Older can sometimes mean Better

[Jim Koepke]

I'm going to see what can be done about it.

Hopefully you will succeed.

It is difficult for most of us who like to regard people as being serious when someone comes along with the sole purpose of leaving something foul smelling floating in the pool to remind us of their having visited.

It would be nice if he was like teeth and would go away by being ignored.

jtk

[Charlie Stanford]

Charles,the Angel swords appear to have real Wootz steel in them(not the pattern welded stuff misnomered Damascus). I can't say I'm crazy about the workmanship,but genuine Wootz is the superior blade material. The real Wootz is not impressive to look at. It just has little sparkles of carbide in it. The carbides are in a soft matrix,making Wootz swords very tough. This process was finally re discovered by scientists back in the 70"s,IIRC. They heated high carbon steel up only to red,and ran it through powerful rollers,reducing its thickness to 1/8 of the former. Heating it only to red does not let the carbides melt. Then,they get crushed into tiny particles surrounded by softer steel. Of course,the originals were hammered down to do the same thing.

Believe it or not,I had begun making steel engraving chisels doing this same thing before I read about the rediscovery. I cannot recall what my reasoning was by now. It made great engraving chisels. However,hammering on only red hot high carbon steel was hurting my bad shoulder. I hired a blacksmith to hammer me a bunch. He,too,complained about the steel being very hard to hammer. I took an engraving chisel over to the Gunsmith Shop in the museum. They started driving the chisel up the tang of a file. When it reached the hardened area,I told them to go ahead. The chisel cut more than 1/8" into the hardened part of the file before the tip broke off,to their amazement!

European smiths heated steel to a much higher temperature,which made it MUCH easier to forge. But,the carbides melted and re for men into a crystalline matrix upon quenching,leaving a hard,but brittle blade which had to be softened by tempering. Wootz can be left fully hard without being brittle as glass.

These blades are good for cutting flesh. Used on wood,they would develop a fine,irregular toothy edge because the softer steel in between would wear away some,leaving the carbides sticking out proud.

Very informative. Thanks. I guess the steel is suited to purpose.

[Charlie Stanford]

Nobody has a clue what you're talking about. I don't appreciate the trolling, though, nor the changing your posts after I already responded to them, solely so that you could troll more. I'm going to see what can be done about it.

It was a hat tip to your productivity and apparent short learning curve, David. Nothing more. To have acquired the knowledge you seem to possess and to have done it in eight years implies working at a very high level of intensity and depth.

Perhaps my reference to the quote makes more sense with a little more explanation.

N.B. I attributed the quote improperly. It was from Chaucer.

[Mike Henderson]

Charles,the Angel swords appear to have real Wootz steel in them(not the pattern welded stuff misnomered Damascus). I can't say I'm crazy about the workmanship,but genuine Wootz is the superior blade material. The real Wootz is not impressive to look at. It just has little sparkles of carbide in it. The carbides are in a soft matrix,making Wootz swords very tough. This process was finally re discovered by scientists back in the 70"s,IIRC. They heated high carbon steel up only to red,and ran it through powerful rollers,reducing its thickness to 1/8 of the former. Heating it only to red does not let the carbides melt. Then,they get crushed into tiny particles surrounded by softer steel. Of course,the originals were hammered down to do the same thing.

Believe it or not,I had begun making steel engraving chisels doing this same thing before I read about the rediscovery. I cannot recall what my reasoning was by now. It made great engraving chisels. However,hammering on only red hot high carbon steel was hurting my bad shoulder. I hired a blacksmith to hammer me a bunch. He,too,complained about the steel being very hard to hammer. I took an engraving chisel over to the Gunsmith Shop in the museum. They started driving the chisel up the tang of a file. When it reached the hardened area,I told them to go ahead. The chisel cut more than 1/8" into the hardened part of the file before the tip broke off,to their amazement!

European smiths heated steel to a much higher temperature,which made it MUCH easier to forge. But,the carbides melted and re formed into a crystalline matrix upon quenching,leaving a hard,but brittle blade which had to be softened by tempering. Wootz can be left fully hard without being brittle as glass.

These blades are good for cutting flesh. Used on wood,they would develop a fine,irregular toothy edge because the softer steel in between would wear away some,leaving the carbides sticking out proud.

For those interested in learning more about Damascus type steel, here's an article from the Journal of Metallurgy, although I don't know if it's the final word. I think research is still being done on how it was produced. As George points out, the term "Damascus steel" is widely used today to refer to steel that was not made from Wootz. The article is about original Damascus steel.

Mike

[Charlie Stanford]

For those interested in learning more about Damascus type steel, here's an article from the Journal of Metallurgy, although I don't know if it's the final word. I think research is still being done on how it was produced. As George points out, the term "Damascus steel" is widely used today to refer to steel that was not made from Wootz. The article is about original Damascus steel.

Mike

Another interesting article:

http://www.nytimes.com/1981/09/29/science/the-mystery-of-damascus-steel-appears-solved.html

[george wilson]

That article is rather full of mis information,I'm afraid. 1700º is too high a temperature. It should be red heat. A red heat seen in a darkened room can be about only 800 or 900º F. Also, steel with as much as 2% carbon is going to be more like cast iron.

The article fails to mention that the modern experiment was done by rolling the steel through rollers ,reducing it to 1/8 former thickness,while only at red heat. Looks like this article was written by someone with a poor knowledge of steel.

Real Wootz steel has no "watery" pattern. That was the result of Europeans trying without success to duplicate true Wootz steel,by laminating steels of different carbon content,and etching it with acids.

[Charlie Stanford]

The actual research can apparently be found in: "The research is described in Volume 25 of Progress in Materials Science, a British publication."

Were we able to lay our hands on it some of the confusion might be cleared up.

Did this paragraph from the article make any sense:

"The superplastic steel developed at Stanford [Stanford University I presume] is kept at high temperature for only a few hours. It is shaped during cooling, reheated to moderate temperature for further working and may then be quenched to achieve extreme hardness. This process, Dr. Wadsworth said, produces very small carbide grains and hence even greater hardness and ductility than in Damascus steel.