The one line summary: Rapiers average about 1.22kg, and most good repros match that.

Lengths and weights of rapiers from the Wallace Collection compared with rapiers listed by Kult of Athena.

Data collection: search for "rapier" in the Wallace Collection and Kult of Athena, and collecting data for length, blade length, and weights for the rapiers. This gives 129 rapiers in the Wallace Collection, and 36 from Kult of Athena.

Warning: reproduction rapiers appear to usually have much less distal taper than antiques (reproduction blades are usually thinner at the base than antiques), so even if the weight and length are the same, the handling could be quite different.

For an overall comparison, we can plot weights against lengths for the antiques and the different manufacturers:

• Weight vs total length

• Weight vs blade length

The overall impression is that, generally, weights are similar, but the repros are shorter.

Comparing just the lengths and weights separately:

• Total length

• Blade length

• Weight

The difference in total lengths and blade lengths between the Wallace Collection and the various manufacturers (with more than 1 model in the comparison) is statistically significant except for Cold Steel (which only has 2 models and thus a large statistical uncertainty). Notched boxplots are available at the end of the complete set of graph if you want to see the comparison with graphical display of the statistical uncertainty in the medians included.

The only statistically significant difference in weight between a manufacturer and the Wallace rapiers is for Hanwei (the Hanwei rapiers are lighter).

For completeness, the weights per unit length:

• Weight per unit total length

• Weight per unit blade length

The differences in weight per unit total length are mostly not statistically significant; the statistically significant ones are Fabri Armorum (heavier per mm) and Hanwei (lighter per mm). For unit blade length, the uncertainty in the Wallace rapiers is lower (blade length is listed for almost all of their rapiers, but the total length is only listed for about 1/3 of them (48 out of 129)), and the only manufacturer without a statistically significant difference is Windlass (Hanwei is lighter per mm, and the rest are all heavier per mm).

For the means, here are the mean lengths and weights, and the statistical uncertainties (i.e., the standard errors in the means):

	TL (m)	Unc.	BL (m)	Unc.	W(kg)	Unc.
Wallace Collection	1.252	0.002	1.0930	0.0006	1.224	0.002
Albion	1.1	NA	0.9	NA	1.3	NA
Arms & Armor	1.13	0.01	0.955	0.009	1.24	0.02
Cold Steel	1.20	0.05	0.99	0.04	1.28	0.08
Deepeeka	1.1	NA	1.0	NA	1.33	NA
DelTin	1.149	0.004	0.969	0.004	1.22	0.01
Fabri Armorum	1.113	0.001	0.89	0.01	1.35	0.05
Hanwei	1.16	0.02	0.98	0.02	1.02	0.02
Windlass	1.165	0.007	0.948	0.004	1.23	0.03

The mean POBs are:

• Wallace: 121mm (uncertainty of 4mm)

• KOA (all manufacturers): 77mm (uncertainty of 7mm)

The Wallace POBs are measured from the guard block (thus include the ricasso) while the KOA POBs appear to be measured from the extreme tip end of the guard, so these aren't measurements of the same thing.