My Type 95 NCO Collection

[Bruce Pennington]

If you haven't already read them, I highly recommend reading through

Ohmura's Type 95 pages - Non-commissioned Officers Type 95 Gunto

Nick Komiya's - Evolution of the Type 95

Stu W's - IJA Type 95 Sword Info

and the NMB thread - Fake Type 95 NCO Swords

 

I tried to collect a fair representation of the various versions of the 95.  I now have 8.  I know a couple of guys that did that and wound up with 50 and 80! Ha!

 

I'll start with some overall pics.  As I began preparing for this post, I realized that many of my photos were taken back when I hardly knew anything about WWII swords, and certainly knew very little about how to take pictures of them.  Consequently, I'm going to take some time to get some good shots of them all and post as I go.

 

To begin, here are the 8, 4 Korkura/Tokyo 1st and 4 Nagoya

 

More to follow as I get good close-us!

 

[Bruce Pennington]

I got my copper handled 95 several years ago and paid almost twice the price of a standard 95, from a dealer, but I'm glad to have it.  The money is long gone, but the sword is still mine!

 

They only made the coppers for about 10 months, and just over 7,000 of them.  Mine is 2643, so just inside the first half.

 

 

All of them were made by Suya Shoten

 

Mine has a replacement saya throat, un-numbered.  I have seen a few of these over the years and believe they were a factory repair.

 

In hand, they are quite heavy.  I can see why they changed to an aluminum tsuka and lighter steel saya in the next version.

 

I always take mine apart for inspection and cleaning, however some guys recommend against it as they sometimes get some looseness in the fit once reassembled.  Other than an arsenal stamp and one of the "W"s, there is nothing to be seen by removing the tsuka on a 95.

Edited October 6 by Bruce Pennington

[TracA]

Bruce,

 

Nice start. I look forward to your posts about your collection. I know nothing about Japanese swords, but it's great that you have obtained a copper handled 95 with a number in the lower half. It's always great to be able to get something that is not really all that common.

 

All the best,

 

Tracy

[Bruce Pennington]

Around 1938, the Army revised the Type 95s using aluminum for tsuka and a lighter steel for the saya, and a drag was added.  I found one for a good price because someone over the years had painted it gold - even the blade!  Made between 1939 and 1942, by Iijima Token Seisakusho for the Tokyo 1st Amry Arsenal, final acceptance by the Kokura Army Arsenal.  Serial number 92605.

 

I discussed it at length with guys on a few websites and all agreed it was a post-war re-paint.  One guy had parents that worked in a theatre group and he said there was always a pile of swords in the corner backstage, all painted gold.  If you're doing The King and I, are you going to use a sword painted Army khaki green?  No, of course not!  So, they'd paint all their swords gold.

 

I decided to strip it with acetone.  After 1972, leaded paint was outlawed and the new paint comes off with acetone fairly easy.  If the paint were WWII vintage, it resists coming off and requires a lot more work.  I went after it, and sure enough, it came off pretty easy.  

 

Next, I talked to a friend that did really good model airplane paint work.  He agree to do the tsuka and told me how to do the saya.  The colors aren't an exact match to the real thing, and it looks too good, but it's a heck of a lot better than it was.  It's the 3rd one from the left in the first photo at the very top of the thread.

 

Edited October 13 by Bruce Pennington

[Bruce Pennington]

At some point in time, Nagoya made a few gunto with a side latch.  This is before the late-war, wooden handled versions.  They only made 4,000 of them, which makes them more rare than the copper handles!  Some are "Na" stamped, in the 130000 number range, and some are "Seki" stamped in the "200000" range.  I have one of each.

 

134112 came with a mottled green paint.  I, unfortunately, thought it to be a bad post-war Bubba job and stripped it off.  Since then, a couple more have popped up on the forums with the exact same paint scheme.  I think they were wartime legit.  Mine was very difficult to strip, a sign I learned later that indicates WWII paint, not modern.

 

202446

 

I have observed that the Quality Control run by the Nagoya arsenal was a bit looser than that of the Tokyo 1st Arsenal.  Note the starting point of the bohi on both sides.  You won't see that sort of sloppiness on a Tokyo 1st Type 95.

 

Of the two makes, the Seki Token often has stamps on the steel fuchi, though they are poorly struck and hard to see.

 

Number 9 on this chart - Seki Token .. NA .. Nagoya Army Arsenal

Edited November 22 by Bruce Pennington

[TracA]

Nice sword and write-up, Bruce.

 

Tracy