Frosty Posted September 20, 2015 Share Posted September 20, 2015 Though technically to stay within context of most knife and metallurgical conversations, when talking about carbon steels we are excluding stainless steels. You don't talk to knife makers who use 440 series stainless steels?Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shamus Blargostadt Posted September 21, 2015 Author Share Posted September 21, 2015 Though technically to stay within context of most knife and metallurgical conversations, when talking about carbon steels we are excluding stainless steels. To remain on topic, I made my first pattern weld with hand hammer. It took a fair bit of time and I lost a great deal of material due to scale. But it worked. I now use this knife as a utility blade in the shop as a constant reminder of humble beginnings.I would try to keep the two steels as close in relation as possible. With the amount of heats it will probably take there will be carbon migration galore. 15n20/1084 is a basic recipe for success. Leave wrought, mild steels or anything else that may suck the carbon over by a great deal, out.Thank you very much for the tip Daniel. I'll get some bars of those for my first try. I'm sure I can look up the hardening requirements for those steels but I was wondering, if two steels have different hardening specs for temperature and quench material, how do you decide which to use? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 May I commend to your attention the research done by Daryl Meier of the Damascus Research Group at the Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, As I recall 4 times to welding heat was pretty much carbon equalization for thin layers of alloys that were not carbon migration impeding (pure Ni being the best know example). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Sells Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 I forgot Daryl, and I should have also mentioned Dr Verhoeven who worked along with Howard Clark for their paper. Sadly few will read any of these, preferring to wait for the you tube videos... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 not forget Dr Verhoeven and Al Pendray's research on wootz too... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanielC Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 Thank you Thomas and Steve. I will put this research on the docket. Up to my eyeballs in smelting as of late. Made some good friends at the Niimi tatara in Japan, so have been discussing a lot of research about that. Hope to make a trip out of it by next year.This research has slipped by me as i rarely have been making pattern weld without a core monosteel. Didnt know they even covered it, as i only know of Dr. Verhoeven working with wootz.I did know about Ni impeding migration, and the fact that it does move at a decent rate. My original statement was still right in the context, that carbon will migrate a lot with a low and high carbon steel. It was just taken out of context but still exposed a hole in my learning and research. Good to know, knowledge is power, and i have been getting into a lot of successful pattern weld. Must utilize a power hammer somehow.This conversation is growing the legs of educational and shedding the shroud of condescending. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 "I saw this on Youtube." Is a sentence rapidly joining, "Hold my beer, watch this," on the top of the list of famous last words.One of my favorite head shaking sentences is, "That's the dumbest thing I ever saw (heard)" almost universally said by the person who doesn't understand. These are also the ones to whom anything they can't do is "impossible." This is how the demonstrably false opinion "you can't weld in a gas forge" came about.Not that anyone on this thread has said any of these things. Steve got me started today. You did, it's YOUR fault Steve! Oh wait, where is the blame someone else thing on the list? DRATS! Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlotte Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 Just to round out the comments on the need to read the research; Several years ago I attended a conference in which Jim Batson was demonstrating. I happened to over hear two young engineering types making snide remarks about his presentation. They took exception to his remarks that he could manipulate the carbon content of the finished blade through selection of materials and forging technique. At the time I thought that they had a lot to learn. The point here is that the information is available but far too many specialists in their field forget neglect to read out side their field. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Sells Posted September 21, 2015 Share Posted September 21, 2015 One thing that no one on this forum knew, except for JPH who was his teacher; is that my blade teacher Bill Wyant day job was as a test engineer, so we did in fact have access to a very well equipped Aerospace and military laboratory with wonderful equipment to use testing scrap steels and pattern welded billets. I miss Bill, and I am sure he would love IFI if he were still among the living.Many of us assumed many things in the past, but modern equipment like the electron microscope have shown clearly that quite a few things were misunderstood. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seek Posted September 29, 2015 Share Posted September 29, 2015 Dies this carbon migration also happen in laminated tools, like antique woodworking chisels and axes? They were usually made from wrought iron with a high carbon bit forge welded on the end. Of course that was just one time welding, but I wonder if it is an issue with these too? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted September 29, 2015 Share Posted September 29, 2015 1 time welds and usually thicker layers so while there will be a bit around the join not a big deal. I have several adzes that have a quite thin---1/8" high carbon pad welded to the back of them to provide the cutting edge. I was derusting one and forgot it in the vinegar for a week and it showed it so very well that a local MatSci professor showed it to his classes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlotte Posted September 29, 2015 Share Posted September 29, 2015 Slightly off topic but, traditional Japanese wood working chisels are laminated steel which were and may still be forge welded. A single layer of high carbon steel backed with lower carbon iron. