Hi guys, hoping to rely on your experiance here.
What is the best steel to use for a sword, where can i get it and how much does it cost.
Also any guidlines for the heat treatment of the steel eg; quench medium and tempering spacifics.
Any help in this area would be greatly apreciated.
thanks in advance.

I would check with these guys:

swordforum.com

Basically I would say if you have to ask this type of question you wouldn't be able to work with the high alloys steels and would suggest you start learning on something like 5160.

As for "BEST"---what type of sword? what's it going to be used for? what environment? what tools do you have access to and training on? what's your budget?

Why somone would assume that there is only *1* "best" I do not know---sort of like asking "what's the best mode of transportation" without telling us any of the details---sometimes a horse is the BEST and somtimes a rocketship is the BEST---but they are NOT interchangable...

I would check with these guys:

swordforum.com

Is there a reason you sent him there rather than give him a real answer, or is it you think none of us here know? :(

I kinda have to side with Thomas on this issue. When you don't know enough to ask the right questions, you have more homework to do.

Thank you for your coments so far.
I should have known better then to leave room for missinterpritations and so i will clafy.
What i was asking was for some recomendaions of steels that you guys have tried and found to be succsesful for a broad range of sword types, furthermore i was intersted in the price of these steels and more importantly where i can find them(i live in australia ).
Hope this helps.

Let me chime in here a bit. Not sure what you have in the way of supplers for materials there or whether you have a forge or not. Can I suggest you get some leaf springs from a pick up truck and forge them to some kind of shapes that please you ,,learn to heat treat the steels and use them to cut paper, cardboard, wood etc...that will give you experience in how metal moves and how it works after you have altered it. A year or three of that will let you know how things work and give you an idea if you want to go further with sords. They are in no way a starting point for someone new to the craft, If I were the teacher and you the student you would be looking at four or five years before starting to think about a sord. Good luck.

Edited October 2, 200817 yr by Rich Hale
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i am not partial to spring steels (ie 4140, 5160) because they move well under the hammer and relitivey forgiveing of some heat and lack there of and for me are relitively good water quench steels

car leaf spring can be 1045 5160 or some other thing the mill makes
a just do not recomend most exotic steels untill you do a fair bit of forgeing (A-32 is not recomended if cooled wrong lots of flying sharp things its not fun)

be safe happy forgeing

the most comon sword steel is 5160 . in america you can purchase it at a lot of places amrality steel is one that is on the web . heat treating is kinda tough for swords as they are a long heat ... you might check with your local industry car and spring manafacturers .they will usually harden and temper for a fee and have the heating and qunching tanks to do the job right . Make sure you let them know that the blades have been forged and need to be anealed or at least normalized before hardening .they can probably provide a suplyier for the the spring steel also ... good luck!

thanks heaps

Is there a reason you sent him there rather than give him a real answer, or is it you think none of us here know?

The reason I sent him here is that it appeared he had asked a legitimate question but no one had responded.

I certainly didn't have "the real answer", but I wanted to at least point the guy to someone who would.

Don

No one responded in the less than 4 hours of your posting? Sorry we all took so long. (according to the time/date stamp on the postings)

Nothing wrong with swordforum, I am a member there as well, its just funny to send a guy away to other places before giving us a chance to try to help.

It suggests a lack of faith in IFI.

Steve; I strongly disagree with your last post. IFI does NOT have to try to be everything for everyone and there is nothing wrong with opening other doors for folks that they may not know about.

Anytime folks get to thinking that it's wrong to suggest places outside of the one they are at I'm *gone*!

As Glenn has never complained about this to me either publically or privately I don't feel that sharing the wealth that is out there is a problem. (Shoot over at armour and sword forums I direct folk with smithing questions over here!)

And sorry it does NOT suggest a lack of faith in IFI; it just suggests another good source of information. Just as I don't consider your answer suggesting a lack of faith that IFI can't stand on it's own in an open information flow paradigm.

Edited October 9, 200817 yr by ThomasPowers

Right.

Steve,

If you had any idea how many folks I have pointed to IFI on other forums, emails, and by writing the address down for them a demos and such, you might think differently of my "lack of faith in IFI".

And by the way, I was the only one to answer within four hours; Bog didn't get with him until after 11 hours.

Apparently Rravan didn't feel "sent away". I hope he learned something from both.

Don

some good places to check are junk yards, truck repair shops. I have gotten some springs for free at repair shops. (just ask nicely, they usually throw the old ones away or sell them cheep to junk yards) . Another note 5160 would be an excellent choice for steel very resilient and will hold a nice edge

How can you know what steel junkyard springs are? And therefore how can you know how to heat treat it?

most car and truck leaf springs are 5160 ... that is the industry standard ..

Do you have any info to back up that statement? I am not being hostile or badgering, just trying to find some concrete information instead of word of mouth.Because all sawblades are NOT L6, and all leaf springs are NOT 5160, most nowadays are 9260, some were 1095.

well ... according to the spring hardening shop bentz spring .... most car and truck springs are ... not all cause not all of anything is ... but most .also potatoe digger rods are being made from 516o currently at the plant in twin falls that makes them.. got that from the manafacturer ... used to be 1084 but they switched over years ago. if they are 1095 or 1084 hardening and tempering is similar and will work as well i do not know what alloy 9260 is but the 60 part is 60 points of carbon (or .6 %)

ive heard that coil springs are mostly 9260, and leaf springs 5160. I have no proof, but i was told this by a blacksmith with WAY more experience than I. Since im still green, i would take every thing i have to say with a grain of salt.

9260 is a Silicon, Manganese steel
the only other experience i have with this steel is the katana i own from maru katana
nothing else to compare it to thou as its the only sword i own.

ps. Grain of salt : )

there are many good sword steels, 5160 is great for swords, but is less forgiving on heat treat, welding & forging than 1065-75-85-95 which is what I mainly have used as it is extremely forgiving in these things however rusts a lot more than almost any alloy steel. in destruction tests and over the years I found I had better results for live steel combat & reenactment swords with 1075 oil quenched & triple drawn to between 50-53RCc . swords for these type of activities are not the same as "real swords" in that they are made with the focus on durability, not on aesthetics & edge holding ability.... I believe that overall though regardless of the type of tool or weapon you are making that proper design, forging & heat treating is far more important than the absolute best steel, I have used everything from jackhammer bits to Hammered out angle iron that had been super-quenched (wont hold an edge or spring well but they came out just short of 50RCc & were tough enough to damage other swords on the field, made me a believer in super-quench) to make swords for reenactment depending on the cost & who I intend on selling them to.