Got a Real World Weapons or Armour Question? Mk X

[endoperez]

Speaking of physics, sword blade geometry and harmonics might be of interest to you. Obviously you'd have to find better sources than these random links, but they look like they would offer some interesting and relatively easy-to-explain physical phenomena.

http://www.myarmoury.com/feature_properties.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flame-bladed_sword

[Aux-Ash]

Would it be accurate to say that slashing and piercing weapons (swords, axes, arrows) function largely off of the concept of pressure; that is, a force applied to a small surface area applying a great pressure?

This is one of the concepts involved, yes. It is also related to the Toughness and Hardness of the materials involved.
Not to mention a right mess of impulse, momentum and torque.

Would it be accurate to say that armors were developed to reduce the forces suffered when attacked by spreading the force out to a larger surface area?

Partly. All armour certainly does that, but I think the effect of that is rather limited. I think it's mainly of a case of A) deflecting and B) providing the body with a hard external shell.

In simplistic terms:

Both of those two should constitute a considerable defence on their own. By deflecting blows (for instance by ensuring that every blows come in at an angle and thus won't deliver the full Force of the blow) you significantly reduce the ability of your opponent to damage you.

The latter case is also significant. In order to cause damage, you essentially have to deform the target area. By ensuring that the target area is covered in metal, you essentially increase it's resistance to that. If the weapon cannot overcome the target areas Toughness and Hardness, then the Work behind the blow will partly convert into sound and heat and partly "bounce".
After a fashion, similarly like rubber ball being bounced off a hard surface as opposed to loosely packed sand. Though not as extreme... or simple.

What is the practical difference between a flexible armor and a rigid armor (chain versus plate, for example)?

I'd suspect that the flexible armour is good at "absorbing" the blow (by spreading the Work out throughout itself) whereas the rigid armour is Tougher and Harder and thus protects about more powerful blows.

[Matthew]

"Chain Mail" does get used in academia from time to time, but I would not recommend using it myself.

[eulmanis12]

"Chain Mail" does get used in academia from time to time, but I would not recommend using it myself.

chain mail tends to get a bad reputation in media because it does not defend well against stabbing or blunt weapons. "scientific" shows (whose names I will not mention) tend to make the mistake of thinking that the only way people fought was by repeattedly stabbing at eachother, and that chain mail was worn alone with nothing underneath.

Chain mail was part of an armor system, but only part. Padded armor underneath absorbed impact and stopped arrows, padded armor alone was vulnerable to slashing weapons so the chain mail was worn over it, the chain mail prevented slashing weapons from killing the wearer.

Chain defends against a slash, but is nearly useless against piercing or blunt force. Padding defends against piercing and blunt force but is nearly useless against slashing. Thus chain was worn over padding to provide very effective protection.

Due to the various types of mail armor the term chain mail is often confused.
Chain mail refers to small metal rings linked together as armor
Scale mail is a covering of metal plates like a lizard's scales
plate mail is a mixture of large metal plates attached directly to chain mail
and there are many other types but these are the three common ones that are often just described as chain mail

[Spiryt]

chain mail tends to get a bad reputation in media because it does not defend well against stabbing or blunt weapons. "scientific" shows (whose names I will not mention) tend to make the mistake of thinking that the only way people fought was by repeattedly stabbing at eachother, and that chain mail was worn alone with nothing underneath.

Chain mail was part of an armor system, but only part. Padded armor underneath absorbed impact and stopped arrows, padded armor alone was vulnerable to slashing weapons so the chain mail was worn over it, the chain mail prevented slashing weapons from killing the wearer.

Chain defends against a slash, but is nearly useless against piercing or blunt force. Padding defends against piercing and blunt force but is nearly useless against slashing. Thus chain was worn over padding to provide very effective protection.

Due to the various types of mail armor the term chain mail is often confused.
Chain mail refers to small metal rings linked together as armor
Scale mail is a covering of metal plates like a lizard's scales
plate mail is a mixture of large metal plates attached directly to chain mail
and there are many other types but these are the three common ones that are often just described as chain mail

Terms like "chain mail" or "plate mail" are for the most part 19th century inventions, that got really popular in some popular science and fantasy circles.

In actual Medieval period, everywhere when latin was not used, "mail", "maille" etc. meant exactly armor from interlocking rings.

Terms like "plate mail" or "scale mail" are confusing and not really correct.

