Damascus Blade, Bog Oak Scales

[Patterd Ales 59]

New knife made. Sheath to come.

[leethedog 3,071]

Nice that mate do you sell them

[the big chief 3,099]

nice mate i am doing one of midnights blanks as soon as my g10 arives

[1Wally 204]

I really like that!

[Patterd Ales 59]

Thanks all, I haven't sold any but would do if you knew what you wanted. I made up one of Midnights blanks recently, lovely thing. Bog oak is a slow b*****d to work! How best to polish it? I have beeswax and boiled linseed oil. Any tips?

[mad4it 693]

great looking knife

[GruffaloGriff 1,852]

Did you start with a blank or from scratch? Either way nice job, looks the bees knees.

[Patterd Ales 59]

Thanks guys. I bought the blade ready made. Can't make them yet. The Oak I bought as a lump and spent bloody ages on it. Hard stuff that! Scales would have been a smarter choice.

[Patterd Ales 59]

Polished and sheath made, wet forming next.

[GruffaloGriff 1,852]

I fancy making a Damascus blade Anyone tried those Damascus billets on ebay from Pakistan? Are they any good? Or where do you get a reasonable priced good quality decent size one? Cheers

[midnight 657]

Patterd ales that's great !

Really nice to see another fellow knife maker progressing !!

 

Can you and anyone else do me a favour ??

 

Please please please don't buy that type of Damascus .....

 

It's indian made stuff , imported mostly by a shark called James noble (he changes that name all the time )

It's not made from any known grade of metals , certainly not carbon steels like it should be .

The production of it is worse than any sweat shop anywhere in the world , made and sold as "tourist/souvenir" product only in Indian but sold as top end "Damascus" world wide .

This isn't just me who has an issue with this , everyone in the knife industry hates the stuff .

Google it and get more information .

 

I have been asked to heat treat the stuff and it won't harden so it's not carbon steel . It warps and cracks if you try to .

 

I don't want this post to take away from your work and interest in the knife making but I really do urge everyone to learn there stuff with knife making . There is so much to learn through the who proses .

It's taken me a very very long time to learn the basics , I have never applied myself to anything as much as I have this ...

It's 90% heart break and frustration,

 

This one has the makings of a great knife and I can see your investment of time money and patience . It's such a shame the steel (out and out the most important part of a knife) is worse than a Chinese butter knife for edge holding ability .

To be a great blade maker look to start at the beginning . The steel ...

Everything else is pointless if that's not right .

It's a great feeling to know that before anything else happens , you picked the right steel , the

right thickness , the right temper , after that go wild have fun be dearing , because you absolutely know it will be a great knife .

For ever thousand years (now provable ) the world understood thus and prioritiesed it above all else.

Only in the last 100 years has humanity forgotten or ignored this .

 

I really am sorry to jump in with a massive negative like this , please accept it as learning nota dressing down .

But to not educate enthusiastic and talented new people to the craft is criminal.

[Patterd Ales 59]

Thanks Midnight, I bought the blade from Germany. Are you saying the blade I bought is poor quality or the billet gruffalo speaks of?

I would love to make the blades but currently have nothing more than am angle grinder and a couple of welders to do so.

I take no offence by your post and am always keen to be educated.

[GruffaloGriff 1,852]

Likewise, thanks for the advise Midnight. Not really kitted out to forge weld my own Damascus blades so where best to buy a decent billet? Cheers

P.S Just removed my bid on the ebay import!

Edited March 1, 2015 by GruffaloGriff

[midnight 657]

Hi guys thank god that didn't go badly ?

Any of the Indian damascus stuff is just a visual quality .

True Damascus or pattern welded steel is going to cost you . It has to, it costs so much to make .

As you know I'm changing how I work , and as such doing real costing for stuff . I reckon to make a billet big enough, out of the right materials to make your knife would cost around £70 that's not the blade just a lump of steel you could then make into a blank .

So if I can, let me break it down to portions .

