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I did four hearth runs, all wagon tire scraps charge as one piece each, stuck vertically in the fire: I also decided to cook a steak! I was skeptical when I first heard of this method, but it’s not a crazy as it looks! No ash really stuck and it mostly just tasted like steak.

Not bladesmithing or knife related, but today I rebuilt my old BB gun. That's a 4.5mm air rifle to you in the rest of the world. Nothing fancy, just a ca. 1981 Daisy Powerline 880. I dug it out of the closet last year when a friend bought an adult-sized Daisy Red Ryder to pass time during lockdown. I found out that the seals had gone bad. It still worked, sort of, but it was hard to pump and wouldn't hold a charge for long. A couple of weeks ago I was looking at it, thinking about buying a new one, when I discovered the new ones are plastic and made in China. Found a guy who sells the se

Hey Everyone, I just want to make all those interested in Wootz Steel aware that we have now launched the International Wootz Society. It has been almost a year in planning and setting up, and we are now open and accepting members. The Society is for smiths, collectors, historians, researchers and anyone who is interested in the production, history or identification of historical crucible steels. We will be having testing of smiths and certification of standards of skill level for those who desire it. We also aim to educate the public with correct historical and technical information concern

This is getting somewhere. I found out that it's 14 years since I cast this blade. The blade was cast using a bronze age process, while I was still doing living history in Archeon. Back then the intention was to also finish the sword with authentic means. But the cast was not refined enough to do that, and would have cost me a hundred hours or so to finish the blade alone to a good enough reproduction. But with modern files it's a piece of cake. I rough ground one surface. The other side requires some more material removal, so I first take the mechanical shape corrector (angle grinder) to it,

Started another basket hilt for my dad's birthday in August. He'd made a blade for one maybe 15 years ago, but never got any further, so I borrowed it from him. It's a reproduction of the William Cleland sword from the 1670's, which was owned by a distant ancestor. It's an older style, and I figured it would be easier to make as it's simpler, but it turns out that trying to make a faithful copy of a particular piece is much more challenging than just making something in the same general style, as you're trying to intentionally reproduce a bunch of stuff that just kinda happened by accident on

I said I won’t be able to do anything until next week but it kept calling me every time I looked at it. I contacted the Fisher museum and got some good info. I was made in the early 20’s and sold in 1932 . If it was sold in the year it was made they ground off the last two digits and rest amped it the year it was sold because they warranted it for one year. He also said it was a 350 / 400 pounder. He told me it was okay to wire wheel it lightly and give it a coat of light oil. so here’s what it looks like now.

Done. The blade is actually ball bearing encased in AK5 stainless, which I first overforged somehow, as its quite bit softer under hammer than 52100 and then it etched also quite dark, which I didnt expected. The chloride eats it like nothing. Well well. Next time.

Before you file flush, make sure all the points of the star are as far into the inlet as they'll go. Gentle hammering with a chasing hammer is okay, but the chasing burnisher used to smear the silver to fit the inlets back when I was inlaying silver into the iron head is better. It's more accurate and the force is concentrated. The burnisher, driven with a small chasing hammer. The inlay after burnishing down the points. File flush and sand as usual. And one thing I didn't show on the other inlay, but since I'm sharing so many lit

This is an idea I've been fiddling with in my head. I had the forge hot and decided to go for it. It's a mezzaluna challenge coin thingee. End of a bar, forged out to silver dollar size. I gave it an overnight etch in white vinegar and a hand scrub at 600. It's not sharp yet, and it's going to need a little pocket protector. What do you think?

Speaking of lightening the casting, I’ll be grinding out the hollow space somewhat to dial in the balance point to that of the original. It’s very close, but at this point, I want to nail it.

Plugging away. Redoing the peen block for better gesture. Lots of final clean up, details & polishing before shipping off to the gold plater. Got the eyes gouged out to the stone setter’s satisfaction. They’ll be pear cut garnets, as garnet is the Norwich stone. Closing in!

good evening I present the work of a friend Tony Nancey French cutler a folding knife with a Sandwich blade in 90mcv8/pure silver/90mcv8/pure silver/90mcv8 Has this kind of work been done before?

The obligatory modeling pic

You may have lost the dendrites, but the watering is lovely.

The two photos added are a look at a reduction of thickness by a factor of 10. If the bar had still been in one piece it would be 40” long. I am not too exited about the pattern as the dendritic look has been lost. ….I am happy to have avoided a "stretched out" look.

Its actually forged 52100. The tang is fully taperred.

Hunting knife.