Chain defends against a slash, but is nearly useless against piercing or blunt force. Padding defends against piercing and blunt force but is nearly useless against slashing. Thus chain was worn over padding to provide very effective protect

This is unfortunately very stupid myth - any sort of cloth armor was by itself much more resistant to slashes and cuts than to thrust - from the very obvious physic reasons.

Thrust with anything remotely pointy concentrates impact on much smaller surface, and it has much, much less material to displace on it's way.... Thrust must displace 'thickness' of material, 'slash' deals with thickness times area of contact.

Adding the softness and 'slipperiness" of soft armor - hard thing to cut.

Mail was in no way "useless" against blunt or piercing force, whatever it is.

Padding was being worn beneath the mail to provide additional dispersion of energy transfered to the links by any sort of attack - so it could be further resisted with reduced damage to wearer and mail itself.

tend to make the mistake of thinking that the only way people fought was by repeattedly stabbing at eachother,

People kind of fought by repeatedly stabbing each other... Arrows, spears, javelins, daggers, more spears - those were basic warfare armament around the Europe and Asia for hundreds and thousands of years.

Padded armor underneath absorbed impact and stopped arrows

Most padded armor that wasn't standalone doesn't really hold much chance of stopping sharp arrow - needs mail for it.

Here at 'test cotas' we have modern, still rather flawed, but illustrative experiment.

By itself, wool felt, very often found in period cloth armor, is rather easily pierced by arrow, but together with mail, it works wonderfully.

Mail alone fares much, much better, but still not 'optimally'.

[J.Gellert]

chain mail tends to get a bad reputation in media because it does not defend well against stabbing or blunt weapons. "scientific" shows (whose names I will not mention) tend to make the mistake of thinking that the only way people fought was by repeattedly stabbing at eachother, and that chain mail was worn alone with nothing underneath.

Chain mail was part of an armor system, but only part. Padded armor underneath absorbed impact and stopped arrows, padded armor alone was vulnerable to slashing weapons so the chain mail was worn over it, the chain mail prevented slashing weapons from killing the wearer.

Chain defends against a slash, but is nearly useless against piercing or blunt force. Padding defends against piercing and blunt force but is nearly useless against slashing. Thus chain was worn over padding to provide very effective protection.

Considering how long it lasted, it must have been pretty good.

In fact all kinds of armor (including leather) were probably way more useful than what they are given credit for.

[Galloglaich]

Leather wasn't used as armor much, if at all, apparently in Europe, though it was somewhat in Central Asia.

In Europe that niche is really taken up by textile armors, gambeson, aketon, jupon and so on, which turn out to be surprisingly effective.

G

[Spiryt]

Leather wasn't used as armor much, if at all, apparently in Europe, though it was somewhat in Central Asia.

In Europe that niche is really taken up by textile armors, gambeson, aketon, jupon and so on, which turn out to be surprisingly effective.

G

Well, to best of my knowledge, leather armors of CA weren't in the exact same 'niche' though - they tended to be bulky and heavy like lamellars and scales tend to be.

Only with leather instead of metals, obviosuly of thicker plates than similar metallic ones.

Obviously though, cloth armors intended for being standalone protection, tended to be rather hefty too, no question.

~ 30 layers of sound linen is going to weight quite a lot.

[Straybow]

Good point, I guess a more accurate question would be why piercing and slashing weapons have such extremely small surface areas, while bludgeoning weapons don't. Are bludgeoning weapons less effective because of it, or do they compensate in other ways?

The cutting edge of an axe or sword gets dinged up banging against armor. The short spikes or flanges of blunt weapons don't care if they get dinged, and they concentrate the impact force as well or better than a blade. Thrusting weapons are limited in their lines of attack. Blunt, axe, and thrusting weapons other than simple spears have hooks that make them versatile combat tools. Swords are balanced weapons, which is often better for defense.

Boil those factors down into physics terms (center of mass, moment arm, momentum, etc).

[endoperez]

I was about to argue that swords can't cut through wood, in another forum, but then decided to check Youtube for videos first. I foundthis video where, at the linked moment, a guy cuts through a rather thick sapling.

Wow! I totally hadn't expected that.

