Mokume Gane

hi guys i was makind a knife the other day and was in the middle of desining the handle for it and thought it would look realy good with a mokume gane gard on it. only problem is i know next to nothing on the subject and was hoping you guys could help. eg can i just forge weld it to gether? do i need a flux? ect. any light sheed on this would be well recived

So in the future i would like to start making larger billets of nickel for a decent size billet of Mokume Gane i plan on just going in and tig welding nickels together using nickels i cut with a coping saw for filler metal to seal it entirely so I have a couple of questions 1. How should I clean the nickels before hand 2. How well will the nickels stick together will they constantly be wanting to fight me and shear apart? 3. How will this fair im a solid fuel forge? 4. Will I constantly be fighting cracks throughout this process? thanks again people

Hi everyone, I'm wanting to improve and solidify (no pun intended) my pattern welding and mokume gane skills. I've done a hand full of successful forge welds and one small piece of mokume gane. I'd like to make two (not overly large) belt buckles as vehicles for this learning curve, one pattern welded/damascus steel and one mokume gane (most likely copper and brass). I'm happy to work my way up to these projects (and knowing me, I'll only get to making them in about a year's time!) but it's good to have a goal. My plan is to make some square cross sectioned billets, then twist, forge slightly flat and then grind even flatter to expose the pattern. Provided …

Making up a new batch of copper/nickel mokume, and I was considering how I was going to pattern it. It seems like a feather pattern would be quite striking, but I don't know if it would work. First issue I see is that it would be a low-layer feather, just stack then cut, and I don't know how that would look. Second and main concern is forging the 2 cut pieces back together. From what I understand these non-ferrous metals won't stick to themselves. Has anyone ever tried this, or have any advice on how to do it?

I am trying to make a belt buckle from Mokume Gane, but I can’t find and material to do so. I don’t have the time or workspace currently to make my own billet. I have trying to find one to buy, but everywhere I look is either way to thin at like 20 ga sheets or not wide enough with all I can find being inch or inch and a half. Id like a roughly 3x5 sheet 1/8-3/16 thick. Any help sourcing would be appreciated

Howdy folks, I'm hoping to play around with making some Mokume soon, and was wondering if people had advice for some good metals to use. I've looked at a lot of pictures, and obviously silver and gold work great together, but I don't want to spend $$$ for just figuring stuff out. I'm planning on using quarters to start with, I'm sure they will keep me busy for a while. Are there other good common metals that look OK? I guess I'm mainly going for contrast so that the pattern can be seen easily. Thanks! R.C.

I've had the same problem with my mokume(quarters) and pattern welded steel. Which is, when forging the face everything goes great. When forging on the edge(hammering on the visible stacked layers) my billet begins delaminating very quickly. Everything looks good, check the edge on the grinder, then it splits. Just to save you all some time, I understand the science but my skills and equipment is where I'm short. Also, the mokume was hot when it split but not hot enough to crumble, the layers were solid when cold. Any tips or ideas are appreciated.

I found this series (linked below) And thought it would be a neat idea to make a series of pens with Mokume Gane. Ive collected the quarters that will be sacrificed but I've hit fatal issue. The videos linked below show himself building the pen off a lathe. I do not have such a tool. What would the best method to correctly form the body of the pens? edit: also I do plan on setting their birthstones on the pen clip hints on how to set gems would also be good! Thanks! Link removed due to advertising Link removed due to advertising Link removed due to advertising

Has anyone made copper brass or copper brass and quarter mokume in a kiln? If so would you mind sharing your process? Just got my evenheat kiln and was thinking it would be perfect for mokume.

hello new to this section, so i live in canada and cannot use coins as it is 100% illegal I am unsure about US quarters as they are used just as often as currency (look just like a canadian quarter with a fast glance same with british and ive even found AUD in my wallet) i can get brass and copper sheets would this be a good idea or should i look for another source thanks M.J.Lampert

Ok, this is going to be a bit of a setup here so bear with me. Last month my boss up and quit and the company owner's kid came in to run the farm until we find a replacement. This isn't a little company, we have a several million chickens between several farms producing eggs. The kid mentioned to me that he's looking to get a show piece dagger or knife made from mokume. I still haven't gotten my first forge weld. I'm nowhere near being able to pull this off. Anyone here feel like taking up that challenge? I can give him your email and you do that voodoo that you do so well.

So I'm reading the Textbook Of Mokume Gane by Masaki Takahashi NPO Japan Mokumegane Research Institute. Its a good read and very inspirational. It has me wanting to make finger guards out of Mokume. I'm wondering if anyone has tried the nickel from Amazon? I have a bunch of copper sheets and brass sheets I scored from a scrap yard by my house. Here is a link to the nickel in question.

