NuViking

As far as using stone to line a forge or heat retention,,,try dolomite. It is a refarctory stone and usualy easy to find. They are most offen pink and cream colored swirls and can be easly cut with a diamond saw blade or masonary saw blade on a circular saw.
make sure the rocks havent been sitting in water for a long period of time. They are very porus and water trapped in teh rock may cause an explosion.

I had to put a picture of that in my photalbum. Cheers.

I love the look of nickle damascus.

Im digging that.

Thanks for the info folks. I am gonna hold off on that for awhile. Till I am ready to make differnt tools.

NOw thats my style of thinking when it comes to a cool looking work knife

Finaly starting to warm up. Man tuesday up in Regina was hard on my old knees.

Greetings from the open plains of Saskatchewan. We are gonna need a Canuck section et. LOL

If you are dealing in an ara where fumes may be an issue,,Try mustard. Yep the same stuff we put on hotdgs makes a great etching material.

If you still want to solder the bolster onto a HT blade,,I have been told that vise grips make a great heat sink. I had once soldered a brass bolster onto a smaller kife and was concerned about loosein the HT,,so I sunk the blade ino a plastic pop bottle filled it with water to 3/4 of an inch where I wanted to solder then tossed it in the deep freezer. Now this froozen block of ice with teh tang sticking out was easy to handle and after soldering it I just let it thw. The knife still seemed hard when it was all done.
Hope this helps.

Greetings from souther Saskatchewan,

Right on. Great to have you here. There are a lot of us canuks here and a few ther folks from sask. We may have to ask the mderators for a Canuck section.:p

Just wondering if anybody has worked with 4340 teel for knives or sharp tools. Now realising thecarbon content is only .40 but a low to mid 50s rockwell can be achieved through proper tempering.
Just wanted to know what its like to work with for forging.
Of course the nice salesman says it works great. LOL

I have no idea why you are calling them ugly. O also think they are neat.

I read a little on teh history of that area too. So much intertwining for a few hundred years. A lot of celtic heratige here in Canuckland too.

That is a cool knife. A little scandi flair me thinks.

Pawnshops,,auto salvage,,steel scrap yards,,,Oh yea. I died and went to heaven. To bad some of the guys at mtorcycle salvage yards seem to be so high on junk steel prices.

I dont know any history on my anvil. I traded my old 80 lp anvil that was dead to the local mecanic for a little lighter one that has a nice ring and bounce. I am sure all ine would say right now is,,,Oh No he is coming back.

That is neat.