Have any groups performed test on if a sword (or axe, or any bladed weapon/tool in general) can cut through various wooden weapons, such as:

spear shafts (made of tough wood and treated somehow) - I expect it would do some damage, but not cut it, at least not in a single stroke. If it's held aloft, it might not do much at all.
eskrima or kali sticks - if it's hardwood instead of rattan, probably not much. Here's a video of knife vs kali sticks, and at the end they show the sticks have taken quite a beating. The damage seems superficial though.
Tonfa or similar - it's probably similar to eskrima or kali sticks in construction, but in this case, they would probably meet the blade straight on. I doubt the sword would cut through.

I'm not familiar with hardwoods, and they are probably quite tough, perhaps too tough to cut through. Then again, I would've said cutting through a fresh sapling like in the video is too difficult as well.

[Fhaolan]

I'm not familiar with hardwoods, and they are probably quite tough, perhaps too tough to cut through. Then again, I would've said cutting through a fresh sapling like in the video is too difficult as well.

I've accidentally cut through an 1-1/4" ironwood jo stick with a blunted sword during a performance. I just happened to hit the stick exactly right to bite into the grain, splitting the wood apart. Both myself and the lady I was working with were a bit surprised when it happened. :) The acting troupe I was working with at that time banned the really hard woods for weapons handles/shafts after several occasions like that one where the wood split/chipped/shrapneled far too easily. The worst offender was the compressed, epoxy-impregnated woods that are usually dyed fancy colours as well. They were technically pretty tough and wore out blades trying to shape them to fit the weapons; but when they did break, they *shattered*.

[Knaight]

I was about to argue that swords can't cut through wood, in another forum, but then decided to check Youtube for videos first. I foundthis video where, at the linked moment, a guy cuts through a rather thick sapling.

Wow! I totally hadn't expected that.

Have any groups performed test on if a sword (or axe, or any bladed weapon/tool in general) can cut through various wooden weapons, such as:

My main concern regarding these tests is anchoring. If you clamp a spear to two surfaces, then cut in between them it isn't going to behave like a help spear at all, and the same applies to a much larger extent to shorter one handed weapons. In any case, the capacity to cut them certainly exists to some extent (after all, axes are used to take down entire trees), the question is really just one of how much abuse it is going to take to get through various wooden shafts.

[Brother Oni]

Interesting discussion.

All the questions on mail has reminded me of something.

In most historical Japanese media, mail is usually depicted as being especially effective against the katana, presumably since mail is particularly effective against slashing style attacks and the katana is primarily a cutting tool, not to mention the edge gets blunted fairly quickly.

Is there any truth in this?

[Matthew]

chain mail tends to get a bad reputation in media because it does not defend well against stabbing or blunt weapons. "scientific" shows (whose names I will not mention) tend to make the mistake of thinking that the only way people fought was by repeattedly stabbing at eachother, and that chain mail was worn alone with nothing underneath.

Chain mail was part of an armor system, but only part. Padded armor underneath absorbed impact and stopped arrows, padded armor alone was vulnerable to slashing weapons so the chain mail was worn over it, the chain mail prevented slashing weapons from killing the wearer.

Chain defends against a slash, but is nearly useless against piercing or blunt force. Padding defends against piercing and blunt force but is nearly useless against slashing. Thus chain was worn over padding to provide very effective protection.

Due to the various types of mail armor the term chain mail is often confused.
Chain mail refers to small metal rings linked together as armor
Scale mail is a covering of metal plates like a lizard's scales
plate mail is a mixture of large metal plates attached directly to chain mail
and there are many other types but these are the three common ones that are often just described as chain mail

I think you may have misread me.

Interesting discussion.

All the questions on mail has reminded me of something.

In most historical Japanese media, mail is usually depicted as being especially effective against the katana, presumably since mail is particularly effective against slashing style attacks and the katana is primarily a cutting tool, not to mention the edge gets blunted fairly quickly.

Is there any truth in this?

Sure, mail is a very good defence against cutting attacks, the point the other posters are making above is that it is far from next to useless versus thrusts and chops, whether edged, pointed or blunted. By far the most common experience of war would have been the spear and arrow, of course.

[Autolykos]

Would it be accurate to say that slashing and piercing weapons (swords, axes, arrows) function largely off of the concept of pressure; that is, a force applied to a small surface area applying a great pressure?

