Hello smiths, 

Today I finally got all my ducks in a row, lit a fire, and heated some iron.  I was going to make a coal rake and a poker. But, I'm a bit too anxious to see how I do with a blade. To make my first attempt even harder, I decided to do a cable Damascus blade. Lol. Do the toughest first,  then the rest will be easy, huh??  I'm sure the weld wasn't perfect and I will probably have splitting of the layers. But, it's a learning experience.  I need to clean up the profile and level out the blade (I was tapped out by this point) but, I'm very satisfied with my first attempt. Utility sized, broken back seax.   

is it a high carbon steel cable?

I believe so.  It's a sling for crane rigging.  I figured it would be a good test.  

(a gentle hint to test before investing the work into it...We've seen a pretty good number of posts that read something like: "Now that I have spent an immense amount of work and time making a blade from an alloy that will not harden---how do I harden it?" They are generally not happy with our replies...)

Learning how to forge a blade before learning the grinding and heat treat is like writing a song before learning to play an instrument. 

It looks like your welds went weld, but until you clean it up you'll never know.  I've got a couple of spools of cable like that (extra IPS), it makes decent enough knives.

Now for the grinding and h/t, which will make the knife.

Yes, sir. My grinder gets delivered today. This knife is basically an experiment.  Just getting my feet wet. Seeing how the steel moves, how the Flux reacts, cooling rates,  forge economy, etc.  I appreciate the feedback.  I'm not too optimistic that this will become a completed knife but, just an opportunity to gain a bit of knowledge.  My next blade will come with a bit more demand for perfection and the next..... Can't wait to get it ground and cleaned.  Who knows, may actually have some usability.  

what did you end up using as an anvil?

                                                                                     Littleblacksmith

A mistake. I ordered this 96 lbs ASO.  It was hollow.  I filled with concrete.  It's ok for tinkering around.  I'm just going to bite the bullet and drop some serious money on a nice anvil.  I'm seeing the uselessness of having zero rebound.  Trying to hammer out my tang and it wouldn't compress evenly.  But, it helps me get my arm into hammering shape. Lol. 

3 hours ago, Ubba Bloodaxe said:

A mistake. I ordered this 96 lbs ASO.  It was hollow.  I filled with concrete.  It's ok for tinkering around.  I'm just going to bite the bullet and drop some serious money on a nice anvil.  I'm seeing the uselessness of having zero rebound.  Trying to hammer out my tang and it wouldn't compress evenly.  But, it helps me get my arm into hammering shape. Lol. 

Been there though a different ASO. Just don't hold off till you can find or afford a good anvil virtually any piece of steel with enough weight under the hammer will do. Shaft, broken axle, RR rail, etc. even a smooth bolder all work just fine.

Frosty The Lucky.

The magic words are "steel" and "solid"; I've used a broken knuckle off a RR car coupler before;  bad words are things like cast iron (NOT STEEL) I beam (NOT SOLID); etc