pudao

[Radplaiddude]

Can anyone recommend a strong steel pudao. I believe this is the same as the horse cutting sword. Alot I see advertised are the wushu quality. We have one at my school that is around 65 inches total with a 21 inch blade but the blade is real springy..

[Bacon]

Are you looking for a live blade or a dull training tool?

[Radplaiddude]

Are you looking for a live blade or a dull training tool?

Dull for trng

[Bacon]

Find a local steel worker who does custom jobs and get him to fabricate one to your desired size/weight. Then just pin it yourself or have him pin it onto a staff of your choice.

[Lucas]

hanwei forge does a pudao

[GeneChing]

Pudao usually have shorter blades, akin to what you are describing is at your school, Radplaiddude. Horse-cutting, aka madao, sometimes have a longer blade, closer to the length of a dao. That is a soft distinction, however, as some schools use the terms indiscriminately. Also worthy of note, there is a more esoteric pole arm called a horse cutter - see our Horse chopper. I've never seen a form with this particular weapon. I'm sure this is not what you are looking for.

We carry two pudao, one for wushu and one from Dragon Well. The wushu version is very popular. The Dragon Well is currently out of stock, and frankly, I don't know when it will come back into stock, if ever. It wasn't very popular and Dragon Well raised its prices and lowered its quality recently, so we might no longer carry some of their items anymore.

[GLW]

You also list :

http://www.martialartsmart.com/45-82wuc.html

The two piece idea for travel and such is kind of nice. It really doesn't affect the usability of the weapon as long as you are not expecting to do duei lin or rough stuff with it.

However, one thing that would make this even better - you have a 65" reported length. That is 5' 5" long. I am 6'1" and prefer a weapon a bit longer. Having an extender would be easy, and inexpensive. Basically, you could sell the extension as an extra. It would have the screw on pieces that the other two pieces have and you would screw the extender to the bottom piece and then connect the top piece to the extender. This piece could be between 12" and 18" long. It would open up your LONG weapons to those of us who would like a LONG weapon.

[GeneChing]

I totally forgot about that one. It's new this year.

And you are spot on about an extension piece, however I doubt that it's something that we would have manufactured. Frankly, I'm not sure the sales of such an item would warrant production (ordinarily, you'd think it would, but this is Chinese manufacturing, so we'd probably get way overcharged to something like that). That being said, it's a standard pipe size and thread, so I imagine it wouldn't be too hard for someone to make one on their own.

[GLW]

What WOULD work would be if it turns out that you guys have more two piece long weapons...you could then have a standard size for all of them...and the piece would then be usable for things like the Madao, Tiger Fork, Monk Spade, etc....

Just an idea. I can recall when it was impossible to get a Jian or Dao of any type that was long enough for me. And it was worse for pants....going from L to XL to XXL they really didn't (an often still don't) get longer....they just get bigger around. So, you get where you have to ask "Does XL mean TALLER or FATTER?"

[GeneChing]

...it's a great idea, just not financially viable at this time. The market for such items is pretty small unfortunately. Right now, we don't carry that many two-piece pole arms. The pudao we are discussing is actually an experimental product and it's way too early to know if it's even viable as is. We'll just have to see how it all goes.

Right now, there's a trend towards metal-shafted weapons because there is a looming white waxwood shortage. Weapon makers are trying to get us to move towards metal shafts because they are easier for them to manufacture. We've been sent all sorts of samples. When there's a good one, I always try to get it. These are the perks of my job. I have a metal-shafted Kwan Dao and Monk Spade (not the ones shown obviously; I just do that to plug product out of reflex). The spade is one-piece. The Kwan Dao is two-piece but an entirely different gauge than these pudao (different maker). It would be totally cool if they fit. If I could have one pole shaft and a selection of different screw-on blade heads, that would be the bomb. Actually, I don't play that many long weapons anymore, but it would still be kind of cool.

Sizing is a huge issue and I feel for you. I can't begin to tell you the issues we have with shoe sizes. Our makers are in Asia and they don't have a lot of larger people to make patterns, so indeed, the taller/fatter issue you've encountered doesn't surprise me at all.

I wish we could be more accommodating more quickly, but we're bound to follow the market and the market just doesn't support this quite yet. Baby steps.

[Syn7]

What are those things that look like a Chinese broadsword with a really long handle? Is that a Madao?

[Shadow_Trickery]

Personally I only train with Pudaos with live blades. I see no point in practicing without a semblance of real application, in fact I find it pathetic.

[Syn7]

Are you saying you think it's pathetic to train with a dull weapon?

[pazman]

train with Pudaos

real application

Pick one, Star Wars Kid.

[bawang]

What are those things that look like a Chinese broadsword with a really long handle? Is that a Madao?

thats called a pudao