Absolutely not, except maybe for piercing weapons to achieve penetration in the first place. But even for them, after they've broken through, the damage is done by cutting. Cutting works by microscopic serrations in the blade taking tissue out of its place micrometer by micrometer. It's like a really small saw. Pressure is almost irrelevant here (you need some to make sure the blade has contact everywhere while you draw/push it across, but that's it). If a blade is sharp or not really comes down to the material, how those serrations will be shaped after sharpening it, and how long it will take to get them worn out again. Some materials (glass and obsidian are notorious for this) will shatter again, showing a new sharp edge, while metal tends be deformed and dull out over time.
Blunt weapons are different again. Here it all comes down to energy. When you deposit a lot of energy in an object, it has to go somewhere. Some of it will move the object, but how much is determined by momentum. The less momentum you have for the same amount of energy, the more is left to do damage. That's one reason why lighter war hammers are actually better at doing damage than a huge sledgehammer. If the hit object is somewhat elastic (Hint: Humans are not, armor and shields might be), some energy will be lost in bouncing the weapon back. All the remaining energy will be used for deforming stuff. It might be the target (unlucky for him), his armor (a little more lucky) or the weapon breaking (very lucky).

Would it be accurate to say that armors were developed to reduce the forces suffered when attacked by spreading the force out to a larger surface area?What is the practical difference between a flexible armor and a rigid armor (chain versus plate, for example)?

If you want to generalize very broadly, your armor takes damage so you don't have to. Thats only part of it, though. Against sharp/pointy weapons, it works by keeping them from reaching the squishy human inside (ideally). If the armor material is harder (or just as hard) as the blade, you can't cut it, and piercing weapons will have their tip blunted. In short, they will have a harder time going in deeper and doing more damage. They also need to move armor material out of the way to penetrate deeper, which takes even more energy that would otherwise hurt the guy inside. And metal armor (except for chain) tends to be somewhat elastic and will bounce some of the energy in a strike with a blunt weapon back. Thats another bit of energy that's not going to hurt you.

How did shields work? Did they protect the wielder through the application of pressure, as I assume armors did, or were they more meant to change the angle an attack landed at, reducing the force applied? A combination thereof? Was the force delivered still enough to cause injury?

Depends on the construction. Norse shields were very light and kinda flimsy. Their use was stopping arrows and thrown weapons (penetrating a wood shield completely is hard), and take damage instead of you. They were expected to get destroyed, and you might go through multiple shields in a battle (duel regulations from the time required each combatant to show up with three shields). Also, large shields can be used to conceal your moves and get the enemies weapon stuck in them, even if they aren't very tough. Fencers even used coats for this purpose.
Metal shields like bucklers or rotellas were meant to deflect hits (or in the latter case projectiles). They would also get deformed, but were a lot less likely to get destroyed.
Most shields are somewhere in between.

TL;DR: For every question, there is a simple, easy to understand, wrong answer. "Armor protects by spreading force" is one of those. It's only part of how armor protects you, and a small one at that (and then only against some types of damage). If you want to over-generalize, "All weapons function by depositing more energy in the target than it can deal with; armor protects by taking damage for you" is way better, but still somewhat wrong.

That's just off the top of my head, so I might be wrong in the details. If you need help with formulas, don't be afraid to ask. I'm a physicist, and there is at least another one around here who reads this thread.

[Spiryt]

Absolutely not, except maybe for piercing weapons to achieve penetration in the first place. But even for them, after they've broken through, the damage is done by cutting.

Well, except that you can have plenty of piercing weapons without any real edge and serrations that can still penetrate target very efficiently....

Pressure is almost irrelevant here (you need some to make sure the blade has contact everywhere while you draw/push it across, but that's it).

There will be a lot of of 'slashing' and 'piercing' actions without any push or draw. Just impact.

Blunt weapons are different again. Here it all comes down to energy. When you deposit a lot of energy in an object, it has to go somewhere. Some of it will move the object, but how much is determined by momentum. The less momentum you have for the same amount of energy, the more is left to do damage.

But momentum of the weapon is absolutely "dealing damage".... If you whack someone to the head with warhammer and it "moves the target" the target being moved will be, rather unavoidably, some parts of the skull of poor target.

Momentum determines tendency of object to stay on it's course, but what happens with stuff on such course, is another thing.

[Autolykos]

Yep, those are some of the details I was talking about. Pretty much every weapon will damage by piercing, cutting and crushing to different degrees, often depending on the amount of armor it faces and the hit location, speed and technique used.

There will be a lot of of 'slashing' and 'piercing' actions without any push or draw. Just impact.

Just because the attacker does not consciously apply pressure doesn't mean there is none. Inertia alone can do this for you if the edge is at an angle to the direction the object is moving at.