Hey all! I've been taking a quick look at mokume. I see some people making it from US quarters, which are made of cupranickel, as are US nickels. I was wondering if anyone had ever tried using US nickels, as those are around the same weight though much cheaper. One thing to note is that nickels are 25% Ni, while quarters are only 8.33%. Thank you! Chimaera

Howdy folks, I've looked around and haven't been able to find any info, hence my post. I'm looking to use Mokume Gane in my knife making, but the prices are currently prohibitive. That being said, I do have brass from reloads that are worn out, and instead of throwing them away I'm thinking about melting them down to make my material. I have two graphite containers for casting bars, but no furnace or hand tools to heat up the metal and give it the proper twists and twirls and whatnot. My question is can I line up the brass and copper in the graphite bar maker, place it in my heat treat oven (Evenheat KH414), and take it right up to just above the melt…

So I have an idea of joining a copper sheet to a cast iron pan using diffusion welding/mokume gane. The purpose would be to help with heat transfer across the pan. I am looking for thoughts, ideas, concerns.... Any input would be greatly appreciated. I doubt this will be a project I tackle any time soon but it is something I am researching. Thanks

So I took the 2 stacks of 9 quarters I Welded at the end of my last thread and welded them together and made this billet. I think this is probably the coolest thing i can do in my little micro forge, but bigger things are on the horizon.

I'm very new to smithing in general but quarter mokume sounded relatively easy so into my little micro forge a stack of 8 went. surface prep was a scrub with steel wool and an acetone bath, I did't use any kind of press just pulled the stack out with a pair of needle noses when they started to sweat and gave them a couple light whacks. The first heat the top and bottom quarters didn't stick so just did a couple reheats until everything was nice and fused. then ground the edges and just stared at the billet for a few days contemplating where I wanted to go from there. thought of restacking a couple times to bring the layer count up but dropped that idea and just shaped it …

I want to make some Mokume Gane. I'm hoping to make a sheet about .04"x6"x6" or bigger. I've made a few pieces from quarters to about .06"x3"x3" with pretty good results but I can't get the size I want without stress fractures from dissimilar metal movement. Anyone know of copper, nickel and silver alloys with similar melting and elastic properties? I can make a billet of about 4"x1.5" comfortably. In the stretching is when I have the de-lamination problems. I work the pieces hot until they become "stiff" and reheat to a low orange. Any thoughts, ideas and sources would be gratefully accepted.

Seems I only get to post when I have a problem. I decided I'd try Mokume. I see it as a step before welding steel. I grabbed some copper and brass which ran about $70. Of course I wasn't paying attention and melted my brass. The puddles off the forge floor and the patio stone came out easy enough, but now I got this expensive lump of trash. I tried a chisel, but the copper wont budge. I think that's more a result of remaining brass than an actual weld. I'm not concerned about the brass (I'd use any left over for a casting project I'm thinking on), but if I can save the copper it would reduce my cost, and make me feel less wasteful. I'm thinking of melting it aga…

Going to make some coin mokume today. I have done it successfully in my gas forge before, but I was wondering if it would be worth the cost of using my O/A torch and making it in a vice instead? I have talked to people who do it both ways, but does anyone have advice on which is better (and if using the torch is enough better to offset the cost).

I'm reasonably certain that member projects is more applicable than the Mokume forum, if not, I'm sure you know where the move button is. I have admired the excellent lock work shared by Nick and others here and elsewhere so I jumped at the opportunity to get a copy of instructions and materials to make a Viking era padlock myself. I decided to up the ante a little and make the materials a little more interesting though. The top and bottom plates are spare quarters mokume and the body is a sheet of copper with a design chased into it, subsequently filled with melted brass wire and melted silver solder in different places then ground smooth to give it a kind of …

hello everyone, I was interested in attempting to make some mokume gane for some handle scales on a decorative damascus style wooden knife I want to make, my issue is, how do I achieve specific colors? mainly black, I know I can get it from a copper/gold alloy as well as purple, but I am certain there must be a lower priced alternative. I would also be interested in green, or blue, as well as any possible alternatives for purple. any advice will be greatly appreciated! thank you very much!

My first attempt at mokume gane. It's just a stack of U.S. quarters, but it's fun just to run my fingers over it and look at it. It started out as $3.00 worth of quarters. Two didn't stick to the stack, but they stuck to each other. So this is $2.50 worth. I made a small press out of 1/2" steel scrap and four bolts. Pressed the stack in that and put the whole thing in the new heat treat oven. I'll be doing a lot more of this stuff.

After a fashion, I squished some hot change together and made this for my wife.. Next up, will start on making actual patterning between metals, but was happy with my initial results.

Ju