Unified Weapon Masters

[Siggi]

Hey guys, check out this website: http://uwm.tv/

I heard about this project just yesterday and it looks interesting (and somewhat riddle-of-steel'ish, I should say).

So, have anybody heard anything about this? Not that I like their first video very much, but the idea looks promising.

[higgins]

I stumbled upon that about a month ago.

The first thing I'll say is that any popular sport outlet for "professional swordsmen" is good, as it would bring more popularity to the weapon based martial arts in general.

That said, the intelligent armor is most likely prohibitively expensive for those of us that won't be engaging the sport full time like a professional athlete does.

And I'm also surprised by the weight of their armor, as I'd have thought fiberglass would be much lighter than steel. The 25kg (55lb) weight they list on their website is pretty much on par on what we mostly wear in HMB, except for the buhurt category, in which all the gear can weigh almost 40kg (88lb) when you include the sword & shield.

A proper buhurt-safe helm will weigh around 7kg (15lb) alone (padding and maille protection included).

[Agamemnon]

Having watched some of it myself, I think the weight may actually be due to what the suits are for - they don't just protect, they have "inbuilt fore measurement technology," per the website. Not only are they protecting the dude in the suit, they are protecting the sensors that are built into the suit that records the blows, which is why both men look rather pot-bellied, I would suspect. The men shown sparring are clearly lacking in bear guts outside of the suits.