damascus help

[Dakota 11]

hello, so i welded up my first billet last night and all went well. i did 2 more welds today on it and the basic welds are good. i had 156 layer billet. now the problem comes in when i tried to twist it. first i took it to welding heat closed the press down on the end and gave it maybe 3/4 of a twist before it got hard to move. back into forge and back up to heat. brought it out and did same thing cept this time i got about 1 and half turns completed. ok np right, wrong i squish the billet down to a workable size and i have 3 diagonal line running across the billet. i had rounded the billet off before i attempted to twist per Ed caffreys damascus video. so now what do i do. the way the lines run there is no way to make a workable knife at this point. Is there any way to reweld these spots ? can i cut restack ,weld and hope it seals the crack? or do i have gurad and bolster material now instead of a knife billet. thanks Pete

 

[burke531]

soak it in muratic acid for a couple of hours then reweld it.