What is it called in English? "Buttereisen"

[J.Leon_Szesny 15]

I cant find a definitive translation

the website translates it into "forging iron" although

the direct translation would be "butter iron"

 

im kinda confused it says

"0.03% carbon which is less carbon than Pure Iron"

but then it lists "pure iron 0.02% carbon content"

 

wrought iron I read has 0.05% carbon 

so..
what is this stuff?!

 

[Alan Longmire 2,714]

It's called "Pure Iron" or 00 iron in the U.S.A.  It was made several years ago by a guy looking to replace wrought iron, and as far as I knew the batch is gone now.  I have some, and it does forge like butter.  Even cold.  It barely work hardens.  It's soft enough you can easily bend a 1cm round bar in your bare hands.

 

I made a small axe from it once, with a high carbon steel edge of course.  just ahead of the eye it was about 3cm x 1cm.  It bent the first time I tried to use it.  So: good for decorative work that won't be stressed, bad for things that actually get used.  It etches bright, having little manganese.  But, if used in damascus it will lower the overall carbon content quite a bit via carbon migration, so be aware.  If you mix it equally with a 1% carbon steel, in other words, the final damascus billet will average 0.5% carbon by the time it's forged out. 

[J.Leon_Szesny 15]

wow that sounds amazing!

I thought the name was mostly just for show.
I already ordered some from angele here in germany(they got some in stock not sure how much or how long)

 

how'd you think it do for woodworking chisels?
from the sound of it now im afraid the neck might bend like a spoon.

although im looking to mostly try making japanese plane blades, kiridashi, other kogatana from it.

 

for a laminated kitchen knife it sounds like the tang would def like to bend...maybe even upwards.

I really didnt think that it was THAT soft!

[Alan Longmire 2,714]

It really is that soft!  Certainly not suitable for chisels.  That said, it would be great for a laminated yanagi-ba as long as you took the steel into the tang as well.  You could hammer out the quench warp with no worries at all.  It is more or less slightly harder than pure copper.

[Al Massey 62]

3 hours ago, Alan Longmire said:

It's called "Pure Iron" or 00 iron in the U.S.A.  It was made several years ago by a guy looking to replace wrought iron, and as far as I knew the batch is gone now.  I have some, and it does forge like butter.  Even cold.  It barely work hardens.  It's soft enough you can easily bend a 1cm round bar in your bare hands.

 

I made a small axe from it once, with a high carbon steel edge of course.  just ahead of the eye it was about 3cm x 1cm.  It bent the first time I tried to use it.  So: good for decorative work that won't be stressed, bad for things that actually get used.  It etches bright, having little manganese.  But, if used in damascus it will lower the overall carbon content quite a bit via carbon migration, so be aware.  If you mix it equally with a 1% carbon steel, in other words, the final damascus billet will average 0.5% carbon by the time it's forged out. 

That's the reason I haven't used mild or wrought in layered damascus in 25 years. It's a very labour intensive way to make 1045 bar stock.

[Jerrod Miller 443]

FYI, I buy what we call ingot iron or cathode iron (depends on the vendor) for work regularly; I like to keep at least 1000 pounds on hand at all times.  A sample chemistry is below.  This stuff is readily available, but not overly cheap.  We last paid about $1.12 per pound for a ton of it, so about 6x the price of our mild steel (we buy pretty nice mild, there are even lower grades that would be cheaper).  We just use it when we need to dilute something in the melt bath, usually carbon.