This morning I added another roll of #0000 steel wool and let it sit for a couple of hours. It did the trick, no heat and it hadn't eaten more than a quarter of the wool. It also turned black, which is a good sign. Now, to filter out the remaining wool and as much sediment as I can. Several layers of cheesecloth, another vessel, a funnel for the second filtration, and, of course, gloves. This won't burn you, but it will turn you dark orange for a week or so. I poured the jar contents through four layers of cloth into the bas

I finished a new knife. I know the proportions and the handle shape are not what I would like, but I leaned a bunch of new skills in this build. I used hidden pins to align the guards, spacers, and handle. It is also my first frame handle out of twist damascus. I also forged a large bar of W's, thank you Mr. States for the tutorial you posted in the brief lecture on pattern welding post. I believe I was successful, but we will see when I chop it up to stack.

Still cool

Here's a rough MS Paint sketch. With this kind of burner entry you don't really need a flare, the lower edge of the hole acts as a flame holder. And here's a link to hightemptools: http://www.hightemptools.com/supplies.html And here's a video of what a good swirl flame looks like. This is a blown burner, but the end result is the same.

Thank you for your feedback . I've been working on this project for 7 months with 2 friends, but I won't hide from you that it's very difficult to develop. so far out of 10 tests only two knives have been made. the blade is well forged. 11mm set ( 0.433071 ) of thickness to arrive at 4 mm (0.15748). We are looking to see if any cutlers in the world have already made this type of O2/pure silver/O2/pure silver/O2 sandwich forging knife. you can find my work on my facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Nancey Or on Les Couteaux de Tony.N . sur facebook.com

Made a start on a new project the other day. A comission for a longer bladed companion piece to the tanto I did a while back. Not a traditional Wakazishi (will not have a habaki/blade collar or handle wrap etc) ) but lighlty inspired by that style with 20 inch blade and 9 1/2 inch handle in a back scabbard. First was I needed to draw a pattern with the smaller (western styled) tanto for inspiration. Make a sheet steel template and select a suitable bar of steel and in this case it is 4.3mm 1075 Scribe the template onto the 1075 bar and grind to dimen

Exactly. And the fine silver won't tarnish, either!

Once it's pretty much flush with the wood and level on the back so there's no deeper pockets (if there's a deep spot in the middle the ends of the long points will raise up when you nail it on!), nail that sucker on. Adjust the outer points by gently hammering them down with a small hammer and file it truly flush. Fitted: Nailed: Flush. That's it for today. I'll do the other one tomorrow, and maybe some other stuff. I might take more pics of making the nails, if anyone's interested. It's much easier tha

I covered this in that other thread about fancy hawk handles, but I was already taking pics, so here you go. Draw a centerline, and draw a stop where you want the end of the star to go. Do this on both sides of the handle. The stars aren't identical, but nobody will ever notice that since they can't see both sides at once. They WILL notice if they aren't the same height on the handle, though, since they can see the tips from the back. Make the initial cuts with the exacto knife on one of the long points. This is your anchor. Once you have that one point i

It's also important to note the color will change a bit over time. It will get slightly darker, both from continued oxidation in the stain and from the fact that linseed oil yellows as it ages. This is exactly why I use this process instead of dyes and tung oil. It's fun to observe, and, as I often say, if you want something to have the feel of an antique, you have to make it with the same methods and tools. That includes finishes. Not all of these were stained with aquafortis, especially the ones with carving, since it doesn't do the grain any favors. The fanciest carved longrifles and

Another weekend, another photo dump of the day's activities. When lat we saw this, I had begun the process of wire inlay, and mentioned it was not playing along. Today, victory was achieved! Sort of, anyway... So what is wire inlay? It's not wire. It's thin strips of sheet stock. This is 0.018" / 24ga sterling silver. Just snip it off the sheet with shears. it'll be coiled up and corkscrewed, but that just makes it easier to anneal the first time. Anneal, then unroll it and file one edge sharp. This is the side that will go i

Looking good.

I had a problem with the blade I was working on and had to make another. The upsweep on the blaxe turned into a bade downsweep and while I would have been able to heat and re create the upsweep the blade is to be a working blade (I think it will get machete type work in Alaska bear woods) so didn;t want anything other than a first heat treat succes for the best blade integrity. Even the second blade lost nearly half of its upsweep so not sure what is going on but at least it is straight and true so have go the finish grind done and it is ready for hand sanding. top blaeis the

This is a rocking project.

This took quite a while, the blades on these are relatively simple but oh the ridiculous amount of small individually shaped pieces in the hilt add up in all there are 49 individually shaped and finished pieces in the sword Some time in the far far future I might hope to be able to do something even half as inticrate and detailed as the originals. They are just utterly mind boggling once you take a good hard look at them and how they are made

To lighten the casting, mostly. And also because it would be hard to have the investment run the full length of the handle, unattached, and not break during casting. Most castings in similar form would have drilled holes or similar support that would have to be plugged in the final metal form. The original had the same shield, somewhat loosely attached. I suspect it was for the same reasons. I’ll solder mine on before final finishing & gold plating.

