Is this wrought iron?

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

I was in the junk yard the other day and seen a few of these old square headed bolts and they looked like wrought iron. So i brought one home to do the knick & break teast and im not 100% sure. It is different than some known wrought that i have. It didnt break though it did peal back like wrough but doesnt have the full string cheese look. Here is a picture.

This is a picture of some known wrought that i have.

  

 

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

Here is a more shallow nick. Could this be shear steel?

Edited June 12, 2018 by Jeremy Blohm

[Alan Longmire 1,792]

Spark it and see, but it looks like really clean wrought to me.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

It had quite a bit more sparks than the other wrought i have.i will get a picture of the spark

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

Known wrought 

Unknown material at question 

1 hour ago, Alan Longmire said:

Spark it and see

Seems like it has a fair amount of carbon 

[Alan Longmire 1,792]

It does indeed.  Might be shear steel, might not.  The next step is see if it hardens.  Then etch to see if there's a pattern.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

I plan on it. I am heading back to the scrap yard tomorrow to get the rest of the bolts. I also started making a vice mount for the receiver hitch for my truck so i can do the nick and break test at the yard.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

I bet there would be good contrast between it and the other wrought i have.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

I went back to the junk yard and i only found one more of these bolts. There was 3 more but i couldnt find the others. But on the upside the one bolt that was left is about 3/4x48 inches. Plus i found some other goodies 

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

I found the other 2 bolts today at the scrap yard. I probably have 20 lbs of this stuff now.

[Gary Mulkey 985]

I'm certainly no expert but the spark test sure looks like a fair amount of carbon.  However if it etches to the look that you want, who cares about carbon.  Use it.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

That what i was thinking and using good steel for the cutting edge. With all the different ways they made wrought iron its hard telling whats in it but it has me interested.

Edited June 21, 2018 by Jeremy Blohm

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

Im kinda hoping it has a good pattern and hardens good. I kinda wanna try it as some edge material.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

So i took a chunk of this from the nick and break test and flattened it a bit and quenched it in water. Im pretty sure it hardened. I tried putting it in a vice and breaking it but it wouldn't snap. It didn't bend either. I put it on the anvil and gave it a smack with a cross peen and no dent. I got caught up making some chainsaw damascus and I ran short on time to do further testing. Tomorrow im going to file test and polish and etch. So we shall see what happens. 

[Will Wilcox 199]

Take the piece and put it standing diagonally on your anvil, part on the face, and part on the horn. That way, theres empty space behind it. Then smack it in the center with a cross pein. See if it snaps. 

Either that or put it back in the vice, and get a monkey wrench. If its gonna break, that will break it.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

So i took an angle grinder with a flap disc and went to town polishing this up to etch it and it got really hot. Hot enough to over temper it. So i put it back in the forge and attempted to re-hardened it. And again put it in the vice but didn't break with a hammer. So i polished it back up but not really good still had some grind lines in it but i dropped it in sulfuric acid and no pattern. Im sorry for no pictures but i broke my phone and have to use the wife's phone for internet and she wont allow me to take it in the shop.

2 hours ago, Will W. said:

Take the piece and put it standing diagonally on your anvil, part on the face, and part on the horn. That way, theres empty space behind it. Then smack it in the center with a cross pein. See if it snaps. 

Either that or put it back in the vice, and get a monkey wrench. If its gonna break, that will break it.

I will give these suggestions a shot thank you. 

I might use it to make some wrought-mascus for the core bar of a project i need to get started on.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

So working with this material and working the wrought i have this is a lot harder to move.its like working d2 vs w2. The wrought i have been using is like working butter but this stuff is really hard. 

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

Ive been trying to find some more wrought and I have had this splitting wedge i bought at a yard sale last year and it just occured to me what it is.

[Jeremy Blohm 369]

What's the chances this is wrought iron? 

 

 

Here is the wood that came out of it.

 

 

Also I think I found a weld seam. I will get a picture of it after lunch.

 

[Alan Longmire 1,792]

54 minutes ago, Jeremy Blohm said:

What's the chances this is wrought iron? 

 

99.5% from what I can see.  That line is fairly diagnostic.  

[Brian Dougherty 670]

20 hours ago, Alan Longmire said:

That line is fairly diagnostic.  

What line are you seeing?  (I'm trying to lean, and not being a smartalec) 

I see a groove around the circumference, but would have assumed that was some sort of wear if I ran into it in the wild.

[Alan Longmire 1,792]

I am talking about that circumferential groove.  That's a weld line left from the billet they made the tire from.  Wagon tire is usually the nasty, gnarly stuff, single-refined merchant bar.  Whoever made that one needed a wider tire than they had stock for, so they welded another bar to it.  There's a tiny chance that groove is due to a flaw on the rollers of the tire bender, but since it shows on the inside as well that's not likely.  Longitudinal striations on rusty metal are a decent indicator of wrought iron built up from smaller bars.  And that's how things worked when wrought was king.  Iron was sold in a few standard sizes after rolling mills became common, (and before rolling mills it was sold in three-foot bars of 1"x2", more or less) so if you wanted something nonstandard you made it by welding up a bunch of smaller stock.  Even after rolling mills became the norm, you often find tie rods (the kind in brick buildings, not steering components) being made by bundling a bunch of smaller rods, welding them up, and re-rolling them into a thicker rod.  This shows up in the etched cross-section.   

 

Also, most (but certainly not all!) metal tires on wooden wagon wheels tend to be wrought, unless they were made/replaced after around 1920-1930 in the states.  I've got around twenty of them, and only two have I found to be mild steel. One of those was arc-welded and the other was badly forge-welded and has quite a lump at the seam.  The metal tires on steel wheels you find on horse-drawn equipment are almost always steel, not iron.  

[Brian Dougherty 670]

Thanks Alan, makes perfect sense

 

[Zeb Camper 627]

On 11/6/2019 at 11:28 AM, Alan Longmire said:

  I've got around twenty of them, and only two have I found to be mild steel. One of those was arc-welded and the other was badly forge-welded and has quite a lump at the seam.  The metal tires on steel wheels you find on horse-drawn equipment are almost always steel, not iron.  

 First off, I'm jealous! 

Second, I have a really thick and heavy wagon tire that's really soft and etches pretty much white. You can forge it cold and actually works kind of like copper. It presents a very lifeless spark pattern and has no imperfections that I can see. Would you say it's highly refined wrought, or something else?