Video: Watch as the guys from Baltimore Knife and Sword make a 400-year-old Dandao sword from China using some really old techniques and machinery. It’s awesome to see iron sand transformed into steel in a smelter that would be similar to the ones the Chinese used centuries ago. It’s almost cooler to see a block of steel get stretched out in a rolling mill that’s been used to make horseshoes for 80 years.
But the best part is seeing how damn hard it is to make the 400-year-old sword. Even with the aid of some modern cheats, turning sand into a steel blade takes so much work that it’s incredible that people actually managed to do it in the first place.