[ThomasPowers]

Lets see I would do that as 1 core piece + 1 edge piece equals 2 not 3, right?

San Mai is used to refer to a sandwich construction with lower carbon bread and a higher carbon meat. Not the literal translation but how it is used by bladesmiths.

This is more like a piece of bread with a lower carbon center and a higher carbon crust.

Much tricker to weld in some ways, particularly the point region. (I remember Al Pendray welding up a blade made from alternating wootz and patternwelded chevrons at Quad-State one year which is like the point problem only more so)

BTW on your website you mention wootz as being medieval but never that pattern welding was early medieval as well, also the glossary doesn't have an entry for pattern welding and I would suggest the term "central asia" instead of India when describing the origins of wootz. (BTW have you picked up a copy of Dr Feuerbach's dissertation on "Crucible Steel in Central Asia" very interesting.) Also if that is a double lunged bellow in that picture it would date to the renaissance and not to the middle ages---came into smithing from the gold smiths that were using them first while the medieval smith was using paired single lunged bellows; but I'm sure you know all that and it was just a bobble in the description.

Will you be at Quad-State this year? I hope to drive in from NM for it.