Hamon?

[Varga Knives]

Probably a stupid question and I wouldn't even ask but someone posted something in an old thread that has me scratching my head.

I don't heat treat my blades so I was always under the assumption that hamon's are simply out of reach until I do. However, someone made a comment that they would try for a hamon after they get their blades back from HT. So the question is do some outsourced heat treaters provide differential heat treatment with clay (having someone else clay-up the blade kinda takes the fun out of it IMHO) or is there a way to achieve a hamon after a regular HT (which is what the poster was implying)?

Thanks

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Many HT sources will do a clay coat. Darren Sanders, probably most of the HT guys on this forum, and Peter's HT (IIRC) will do it.

Don't expect them to spend three hours arranging the clay into a O-chogi-midare format. They will do a basic clay coat for a suguha or midare hamon.

......Of course, you have to use the right type of stel.