Spearheads

Cold Steel makes a variety of spears.

Bo Randall used to make spears. I saw them on a visit to the Randall Knives shop in Orlando last year. The serious ones were on steel conduit shafts. Probably a little expensive if you could find one for sale at all.

I used to be a devotee of Kult Of Athena, but I just don't have the money for that sort of thing anymore. Cold Steel makes a great Boar Spear, to which I can attest to it's usefullness in living up to it's name. I used one on a (stocked and guided) boar hunt in Germany half dozen years ago.

There's an outfit called "Museum Replicas" which sells what they describe as being "fully functional" reproductions of antique edged weapons, including spear points/blades. You might find something more well-suited for your purposes there. IIRC, they do not sell or provide the wooden shafts for their spears, but include dimensional/fitting data and materials recommendations to help you find a suitable piece locally.

I purchased several repro swords and a few daggers, etc. from them over the years, but that was back before the company was purchased from Hank Reinhardt by an Indian outfit called "Windlass Steelcrafts" several years back. While I was uniformly very favorably impressed with the quality of the materials and workmanship displayed in the items I purchased from them back then, I can't say whether the current owners have held to the same standards or not.

Get a naginata. This one looks nice. http://getasword.com/632-naginata.html

Bushman + good staff was my choice. Cost less than $30 total, works like a charm.

Here's some good discussion:

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=470958&highlight=spear

This thread makes me want to forge a spearhead...

Here is the link to Museum Replicas, mentioned earlier. The company is an offshoot of Atlanta Cutlery, which was founded by Bill Adams, and sold by him to Hank Reinhardt. Windlass Steelcrafts is a cutlery/weapon maker based in India, and has been associated with Atlanta Cutlery for decades; they make the official UK contract Kukri Knives for the Gurkha regiments. They also have made most of the weapons sold by Museum Replicas for many years now, and in fact purchased both Atlanta Cutlery and Museum Replicas from Reinhardt not long before he died. Their quality is pretty good and their prices are reasonable. You'll see at the link that spearheads average around $40.00

Sarco has German Lanses
http://e-sarcoinc.com/miscedge.aspx

If I had some spare cash...

This site has links to lots of Sword and Spear vendors.
http://www.sword-buyers-guide.com/index.html

Good selection here.
http://www.kultofathena.com/spears.asp

Good selection here.
http://www.kultofathena.com/spears.asp

Click to expand...

I have the Windlass Viking spearhead shown on this link, and my son has the Windlass Greek spearhead. Both appear to be very high quality and from some of my research seem to be pretty authentic reproductions, in both design and construction. Both are mounted on 1 1/4" ash shafts and have buttcaps (also shown) attached on the other end. The buttcaps really help to balance the spear and also protect the wood.

The only good spears made in recent years by reputable makers are probably the German boar spears by Carl Schleiper (Eye Brand) and Puma.

Sasha Siemel forged his own spear heads for hunting jaguars, although I saw a photo of him with one head that may have been made by Randall.

He killed big (to 400 pound) jaguars with those.

If you are serious, be prepared to spend a lot and to get the spear from a custom knifesmith who gets intrigued with the project. Also, check local laws.

Lone Star

Agreed, I've seen perfectly acceptable quality spears for as little as $45.

In order to make a "good" spear, what are the key points? Head to shaft connection, head design and heat treating, strong wood pole...

Am I missing something?

Not really. Good wood, good blade design, good socket design, and proper heat treat. That's it.