And yes, deforming objects requires moving parts of them relative to others, and whenever something is moved, momentum is involved. What I meant was knocking the whole target back without doing much harm, not moving one part of a bone relative to the other until you exceed the elastic limits - even though, technically, both is movement. Pretty much any martial artist will differentiate between slower kicks with a lot of weight behind them to stop or knock down a target and fast kicks to damage the target. I don't know what the English terms are, but in German we talk of "Fußstoß" vs "Fußtritt", at least in Ju Jutsu.

EDIT, @OP: For your project, the most important concepts you'll need to elaborate on are inelastic collisions and fracture mechanics, with especially the latter quickly becoming way too difficult for school-level physics. Luckily, your teacher probably won't know that much about it either.

[Spiryt]

What I meant was knocking the whole target back without doing much harm, not moving one part of a bone relative to the other until you exceed the elastic limits - even though, technically, both is movement. Pretty much any martial artist will differentiate between slower kicks with a lot of weight behind them to stop or knock down a target and fast kicks to damage the target. I don't know what the English terms are, but in German we talk of "Fußstoß" vs "Fußtritt", at least in Ju Jutsu.

Push kicks, teeps, or whatever any other martial art is calling them cannot be really compared to mace, axe, hammer or anything like that.

Human legs, hips etc. are way more massive, soft, things on hinges with a lot of give, that indeed can push something forward with relatively slow and steady application of force.

With any sort of steel/lead hammer it's not really possible... no matter how much weight of the body one will try to put behind the blow while still making it 'slow' it will still concentrate force on smaller area, and stop way more rapidly, inflicting bigger force on target.

I can't really imagine any weapon actually 'pushing' the target back, even stuff like baseball bat at most can shake head on the neck very violently...

Which is obviously usually very fatal.

By 3rd newton's law it's very understandable too - if a momentum of hand held weapon was to actually push something back.... Then hands and other parts of the striker would pushed back as well due to this momentum.

If someone push kicks someone, proper technique means that large bones, muscles and tendons in leg, hips, back can take this impact 'safely'.

[Autolykos]

Please don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that getting hit by a sledgehammer is harmless, or comparing its effects to kicks. I was just using the concept to illustrate the differences between high-momentum, low-energy hits and low-momentum, high-energy hits. It's relative. Even the fastest kick will probably have more momentum for its energy than the heaviest hammer.

[Spiryt]

And it still will probably do much more 'local' damage, than actual momentum tranfer on larger scale.

To actually push something one generally needs less 'focusing' tools, like feet or shields - that will indeed push something back on impact.

I was just using the concept to illustrate the differences between high-momentum, low-energy hits and low-momentum, high-energy hits. It's relative.

Well, it just seems to me that even with very low energy high momentum hits with something like large mallet won't probably do much in terms of 'pushing' roughly human sized target. Bricks or whatever can be sent flying, but few bricks together will already get cracked.

Can be wrong, of course.

[Autolykos]

Yeah, it won't be much. We're probably talking about 5% of the energy wasted vs 2% of the energy wasted, or something like that. I mainly mentioned it because part of the energy *will* always go this way and some nitpicker was going to point it out otherwise (and physics teachers are amongst the worst nitpickers ever).

Edit: I just quickly ran over the numbers (with a lot of simplifications). Assuming a war hammer weighing 1kg, a sledge hammer weighing 10kg, the target (including armor) weighing 100kg and the strike being made at 10m/s, the war hammer will waste 1% of its energy, the sledge hammer 10%. Still not much, but significantly more. Once you factor in that the war hammer will probably be quite a bit faster, the difference will become even greater.

[Spiryt]

Warhammer will be much faster, but good deal of weight involved in striking (wielders own arm/back/shoulder mass) will be constant though.

So with smaller weapon one can still hit pretty hard, while it maneuverability and general versatility will be much greater.

the war hammer will waste 1% of its energy, the sledge hammer 10%

Well, energy 'wasted' should probably be pretty much always in marks, cause movement of larger part of target will pretty often be damaging on it's own right though.

[Autolykos]

Let's just conclude that reality is complicated, and leave it at that. You could probably fill an entire book (or at least a rather long paper) with this problem alone.
EDIT: "On hitting people with hammers" would be a pretty cool title, though. I'm just not sure if the introduction should quote "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" or "Hammer Smashed Face".

