Strong Sword (No glue, assembles smooth! Also a story about banana bread)

Are you a sword enthusiast who knows a thing or two? Well, I'm not, and this was never about swords for me. It's always been about banana bread.

This all started two months ago when my friend, an actual clown, asked if I could print them a specific sword from Naruto. I haven't seen Naruto, and—as I said—I know nothing about swords, but I'm not one to shy away from a challenge, so I said "sure!"

Come to find out, Zabuza's sword is eight feet long. EIGHT FEET. It took me an entire month, two rolls of PLA, and thirty-five interlocking components to finish the project after a bunch of failures and mistakes on my part. It was a mess. I got literally sick from PLA fumes. Whatever, I'm not here to talk about THAT sword. I got it done, the clown bought it, and it's out of my hands now.

See, the problem is that I got confident afterwards. I'd printed an eight foot sword. It rocked. What else could I do? I did what every confident young person does, and I wrote about it in my Tinder bio. That's right. I said something corny like "anyone can buy you flowers, but I can make you a sword." I thought it was funny, and what was the worst thing that could happen? I'd have to print another (smaller) sword and meet someone new because of it?

Sure enough, someone matched with me soon after. Their bio said they were perfecting a recipe for banana bread, which is a huge part of why I swiped right. I like me some banana bread.

Naturally, I proposed a trade: A sword for a loaf, a loaf for a sword. And to my delight, this deal was struck between us. I sprang into action, opened up my license-expired Fusion 360 window (fun fact: they can't kick you out of the program if you keep the window open when your license expires), and began a new custom sword design.

There's something to be said about starting from scratch, and I really let my creativity loose on this thing: Spiral extrusions, wide revolves, and chamfers galore. Best of all, the Zabuza sword taught me how to make it all fit rigidly together without glue. Small pins join sections of the blade, and its two halves meet in a narrow dovetail. The hilt slides down over the blade, locking in place with the threaded handle. Not to toot my own horn, but this thing came out real elegant.

Eager for that sweet, sweet banana bread, I got back on Tinder to arrange a time and place for our trade, but alas! My match vanished. Unmatched me. No clear reason, just gone.

So here I am, loafless, with a sword I never wanted but can't bear to waste. May you enjoy it more than I have. If you do, I would greatly appreciate any tips sent to my Paypal link via the blue 'Tip Designer' button.

All tips will go directly to banana bread.