Blades from meteorites?

A. Brett Schaller

A. Brett Schaller

Joined
Mar 22, 2001
Messages
787
I had a gentleman contact me about possibly making blades from two meteorites he has. (I'm assuming they're iron meteorites and not stony meteorites.) I know it's not something I can do, but does anyone know whether it's practical? Would anyone here undertake such a project? I told him I'd check around and see if anyone knows more about meteorites than I do.

Thanks!
 
A. Brett Schaller said:
I had a gentleman contact me about possibly making blades from two meteorites he has. (I'm assuming they're iron meteorites and not stony meteorites.) I know it's not something I can do, but does anyone know whether it's practical? Would anyone here undertake such a project? I told him I'd check around and see if anyone knows more about meteorites than I do.

Thanks!
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People use meteorite iron as an ingredient in damascus and for bolsters and such. I wouldn't try to make blade from one because it ain't steel. Furthermore, the really nice Widmanstettten (sp?) patterned meteorites can be worth a buttload of money these days or any nickel iron meteorite for that matter.
 
I have done it before. Need to mix it with other material. I ended up using it for the outer skin of san mai. I even have a bit left over.
 
Chuck, I ran across one guy who used sell the swarf and small cutoff pieces from cutting meteorites into VERY expensive slices for display, overpriced paper weights etc. to knife makers for damascus. he also sold small slices for bolsters. To an one who wants to do this, the problem is that the pattern will probably go away if you heat it up.
 
Dr. James Batson, the rocket scientist and master blade smith, did an article, with 8X10 glossy color photographs, in Blade magazine on how to make a blade out of a meteorite. The elephant in the living room: no two meteorites are alike, and even one in your hot little hand has an unknown composition. Even if you do mass spectrometry and determine the make up, the alloy is not going to drop on to a conventional heat treat sheet.
So I would be inclined to use the extra terrestrial material for the non cutting (decorative) parts of a knife.
The
 
I know HHH knives has done it several times, both for decorative fixtures as well as including it in his damascus.
 
If I could get a slice of meteorite and do a stock removal knife, I wouldn't heat treat it, I would hang it on the wall and strike a pose next to it every time someone came over for a visit........ you know, foot on a stool, elbow on my knee, Captain Morgan in my right hand ;0)
 
The meteorite I used was campo, No pattern just a high nickel content. Some of the Gibeon meteorites have the great pattern and yes it will disappear if heated to welding temps. The customer actually gave me 2 large meteorites. I drilled holes in them and used the chips in a box. Stuffed the box as full as I could and filled the remaining with steel powder. I added carbon by weight based on the meteorite was almost pure iron with some nickel to give me what I hoped would have been adequate. But it would not harden so I used it for the San Mai. Turned out pretty good. I have a box of granulated meteorite left over along with some of the actual larger pieces. HAve been toying with the idea of doing another billet.

Looked up the campo and they are going for about $100/lb.
 
I just looked up some Gibeon slices. They had one 340 gram etched slice.................for close to $1000!!!!!!! And we thought that CPM 90V was expensive!! :eek:
 
A C Richards said:
Don't want to mess up a billet with that in it!:black_eyed:
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Knapp_140121-web_zpsc3fc4832.jpg


Here's a folder I made using two different kinds of meteorite. I used Gibeon for san mai on the blade with 1095. I had always thought that forge welding would take away the pattern in the Gibeon but with some experimentation I figured out how to do it and preserve the pattern. The key is to use as low a forge welding temp as you can. As you can see, the pattern did not go away when I forge welded it. I used meteorite with olivine crystals for the scales.
 
I have made many folders with bolsters of meteorite. I like Gibeon and Semychem which sometimes even has some gold or silver in the material. Seymchen does contain a lot of slag that causes al sorts of problems in getting pieces big enough for what you want. I heat colour all my meteorite to give it that "going through space look." I did one meteorite blade where I placed a small applied stainless blade along the cutting edge. So see a couple of my bolsters in meteorite, please go to Custom Knife Gallery of Colorado
Frank
 
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Mark Knapp said:
Knapp_140121-web_zpsc3fc4832.jpg


Here's a folder I made using two different kinds of meteorite. I used Gibeon for san mai on the blade with 1095. I had always thought that forge welding would take away the pattern in the Gibeon but with some experimentation I figured out how to do it and preserve the pattern. The key is to use as low a forge welding temp as you can. As you can see, the pattern did not go away when I forge welded it. I used meteorite with olivine crystals for the scales.
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Wow!!!! How did you manage to pull that off, Mark? That looks fantastic!!!!:thumbup::D
 
Thanks for the replies everyone! Lots of good information.
If he's serious about wanting a knife made, would anyone mind if I pointed him to this thread, or passed along contact info?
 
A C Richards said:
Very cool Mark! I can see were dry welding could be very handy here.
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jdm61 said:
Wow!!!! How did you manage to pull that off, Mark? That looks fantastic!!!!:thumbup::D
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Actually, I did it with a little flux. I knew that mild steel welds at a lower temp than high carbon, and that differing steels usually weld at lower temps than like steels do. I suspected that too much heat might destroy the Widmanstatten pattern so I started at a very low welding temp, as I remember, somewhere around 2200deg. It didn't weld there so I increased the temp at 25 degree intervals till it welded. Next time I do it, I will do the same.

I have a little bit of a backlog right now but, yes, throw my name into the pool too.
 
I'm pretty sure most people here have seen this on youtube but since it wasn't mentioned yet I'll go ahead and share it here.. :)

[video=youtube;DAbIf3Li1go]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAbIf3Li1go[/video]

EDIT: Here is another one that might be of interest.. BTW There are 3 parts to this video.

[video=youtube;VXg0Uzl1pu8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=VXg0Uzl1pu8#t=18[/video]

~Paul
My YT Channel Lsubslimed
 
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