NickWheeler

Well here I was thinking that I was going to be signing up for a Monster Metal hammer class!!! Hope all goes well with the guy Larry! :)

Okay Sam, I'm still missing something because I didn't seen anything in Kevin's post about not using a stainless salt vessel and I read it three times. That doesn't mean it's not in there, but I missed it if it is. :huh:

I'm not sure I understand the post about "NO stainless steel" My shop-built rig has a 316L stainless salt vessel I've been using for several years.

Wow... this is mesmerizing to me! Just when I start feeling like I have a fairly varied skill set due to background and education... I see something like this and immediately get slapped right back into the reality that I don't know $&!# Thank you very much for sharing! I absolutely love this project of yours and all the photos. Beautiful, flowing, elegant work!!! I'd hazard a guess, to say that I'm like you about keeping shop. A clean and organized shop helps ME to produce clean and organized work. Although my current shop is a closet compared to yours! Thanks again :)

Okay, what the heck is a bp? Is it really blue print? Man, I'm showing my ignorance!!! LOL (nothing unusual about that! ) Thank you for the kind words and questions! I don't mind sharing anything I can. I always want it to be clear that anything I do is certainly not the only way to do something and there are probably BETTER ways I just don't know about. With that said- The polishing abrasives USE to be very easy to find. There's a place called Mager Scientific that sold abrasive powders for polishing lenses and such. I had purchased several grits for like $10 a pound. Now they don't have the stuff I bought, and what they do have is insanely expensive. Places like McMasterCarr sells the stuff, but again.... something like $120 a pound!!! So enter ebay. There is a place on there that I got the 1500X Silicon Carbide powder from for about $12 shipped. I was hesitant to use something from a fireworks supply place and not some kind of lab... but it has proven to be very high quality (I had nightmares of going along with it and dragging a piece of gravel across my blade, but no such thing has happened ). When I am sanding my blades I like to use WD-40. I have been making knives since I was 14 (32 now) and even had a full time stint of it for 5 years... I always thought fancy/unusual must be better, so I tried everything under the sun: water, soaps, KoolMist, Windex, Simple Green, cutting oils.... thinking something "more exotic" than WD-40 would be better.... but I am back to using WD-40 these days. I DO add a few drops of this stuff called Ballistol though. It's a gun cleaning/lubricant/protectant and I LOVE it. You can get it many places online. It seems to help to avoid the oil and grit "gunking up" so quick and needing to be wiped off after two seconds. Well, that was sure long-winded! Hope it helps! Thanks guys :)

Thanks guys It's funny the relativity of things. Let me preface this by saying this is simply an observation and NOT A DEFENSIVE thing on my part: Don said he isn't obsessed with all the hamon business. I guess I am! LOL It's just very interesting how we all have our different likes and dislikes. I've spent many years trying to do it, and after all that you have some folks who love it, and some folks who want to know why you have a weird, squiggly line in the blade! Like I said, just observing something. I came to grips with the fact that not every piece (or sometimes any) will make every person happy and that's part of what makes the world go round. Sorry, I don't really know where that all came from... maybe my ADD meds are just making me introspective or some such bullshit Thanks again folks :)

Thanks Rich- You're right... it has a bit of a ladder look to it because of how I forged it. I made some really tight radius drawing dies for my hydraulic press. When you draw the billet down with these dies, it pushes the layers around enough to leave a lasting effect on the final look. But it is just random and not an actual ladder. Steel is 1084 and 15N20 Thanks for asking :)

So after all of that (several days worth of work) where did it get us? This is the result. Unfortunately you can't capture all of the "stuff" in a static photograph, but you can get a hint at what this looks like. I fell in love with this type of stuff and have been pursuing both creating it in the first place (heat-treat) and also the polish to bring it out for about 7 or 8 years now. Here is the finished knife. Photo by Jim Cooper, leather by MASTER craftsman Paul Long. Thanks for looking folks... hopefully this helps somebody out or is at least kind of interesting to someone. :)

Polishing away! This little wood set-up is a purpose built tool. Very simple but very handy. It has a rubber pad on it, so I can poke the tip of the knife into it and polish....but easily move the blade to where it's easier to see what I'm doing. It eventually comes down to just my thumb anyway, so I can FEEL how the abrasive slurry is cutting and if it needs more oil or abrasive added. NOTE!!! You should position your hand so that your fingers will "catch" on the spine of the blade so you don't slice your thumb open. My hand position here is WRONG!!! I had no choice though because my other thumb was bandaged due to a "to the bone" cut (from something non-related). Man, this is a lot of tedious work! lol

It's a lot of repetitive work... etch, polish...etch, polish.... Each progressive etch brings out a little more detail. Etch....AGAIN...lol After 6 to 12 (give or take) etch/polish cycles, then I REALLY go after the fine detail in the hamon. I have a crude little handle I put to use (squished pipe with some 1/4-20 bolts in it) that allows me to really get ahold of the blade, but also move it around very easily. I made this little block to mimic my thumb and reduce the chances of getting cut. Here are some things I've accumulated for this job over the years. The 1500X powder (mixed with oil to make a slurry) will cut a lot finer than the 2500X paper did. Sometimes I mix it in oil, sometimes in the diamond compound lube... I don't know why LOL

Now traditionally the Japanese DO NOT etch their blades... it's something we do in modern times with modern steels. Many guys use Ferric Chloride, but I save that for damascus. I prefer to etch these blades with either lemon juice or vinegar. This one will be etched with vinegar cut with some dish soap. It's heated up (I've changed from simply heating the bowl in the microwave to keeping it on a hot plate on the bench while doing this). The blade is CLEANED CLEANED CLEANED... then the etching starts by soaking a blue shop towel in the vinegar and constantly rubbing it over the blade for 10 minutes. Here it is after 10 minutes... all oxidized and ugly. One step backward! But the hamon is starting to show more. Here is the bench set-up for "oxide removal!" lol The initial step for me is going over the blade with Liquid Flitz and a cotton make-up pad (I focus more on the soft part of the blade than the hard part, but I do go over the entire blade).

Hey guys- I shared this on another forum and thought it might give some folks here an idea or two. It's certainly not the only way to do this, it's just what works for me. This is the final polishing for a clay hardened W2 blade... it's all about TRYING to get the hamon and all its little intricacies to show. It all starts with hand sanding, stones, etc. I come off the disc sander and start hand sanding at 320X work up to 500X, then 800X, then 1200X, then 1500X, then 2000X, and finally 2500X. Of course you go in one direction with one grit, and then cross over it with the next grit to ensure you remove ALL of the previous scratches. Here it is at a super clean 2500. ANY scratches that are coarser than 2500 will show.... so you're just wasting your time if you don't get them all out first.

Thank you!!! Jim Cooper, Chuck Ward, and Eric Eggly are fantastic photographers. I couldn't take a pic as good as these with a gun to my head. The cost of having these guys shoot your work really is worth it in the long run!!! :)

A huge bowie I put together for the American Bladesmith Society all forged blade Exposition in San Antonio, Texas. 11-1/2" blade forged down from 1-3/4" 52100 roundstock, 120ish layer twist damascus fittings, fluted/line cute spacer, Ironwood handle, domed 416 pin. Thanks for looking folks!

A random pattern damascus fighter... More Paul Long goodness