Forging a blade from meteorites

[bile]

I've found a smith that will happily attempt this little project for me, the aim being to make three blades from a 740g meteorite if he thinks the material is sufficient. I want two three inch blades for folders with a warncliff pattern blade, the rest for a chefs knife.
Obviously I don't want to bugger up this due to the difficulty of getting that much iron at a price I can afford ( which is why most smiths didn't want to touch )

The stone has strong Widmanstätten patterns, will the forging entirely obliterate this or will the blades still show some odd kind of pattern when polished and etched.

Then there's the problem of holding an edge - at 90%iron 8%nickle he's told me the blade will be tough but won't hold an edge very well,
do I go for a case hardening or talk him into folding something else in as well.

cheers
Bile

 

[Chuck Gedraitis Knives]

Have him fold something in, there probally isn't enough carbon in it right now. Probally 1095 would work well. And just so you know this thread is probally going to get moved to the shop talk forum.

 

[Danbo]

If you plan on using the knives, you will most definitely need to mix some high carbon steel into the blade. O1 or 1084 would be good candidates. Or, maybe a San Mai type of blade with pure high carbon core and the meteorite damascus for the outer layers?

 

[george tichbourne]

I have heard that the pattern is lost during forging.

If it is like the Gibeon meteorite that I have been purchasing the carbon content is almost non existant therefore will not harden, great for bolsters and such but not for blades.

 

[gk2410]

This is second hand, but a friend ran into a similar problem with using meteorite for the blade. He was advised that without adding another material to the mix it would not be hard enough and hold an edge. Adding the material would also take away from the natural pattern of the material. Whether that's all true or not, he didn't pursue, as he didn't have enough material to practise...

He ended up using it for a folder, and the meteorite has a very neat chrystaline pattern. He had it made into a very unusual "story" knife that is a non-user of course. The maker used the ancient meteorite for the blade and mastdadon ivory for the handles. They then sent to have a scene scrimshawed on the handles of two mastadons fleeing from a meteorite shower (rubies and saphires) - the event that brought about their extinction. Sounds gaudy but it's not, very tastefully done and way cool.

 

[Phillip Jones]

One person to ask would be Tai Goo. He forges meteorite into almost every damascus blade he makes. He hangs out alot over at CKD and at The Crucible forum.
Here is a link to the CKD...
http://ckdforums.com/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=37

 

[Kit Carson]

I've made a number of folders with the Widmenstatten pattern. They are useless as cutting pieces but they sure look good.
I had a top smith forge a piece of 52100 between 2 pieces of meteorite. I ground the blade out, etched it, and the pattern was just not there. I'm still working on it but don't think it will ever show the pattern.
Here is a picture of one set.

 

[tom mayo]

owow!!

 

[Boink]

How about knives made from volcanic hot lava? Maybe this can be combined with meteorites and make a knife really out of this world!

 

[Chuck Gedraitis Knives]

I thought that Lava was molten rock? Maybe an obsidian blade and meitorite handle?

 

[Arthur Washburn]

While working for Devin Thomas we made quite a bit of meteorite damascus for Ken Largin out of some of the Nan Tan stuff. All pattern is lost in the forging and it must be mixed with something like 1075, 1084 or 1095 to make any sort of a useful blade out of it. It can also be very difficult to get the stuff to weld good, partly because of the non metal materials contained in the meteorite partly becasue there are lots of inclusions contained in the meteorite itself. For patterning we either twisted, laddered or raindropped it. You have to be careful twisting as the stuff can tear easily.

 

[budrichard]

The Widmanstattan pattern shown in 'Nickle-Iron' meteorites can only be developed by cooling in outer space where cooling rates are a degree/century. Heating above 1/2Tm(Tm=Melting Temperature) will cause the pattern to be lost by anealing. Forging with other alloys needed to produce a useable blade will result in a loss of all traceablity to a meteorite. A raw meteorite blade is essentialy just for show and is useless as a cutting blade. Using a 750gm meteorite for a blade forging is a waste of a beautiful object. I currently have a maker producing a folder with a raw meteorite blade, blue mammoth scales and later scrimshaw. GK2410,Who has information about the same type of knife quoted in a previous reply? -Dick