Coulton Cline

I’m not too familiar with doing fullers yet but I have been playing around with them lately. I know I’m very late to respond to this but hopefully my limited experience can help. I’ve found personally that grinding the flat profile first to establish the shape and lines helps and then grind in a shallow fuller. Leave it fairly thick and very shallow before heat treat to avoid warping though. Made that mistake and it’s nit a fun one. Still learning on this process but hope it helps. And I don’t think the patterns on the spine would look weird in a fuller. I think it depends on what wheel you use for the fuller.

Little late to the post but I love reading this. I will be taking notes and hitting the forge soon to make my own :). Thanks Emiliano! A true help and guide as always!

Thanks everyone! All this information is super helpful. Sorry for the late responses. My work keeps me pretty busy through the day. Alan, thank you for that! What you said makes a lot of sense. Especially work knives being pretty simple and a pattern welded Seax being more of a Mont Blanc situation lol! Cracks me up haha.

Thanks Daniel! I can see what you’re saying. The patterns do look rather similar. In the book I have on the sword in 5-7th century England it has a graph that shows the patterns and also how many bars where used and such as time went on. The “viking” and migration patterns do tend to run together now that you mention it. I wonder if knives of that period were also pattern welded? I know it wasn’t very common, although most common smiths make them pattern welded for beautiful aesthetic reasons. I’m curious as to wether their knives were as decorated as their swords?

Daniel, Thanks man! I actually have that book and have began reading and researching it! It’s an excellent book and full, FULL, of information. I picked up about a week ago I believe? I’ll have to check that link out! Spears are definitely a route I’d like to explore. What you’re saying about the art style makes sense, especially it being so close to the anglo-saxon style. Valsgärde will be helpful to look up also, thank you! Alan, Haha I enjoyed your comments! Would it be safe to assume that by looking at Germanic work as far as forge welding/pattern welding, and blade shapes etc. be a reasonable option as far as creating Vendel type knives? I’ll need to read some more in my book (the one Daniel mentioned) and maybe that will help some more as well. Swords are in the future for me for sure, but I’d like to maybe start with something more familiar in shape. I’ve seen some seax blades that Petr Florianek has made influenced by the Vendel era, and it was making me wonder as well. So here we are. I don’t see to many people making knives from that time in history. Or if they do it’s always a “viking” knife. Plus I saw a photo of Paul Mortimer in his kit, with a seax that was very unusual for a seax I’m used to seeing. Your comment helped a bunch! I’ll have to back track and do some digging it would seem. Thank you!

Thank you, Alan!

Oh thank you! I appreciate the help! This is all pretty new to me !

Hello all! While I’ve been smithing awhile, I am very new to the forums. I’ve been registered for awhile now but it’s about time I use the forums and learn more. I am posting this to ask if anyone has any websites or books or information on Vendel finds regarding seax blades? I’ve seen several smiths make Vendel seax blades based on grave finds etc., but can’t seem to find anything at all when I start searching away. Am I missing something? As far as viking age stuff goes I have a few sources and friends I can refer to, but the Vendel era is a new interest of mine and it’s catching my interest more and more every day! Any help would be wonderful! Thank you!

@Justin Mercier thanks for the clarification on the wolfsteeth process Sir! I really, really value what you’ve told me. I understand the process much better now thank you!

Thanks John! That answered my question perfectly! Now I know what to try when I get my chance to try it again in the near future. You guys have done an excellent job with this piece

Thanks for sharing guys! I saw that Emiliano had shared some pictures via Instagram and we talked about it a bit and I have to say, I’m glad he pointed me here. I really enjoyed reading all of this! I learned a lot and the blade is absolutely beautiful! I do have a question though, and I might have misread, but was it just the edge bar with the teeth? Was the iron just hammered on by force or was it given wolf teeth as well?