Alas, wax. LOL.

Finished this one.

I agree with Brian that three burners is overkill. Once you've got the insulation in there, it'll be much smaller, like 13" x 8". And yes, bell reducers are not burner flares and do absolutely nothing. The taper is wrong. But they look cool, so somebody on the internet started using them and it caught on. Kind of like wide ties or skinny jeans, all looks and zero function . Sculpt the flare into the cast-o-lite 30. The angle is the same taper as a dixie cup. Finally, and this is down to personal preference, do you want a hot spot, or do you want fully even heat? Both have their advantag

Wonderful! Anybody wants to try this with 24k gold?

Very nice.

I think this is an awesome thread.

Very cool knife! I googled the melting point of copper (1085C) and silver (962C), same as cumai, so in effect 3 pieces of O2 silver soldered (not quite) together?

Now to make silver nails. The tricky bit is that you hold the tip of the wire in the inner cone of a propane torch flame until it melts and balls up on itself. The instant that ball forms, you have to get it out of the flame or it will drop off. Quench the ball end, especially if you're holding the wire in your bare fingers. This does anneal it, but it's cheap insurance against the end dropping off. Apologies for the blurry picture, this was the best of three attempts. The blob on the wire: Now check how deep your pilot hole is and cut t

You may notice the star has been annealed. The smaller points were not wanting to seat properly, so in a flash of inspiration I annealed the star. Note to self: do not do this after you've inlet the thing. It got a bit too hot and drooped. I had to put it back in the swage block and then use the inlet itself as a form to gently hammer it back to shape, then anneal again (more carefully!) before starting on the nails. First we need a hole for the nail. How big? The silver wire is 18 gauge, or 0.040 inches/1.02mm. To pass through the inlay without bind

Geoff covered it well. Rescued from a dumpster? Geez... ask the guy if he has any other valuable objects he doesn't want. He might have an old Lamborghini in the garage too.

Another attempt at a bronze sword hilt. Didn't work out, but was educational. The wood is alder, which I harvested some years ago. Unfortunately after I burned in the tang, there was still a drying crack there, making this one unusable. So I split it open, to see how the inside looked. As I've experienced before, the effect of the burning is paper thin. A tenth of a mm below the surface the wood is completely unaffected. Burning in the tang. The wood is kept wet in between burns. The tang is heated to below red (though in broad day light): The split handle: Th

Ready to inlay! I covered this in that pinned thread on page one, but you have to remember this is a flat piece of silver, and it needs to fit on a curved surface. You can either flatten the wood, or curve the silver. Always curve the silver. It just looks better, and is what you'll see on the old ones. How do you do that? Yep. Pad a swage block and use the eye drift. Make sure it's aligned right, then squash that sucker hard. Just push on it, don't hit it with a hammer or anything. It's silver, it'll bend. Not bad! I then l

I've used this pattern several times, but I tried something different on one of these: We often speak of "mystery steel", but this is "mystery wood". I salvaged it from a warehouse parts tray 20+ years ago. I don't know if it's tropical or composite. The dust had a unique smell and was kinda sticky. It was worth the try though. It looks great and polished out nicely with just some 0000 steel wool and olive oil. The blade is 4.5" and about 8.5" overall. It's made from 1084. This is from the same pattern and steel

I'm using the VFD you linked from Amazon on a 220V 3 Phase motor that is hooked to my disc grinder. It works just fine, and I like the fact I can run it in reverse. I use a KBAC 27D on my belt grinder.

My first blade totally from scratch. Thanks to all for the tips! Blade is of course 6150. The handle is made of oak i get in large blocks from a local mill. Brass rods are just 1/8" (ordering larger this is all home depot has) getting 1/4 from onlinemetals dot com. Great prices there! Anyways I also used loctite epoxy under the wood. Sanded and polished. Super smooth and super sharp!

I currently use canola oil for quenching. I keep it in a standing iron tube welded on to a steady plate, and heat it with a propane torch before I use it (up to about 60 degrees Celcius). I keep a thermometer in it so temperature is easy to read. 1075, 15n20 and similar steels for pattern welding react well in this oil. I use 5160 for mono steel blades and that works well also. I have a die grinder on the side in a fixture with an excentric wheel in the chuck. Just before it is time to quench I start the die grinder. This causes the whole bath to vibrate and this shortens the vapor phase.