- Joined
- Nov 27, 1999
- Messages
- 3,745
I have a knife that I am duplicating. I happen to know the history of the thing and it was made by a blacksmith in The Shenandoah Valley in the mid 1800's.
The thing that puzzled me were the scales. They were metal, silver Grey and while had corroded some, were not rusted. One blacksmith in the area I talked to told me they were "Pot Metal" but couldn't shed much light on the composition of pot metal.
A number of google searches found more recipes for pot metal than I wanted to know but none seemed right for this knife.
The more I looked at the original, the more it looked like really worn Aluminum. Thinking aluminum was a much later alloy, I dismissed it.
Just for the fun of it, I googled aluminum history and damned if the stuff wasn't around before 1807 when it really kicked into gear.
The thing that puzzled me were the scales. They were metal, silver Grey and while had corroded some, were not rusted. One blacksmith in the area I talked to told me they were "Pot Metal" but couldn't shed much light on the composition of pot metal.
A number of google searches found more recipes for pot metal than I wanted to know but none seemed right for this knife.
The more I looked at the original, the more it looked like really worn Aluminum. Thinking aluminum was a much later alloy, I dismissed it.
Just for the fun of it, I googled aluminum history and damned if the stuff wasn't around before 1807 when it really kicked into gear.
