Guy forges blade out of raw river ore!

Nic Ramirez said:
http://jarkko1.deviantart.com/#/d5d2l2v

I thought this was really awesome! I have to say, those grinds look like he used modern equipment but still, how cool is this??

Does anyone know if a blade like that would hold an edge for very long?
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From what I've read it depends on a number of factors; how much carbon did he get into the iron?, How much impurities were left behind?, What trace elements were in the ore?, What heat treatment did he use?, How hard did he temper the blade?, and probably some other factors that I forgot. Typically this type of steel does not hold an edge as well as modern steels and it will be much more prone to rusting. This is how steel was made in that part of the world 3 or more centuries ago. It is better than a copper or bronze knife and better than an obsidian one as well.
 
Not sure whether the end result is usable but that's still cool. That guy could use a little more defensible space around his forge, though, or at least I'd want some if I was forging in a field of tall, dry grass.
 
I guess it depends on if the craftsman made cast iron or wrought iron. If he starts with cast iron the he will forge out the carbon to make steel. So I may have gotten my irons mixed up. It is possible to increase the content of wrought iron by burying the iron in the reducing portion of the charcoal or coal bed.
 
my own question surrounds his mining method. i find it strange he's dredging for magnetite in deep water. iron sand is usually found in the shallow parts of a river, concentrated along a layer in a sand bar, or at the bottom of river pot holes.
 
Yep, pretty standard bloomery furnace. It'll make a good billet of steel if your refine it enough after the smelt. This is pretty much how the much-vaunted tamahagane is done.
 
From what I understand, the first bloom out will have the highest carbon content. Subsequent refining by reheating it, folding, etc... drops the carbon content. It produces a low carbon steel-not the best, but certainly useable.
 
pretty cool stuff. Primitive, but you have to start somewhere. If you were able to get your hands on some alloying metals, would you just hammer weld them in? I'm assuming that you aren't getting fully liquid iron from that process. If you could keep the sulfur content low enough it would be useful for a lot of other things as well.
 
At the bottom of the page he describes that it is soft. Not hard enough to cut much more than saplings. I will say though that the experience must have been great and what an awesome way to learn.
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Beckerhead #32
 
At any rate, it was cool to see the process. Even if it's not better, it's interesting to learn about traditional methods.
 
Very interesting stuff!
 
Both bronze and wrought iron blades can't be HT'ed ,however they can be work hardened and were ! It's not uncommon to see that on ancient blades that have been work hardened on the edges. Hammer and anvil are used to thin and harden a small area to the out to the edge.
 
that's awesome i just watched a TV special on the History channel called mankind: the story of us all and it talks a bit about forging bronze and iron in the beginning of metal tools and weapons
 
I'll hijack this thread for a bit... :-D

Do you guys know any good forging-related documentaries? I've seen the one about the traditional katana and tamahagane, and the aforementioned Viking one.
 
AWSmith said:
From what I understand, the first bloom out will have the highest carbon content. Subsequent refining by reheating it, folding, etc... drops the carbon content. It produces a low carbon steel-not the best, but certainly useable.
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Different parts of the bloom will have different carbon contents. Further refinement evens out the carbon content as the layers get progressively thinner and the carbon migrates from high carbon areas to low carbon areas.

Everything I've read (though I haven't made particular study of it, just in passing multiple times through the years on blacksmithing forums) has indicated that tamahagane works out to somehting on the order of 1060 with slag inclusion.
 
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