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seek Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 Thanks for the answers. Indeed the Japanese smiths still make laminated chisels. I think in the western world this process is very rare nowadays, while it was very common at least until the start of the 20th century. Planeblades likewise. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Sells Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 there is no reason too with so many varieties of easy to acquire modern steels, except for tradition or aesthetics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 But if it were not for Hype and Mystique we would see a lot of things in the Knife world; and no RR spike KSO's either! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlotte Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 there is no reason too with so many varieties of easy to acquire modern steels, except for tradition or aesthetics.I'm less certain of that than you are Steve, although my work experience and education argues in your favor. My most used chiefs knife is a carbon steel German blade made before stainless took over the world. I've never duplicated it my self nor found another to equal it. I can't decide if it is combination of design and material or habit that brings a feeling of confidence when I start working on a gumbo. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Sells Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 My favorite kitchen blades are what I am guessing is simple high carbon steel, brand name of "Ontario" from NY but I admit that brands like Wustorf and others are very nice also Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seek Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 The fun of a laminated chisel is in the ability to pair a simple high carbon steel at rather high hardness with a softer backing, toughness and hardness in one. That allows you to sharpen the edge to scary sharp heights, it allows you to retain the use of old fashioned oilstones and it shortens the sharpening time, because most of the steel is pretty soft, only a small bit is very hard. These are the kind of things woodworkers can argue about ad nauseum. In handtool woodworking everything is about sharpness, and easy and quick ways to restore that sharpness. Edge durability is of secondairy concern (not unimportant, but not as important as you might think). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlotte Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 Excellent point Seek. I started thinking about making my own tools when I had a store bought chisel edge fold while cutting mortises in pine. I went from there to Alexander Weygers' books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shamus Blargostadt Posted January 8, 2016 Author Share Posted January 8, 2016 On 9/17/2015 at 11:20 AM, ThomasPowers said: Since I don't have power to my shop I generally do this by hand. That's why I start with 25 layer billets of bandsaw blade and pallet strapping: 5 welds => 25,50,100,200,400 instead of 5,10,20,40,80. I'm sure the Saxon process was en-thralling... I scavenged a buddy's metal shop scrap bin and got a discarded bandsaw blade and plenty of pallet straps. When you layer these, do you layer them alternating one by one or a group of saw, then a group of straps? what do you normally use for etching these? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted January 8, 2016 Share Posted January 8, 2016 I use alternating with pallet strapping on the outermost layers. Do not have BSB on BSB as that is a bit trickier to weld when you are starting out. Test your pallet strapping---heat to high red and quench in water and try to break it---you would prefer the higher carbon ones if you are working on a blade to keep the total carbon content up. Including some file can also juice up a billet, I have collected a lot of the old black diamond files that are 1.2% Carbon or have used nicholson files as the center layer of San Mai. Note that if you weld both ends of a BSB&PS billet; when you heat it in the forge the outer layers will bow out which can cause problems in a coal forge with trash getting in. Me I generally wire my billets or wire one end and weld the other Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shamus Blargostadt Posted January 8, 2016 Author Share Posted January 8, 2016 will do. Thank you very much sir! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shamus Blargostadt Posted February 1, 2016 Author Share Posted February 1, 2016 holy cow this weekend was a grand fail. I got a spent band saw blade, and some pallet banding.. tested the banding and it broke just fine. I stacked around 7 BSB between the banding strips (about 6" long) with banding on the outside.. welded one end and wrapped the other end with wire. made a hot coal file and once I heated the billet, added borax to the sides and ends to get between the strips.. back into the fire to get red hot... hammer, then repeat until giving up in futility. The strips never fused and had to replace the wire wrapping twice. It was hot enough to start to burn the outside straps. Am I going about this wrong? Also warped and broke two blades I was working on.. not a productive weekend. I think perhaps I didn't heat my quench oil enough. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmccustomknives Posted February 1, 2016 Share Posted February 1, 2016 Since your using coal it would be much easier, but more work, to start with thicker material. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shamus Blargostadt Posted February 1, 2016 Author Share Posted February 1, 2016 propane would work better in this case? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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