[Matthew]

Just wanted to mention that I have been reading the Gesta Tancredi recently, and that it has quite a lot of military detail in it. The effectiveness of armour is reiterated there, with Tancred shown piercing the armour of his enemies in explicit contrast to its usual effectiveness.

[Straybow]

Oooh, now that the rapier vs broadsword fest has died down I thot I'd stir the pot:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcMF3cwYabo

I don't speak German but here's a test in which the katana's untempered back edge causes it to deform inelastically when striking a clamped test blade, while the diamond cross-section longsword breaks the test blade.

Not that you'd ever hit a weapon so firmly held that it would be sundered rather than just knocked out of the hand...

[Storm Bringer]

Oooh, now that the rapier vs broadsword fest has died down I thot I'd stir the pot:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcMF3cwYabo

I don't speak German but here's a test in which the katana's untempered back edge causes it to deform inelastically when striking a clamped test blade, while the diamond cross-section longsword breaks the test blade.

Not that you'd ever hit a weapon so firmly held that it would be sundered rather than just knocked out of the hand...

I've seen that one before, and i;m pretty sure it's on one of this threads forebears somewhere.

still pretty good, though.

[Yora]

Ah that one. I think it's rather questionable.

Katana striking longsword, longsword striking longsword.
What about katana striking katana, or longsword striking katana?

And again, this is a test performed under conditions that are impossible in reality.

At the beginning, they demonstrate a couple of moves that can not be performed with a katana. The entire middle part can be summed up as "results are the same".

An important thing to note is, that the katana was apparently much more used outside of warfare against unarmored opponents, similar to a rapier. When samurai went to war, the primary weapons were spears and bows. Compact size and leightweight construction was an important factor, long-term durability not so much.
On the other hand, longswords were weapons meant for war. Comparing the two would be a bit like comparing a revolver with a rifle.

[Spiryt]

I can't understand much German, and the quality is rather poor, so maybe they have something to support their points and show convention...

But it seems really like another of them silly programs.

Although it wonderfully illustrates why one swords in fact weren't used to wham them into solid metal bars/objects fixed in place firmly....

The sword they were striking against doesn't really look good to me, although hard to tell with that grain.... Like some very cheap overbuild stuff. not that it matters much.

It pretty much repeats standard problem - "das samurai schwert ist" like it was one or even just 10 design of Japanese sword, without counting individual details...

On the other hand, longswords were weapons meant for war.

Well, no, not at all. There's plenty of 'civilian' examples at least since 14th century, and even more "war" longsword would always be, like most swords kind of 'personal' weapon.

In fact katana and longsword are pretty comparable, all in all, because they both most probably evolved from cavalry weapons to two handed personal weapons, both very prized and associated with dedicated warrior class.


The effect of bending at the spine is pretty cool looking, at least.

[mcv]

Oooh, now that the rapier vs broadsword fest has died down I thot I'd stir the pot:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcMF3cwYabo

I don't speak German but here's a test in which the katana's untempered back edge causes it to deform inelastically when striking a clamped test blade, while the diamond cross-section longsword breaks the test blade.

Not that you'd ever hit a weapon so firmly held that it would be sundered rather than just knocked out of the hand...

I've seen that video before (though I thought it was in English). It's in no way a serious comparison. Mostly just dramatic showing-off.

The moves they show that a longsword can do but a katana can't, are pretty exotic, and don't exactly make a terribly convincing argument. There are many much more interesting, common and useful moves that a longsword can do and a katana can't, but you need to know a bit about swordfighting to recognize that they're different, and they probably don't look as good on TV. Of course there are also moves that you can do with a katana but can't or won't easily do with a longsword (though not as many, I think).

As for the cutting through a sword, well, you're never going to hit a sword that way, so it's not a very useful test. That said, it doesn't surprise me that much that the longsword does better on it than the katana. This particular longsword at least seems to have a much broader blade, which probably helps to keep it from deforming the way the katana does, and that makes sense too, because I think the katana is actually better against lightly armoured targets, instead of steel armour. So the longsword will have been designed to be better at hitting steel.

But more importantly, how have these two swords been constructed? With medieval smithing techniques? With modern steel working technology? That sort of stuff matters quite a bit. Modern steel doesn't tell you much about how the historical swords would have performed. But historical swords' quality could vary wildly, so it's still hard to make a fair comparison.

The makers of this show won't care, though. They just want something cool to show on TV.

[Straybow]

I don't know what they're saying, but at the end it looks like the guy hand forged the longswords himself.