First forging attempt

[Doc Shipley]

I tried forging a blade last night, and I'm not displeased with the results at all. Well, except for the blisters on my hammer hand....

Next attempt, I'm either buying some 1/4" x 1" stock or splitting this 1/4" x 1.75". Drawing it out to width was probably good practice, but not loads of fun.

No way it would be done before the weekend, but I decided to try the ballocks dagger style. 1084, 9" single-edge blade, stick tang, no ricasso. I don't have any good dressed edges on my anvil yet, or Hardie tools, so omitting the plunge line is a plus.

It's not finished by any means; I ran out of propane. The tang will get drawn out a lot thinner, the edge beveled, and the transition from blade to tang cleaned up. And obviously, I'll try to leave it a little less crooked.

It's not finished by any means; I ran out of propane. The tang will get drawn out a lot thinner, the edge beveled, and the transition from blade to tang cleaned up. And obviously, I'll try to leave it a little less crooked.

The photos were tsaken after descaling in vinegar overnight.

I have a couple of questions about what looks like cold shuts and decarb, and how to prevent or manage the mushrooming.

You can see the cold shuts in these photos:

Should I grind all that out before going back to the forge?

Is this decarb or just where scale got ground in? Is it a problem, other than having to sand it out?

And finally, What's up with the straight groove toward the middle of the blade? I'm certain that's not a tooling mark:

I think I'm going to finish the forging and bring it with me to Ashokan for "grading" and pointers.

 

[Salem Straub]

The first of the last three pics looks like a problem. Grind it out for sure before forging again. The second pic looks like fairly benign pitting. Hammer it out or grind it out. Running low heats and a reducing atmosphere, or even wet forging may help with excess scale. The third pic, hard to tell. Maybe grind it bright and see if there is a fine black line there. If so, grind it out. To reduce mushrooming, just stay on top of correcting these problems as you go. Much easier than letting them get out of hand and then dealing with it later... I often switch hammers as I go, using a big heavy one to do things like break down stock quickly or keep the thickness down, or a lighter flatter one for the bevels. (I can see the tang got a lot thicker from the drawing out). Also, toward the tip, it looks like either you need to hit it flatter or your hammer needs to have a bit of a flatter face. A little crown is good, but for your main blade forging hammer I would recommend that at least the center of the face be pretty flat. Hope this helps. Happy forging to you.

 

[Doc Shipley]

Thanks, Salem!

That third pic, I don't know what it was. It ground out clean and didn't come back. I cleaned up the cold shuts everywhere but the tip and finished the forging last night. The tip is going to get ground out pre-HT anyway.

The blade came out better than I hoped. The only real fubar is the tang - for this style I wanted it centered on the blade and it's way off-center toward the spine. I figured out too late that cross-piening mostly on the spine side could have prevented that. I took photos, but haven't offloaded 'em yet. I'll try to post them tonight.

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Heat it up to full forging heat and move the tang to wherever you want it. If it doesn't want to move, the steel isn't hot enough. It looks like you are trying to let brute strength and heavy blows move the steel. Instead, let the proper forging temp and a smooth blow do it almost effortlessly ( OK, maybe a little effort).

When I draw out a tang it often starts like yours. After tapering it out and shaping it, it may end up 10" long. I cut off the extra.

 

[Doc Shipley]

Heat it up to full forging heat and move the tang to wherever you want it. If it doesn't want to move, the steel isn't hot enough. It looks like you are trying to let brute strength and heavy blows move the steel. Instead, let the proper forging temp and a smooth blow do it almost effortlessly ( OK, maybe a little effort).

When I draw out a tang it often starts like yours. After tapering it out and shaping it, it may end up 10" long. I cut off the extra.

Thanks, Stacy. By the time I finished drawing it out and got the blade forged and ground down to the width I want, it's not so bad.

This weekend will be my first chance to see a blade forged live. I expect I'll gain a lot of clue...