You need maybe 2x o1 tool steel flat stock and x3 equivalent in 15n2o nickel steel as we know they both are very high quality streels, both have nice carbon content , 15n20 a little less. O1 is easy to get , 15n20 very hard to find and expensive .

So £30 for the o1 and £50 for the 15n20.

What have we got at this stage ?

Not much just 5 bars of steel ......

That needs descaling and degreasing cutting into appropriate strips and then stacking into a billet of alternate layers .

Weld the ends with arc welds so it will hold together as we bring it to heat , weld on a handle (usually a £10 bar of steel)

Then get your vertical welding forge to heat , ok a little about the forge . You can't buy them commercially , they have to be made by you or someone that knows there stuff . People make there own ... To do that you need to learn all about refractory , all the different types of environment inside a forge , burner types on and on .

So with time materials etc etc £1,000 investment seems fair .. So why not use a small commercial forge ??

Simply because the flux we use and the temperatures we need will destroy the forge in weeks , even if it's not lit after use. So that's out !

Back to making a billet then . We have our steels . We have our forge , a nice big full propane tank £35 x2 if your hand forging .

And we have the right environment in the forge , it's called reducing , we want a fuel rich mix of air and gas , around 20 to 1 ratio , we want to get the billet hot without scale so the fuel rich nature expels oxygen and lessens the risk of oxides that will case scale that might get trapped between the laminates and stop a proper weld .

Before we get a big heat we want to flux the billet . Using boric acid in powder form we sprinkle it over the billet and back to the heat . This stuff is cheap at £7 a kilo but someone has to pay for it right?

Repeat the above until we get a nice liquid layer of flux running and bubbling all over the billet . To see this you gotta looking into the forge . But that will destroy your retina with uv damage , so you have to be quick .

Billets hot (lemon yellow) flux is like boiling honey so to the anvil and strike the billet in a sequential movement . Basically overlapping blows working the length of the billet working out to the edges , it's not hard blows just enough to squeeze the steel together . You have seconds to do this as you lose heat fast, no hear no weld .

Repeat this 3 times and you have one harmonious lump of laminated steel , nothing more .

No we need to draw this out . 4 options here , power hammer thousands of pound of money , if you have the location and ability to use one . Or get lucky and pay for time in a blacksmiths shop if they will let you .

Next a forge press (Iv never seen one and only know two guys that have one )

Next a forge roller , again I don't know anyone .

Or hammer and anvil . That's most likely where you would start , I did and destroyed my elbow joints doing so .

Let's move on .

You draw out the billet enough to cut and stack into a billet of 5 layers of the original ..

Repeat ,repeat , repeat .

If your doing this by hand you will have been hammering for a couple of days now ?

Time to pattern the billet , lots of ways to do this . All will see you loose at least 1/3 of your billet .

Keep it simple . We twist the steel in a tight twist , it might tear , your welds might not hold , you will find it impossible to get an even twist rate and you will have at least an inch at both ends untwisted because you need to hold it in a vice and clamps .

Ok it went well it's twisted what next . It needs squaring off under the hammer . Then grind off all the nasty bits and unweeded edges . You will loose maybe 50% of the billet again . You can now forge out your blade .

Thurmo cycle it to reduce the grain size of the steel for maximum cutting quality blade and anneal to a soft working state .

There you have the simplest ,least waist-full method of making a pattern welded knife .

All you have to do now is all the bloody work of making a pleasing shape , grinding and preparing for heat treating .

 

On and on it goes .

 

To answer where to get a Damascus blade from .. I don't know is the answer . As you all know I pretty much have given my work away until now .

Alabama Damascus offered very nice , properly made pattern welded steel in ground flat stock and blanks I think . Google will find it easy .

But as always it's not English so just funding a foreign enterprise to success, where a uk based company could be.

[Patterd Ales 59]

I know price is no guarantee of quality, my blade was £35 I think.

That was insightful Midnight. Sounds like jolly hard work! It all adds up so quickly, oak block was 15 plus postage, pins, abrasives, Polish, leather, leatherworking tools etc etc. But, such a knife to buy would be over 200. Just as well we enjoy it.