using the oil, papers, cloth and powder ball.
With your maintenance kit in hand, it is time to get started:
- Remove the old oil from your blade with a sheet of rice paper.
- Tap the powder ball against the blade every two inches or so. This will lightly coat the blade with power. You may need to tap the ball a few times to get the powder flowing through the fabric.
- Use a clean piece of rice paper or a cotton cloth to rub over the powder. Repeat this until both sides of the blade are clean and polished.
- Apply a few drops of oil to each side of the blade. Use a clean rice paper or a cotton cloth to spread the oil evenly over the blade.
With your blade clean re-sheath your sword and rest assured that that beautiful katana will stay free of rust until the next time cleaning is required. Proper sword maintenance really is important to extend the life of your katana.
Pcitures will follow by end of the week..just give me a minute …or two 
how often should it be cleaned
i have an old sword definately more than 50 years old,
it was prone to rust beneath the handle so how often should i do a full clean or even just the blade??
any one please mail me
alexjm @ gmail . com
woops im silly didnt read it all properly
but when cleaning the “tang” bit inside the handle how often should the mekugi “peg” be replaced for a new one? every time?
NEVER EVER EVER clean the tang of an old sword. Ever. Really. You shouldn’t even clean the tang of a new sword.
The rust on the tang is one of the ways they date old swords, so cleaning it will reduce the value of an old sword tremendously.
Right…stay of your tang
As far as the mekugi peg, just check every now and than to be sure it’s still ok to practise with but usually they are very solid and they don’t need to be replaced very often.
Dave
what oil do you use on the blade after its been polished?
RECENTLY BOUGHT A SWORD. I KATANA SHOGUN IF THAT MEANS ANYTHING.. I UNDERSTAND ABOUT THE POWDER BALL, RICE PAPER AND OIL.. BUT I ALSO HAVE TWO TIMBER RODS ABOUT 3CM LONG AND A BRASS WHAT LOOKS LIKE A SMALL HAMMER. THE HANDLE SCREWS OFF AND THE OTHER END HAS A BLUNT SPIKE. ANY IDEAS?
nope i was wondering that
With regard to callum and sway’s question, i believe the small spike is used as a punch to be tapped by the hammer to remove the handle pegs – I use it to clean the tang (inner metal part of blade handle) – but pay attention to what heresiarch said ablout older swords and diminishing their value.
Oh yes, perhaps the timber rods are supplied to make new handle pegs. Both the pegs and the hammer remarks made by me are just guesses, please don’t curse me if I’m wrong.
i made the mistake and entrusted my brother with two swords with a value of 3,ooo.oo for the both.i left clear instructions on how to care for them.i was out of town for 8 mo. i did not no that he also left for 3.5 mo.he put the items in the basement ,all the heat was off so his bill wouldnt become large;i now have spots of rust on both blades and in spots thru-out the length of each sword on both sides;some have eaten into the steel.they i assume are worthless,tell me something positive,please.
This is for “lewis titus” and his request for positive news.
Well lewis, i have some!!! You can clean rust off of a sword! (btw- for any ppl out there who wanna give any comments that are mean- just know i have put in a good 10 years on straight studying swords). I would recommend using”Metal Glo” polishing paste. it takes rust right off. as for the rust that is set in… use a VERY VERY fine steel wool, yes i know, scratching your sword isnt exacly what you had in mind… but trust me… it works- i used this on a sword that was a $12,000 Folded steel Katana. Anyway- the soft VERY VERY fne steel wool is just if the paste dosnt work. The kind of steel you will need will be in the 0000 steel grade range. go to a steel place, or order online. anyway, they are not worthless, remember, they had better swords back in the middle ages and before—-and the swords were kept for a long time. if you have any other questions, please email me at Godlydrumming@yahoo.com
And my last bit of advice……………. Never entrust someone who has no experiance with swords with a sword!!! and if they are 3000 ea… well, your just stupid for that! lol but its ok. The point is…. your swords will not be worth as much, but it is fixable- depending how bad the rust is.
I am only starting out my sword collection but am really getting into it. Does anyone have any tips on what to look for when buying a good sturdy sword?
well, it really depends on what KIND of sword your looking for. if your wanting a “wall hanger sword” (which means its not smart to take it of the wall and swing it around to much) or a “battle ready sword (which means… trees beware..). I would recommend battle ready, because they will last longer (assuming you take care of them) but wall hangers dont require NEARLY as much attention. This is a GREAAAAAT website for buying online swords http://www.sword-buyers-guide.com/
So basically the powder you speak of removes fine surface rust? Is that correct?… I have a ‘battle ready’ katana made in Hong Kong (lol) and it has developed a little bit of surface rust. Does anyone know if its possible to buy these katana maintenence kits in martial arts supply stores here in Queensland?
It rather takes small scratches away than removing rust. Not sure if you can buy them in Queensland but there must be some shops over there where you can get them
As Joseph points out, we don’t talk about nihonto here so polishing paste and very fine steel wool will be fine to remove the rust on your blade.
Simon,
Metal glo (assuming that is what you are talking about) is a polish that can help prevent rust.. but if you put that on a sword, and use a very vine steel wool (0000 grade or under) on it.. the rust should come out. NOTE: After a certain amount of time, rust cannot be taken out of the steel, because it has set in.. and after that, microscopic cracks begin to appear in your sword (of course you can’t see them… but they are there). Thus, it will (again…over time) destroy your sword, so handle rust as soon as possible.
As to if you can buy them in Queensland, I don’t know. I am not familiar with the geography of the area, so i don’t know what places sell what. HOWEVER, you can buy all of this stuff online at various websites.