Liquid Metal is here! well at least some prototypes

nhamilto40-- Thanks for the link , cool school.

R.W. -- Thank you sir . Sure is some really cool stuff , wish I could get my hands on a knife made from it to see it in action .

Thanks for all the info. shared in this thread my poor head is spinning around trying to process it .

Jerry
 
I've learned to stay out these discussions (for the most part) because of the recent S30V debacle when CRK switched over to that alloy. I guess the bottom line is that the proof is in the puddin' and the puddin here is real life testing! Hat's off to Mr. Clark for doing JUST THAT! :) Now if you look at Talonite strlictly "by the numbers" it's not so great either, particularly in hardness, etc. But it's got some great applications (at least Mayo and Camillus think so). I'm just old enough to remember the introduction of fiberglass in boats, enough said.
 
R.W.,

I was thinking about mils instead of micron thickness "coatings". I would think that at the thicknesses needed to serve for a knife you'd be constructing a laminated item instead of a coated item. As to concern for sharpening the material away it looks like your own tests show that you wouldn't have to sharpen the material often enough to worry about that.

Are the coatings applied in a sputter chamber?

I have seen the product, Armacor, used on drill bits before and it does significantly extend the useful life of the bits.

If anyone is interested, Rolla (UMR) is a great engineering school. Two good friends of mine came out of there and it's one of the best mine and materials schools going. According to my pals there's nothing for miles and miles and the male to female ratio is reported to be 10 to 1. As such there ain't a lot to do other than study, drink, study, get in bar fights, and study.
 
The fracture angle quoted is typical for an amorphous material.

It would be informative to closely examine the damaged edge of the test knife to determine if the dulling observed was predominatly the result of micro chipping rather than the more common edge rolling and plastic deformation typically seen in steel blades.

It may be that this material is exhibiting behavior more commonly seen in ceramic blades i.e. dulling is by edge chipping as opposed to abrasive wear and/or blunting by plastic deformation.

A low power microscope or strong loupe may be in order.
 
I still have access to SEM and optical microscopy if R.W. wants to investigate this further, but I bet there are plenty of microscopy facilities with knife nuts in CA that would be happy to do this for him.

www.csem.caltech.edu/Publications/ Ustundag-Deformation.pdf is an interesting article on a "beta" phase BMG that reduces the shear band catastrophic failure. Considering the Ti in the LM R.W. is using I wonder if this would make for a good composite using Ti as a base material and then forming the LM on that with the "beta" phase material acting as an intergrowth bond? What do you think nhamilto40?
 
OK… Now we are back to one of my original questions.

Based on the data presented so far I was hazarding a guess that micro-chipping would be the primary edge degradation factor. I would be surprised if edge rolling or plastic deformation played a large part in this due to the elasticity characteristics and the comment Mr. Clark had made related to “I bent one bar to about 60deg and it bounced right back like it was never bent. When it does fail it is a clean snap.”

Also since we keep referring to it as a glass I would assume that it would wear somewhat like obsidian. An excellent edge that does not deform, but would degrade over time due to micro-chipping (unless you are not careful with it and then it can be macro-chipping.)

So Mr. Clark,

During your testing of this material what type of edge degradation did you notice?
Also, what edge angle did you find to work best with this material?
Also, did the material tend to clog sharpening stones more so than current standard knife steels?

Thanks,

Lorne
 
"Considering the Ti in the LM R.W. is using I wonder if this would make for a good composite using Ti as a base material and then forming the LM on that with the "beta" phase material acting as an intergrowth bond?"

HUH?:confused: :D

Actually it seemed to dull more from edge rolling than anything else. You can see it in the final photo on the testing page. You will notice that there is a slight shine on the cutting edge. Micro chipping might also be a factor but I do not remember noticing any. Unfortunatly the knife is now at CalTech for further testing.

I will go out to the shop and sharpen another up. I will chop some ebony and see if I can get it to dull. If it dulls quickly (it should ebony is tough stuff) I will get a super close up shoot of the edge and let you guys see for yourselves.

The knife in the testing video was set at about 17deg. This is a little steeper than I have my EDC set at but we really wanted to put the knife at a disadvantage for testing purposes.

Sharpening on my EDC was done with a 120 belt but follow up honing is done with crock sticks. It does not appear to clog the sticks any more than my O1 EDC.
 
Well, I just spent the last 10 minutes hacking ebony. The edge has not even begun to dull. It is still popping hairs. It is too late and I am too tired to do any more chopping tonight. I will pick up a loupe in the morning and let you know what I see.

Also if anyone wants to come on over and do some cutting with this stuff let me know. I would be happy to get more third party opinions. Just be warned that if you cut yourself don't cry to me. I supply bandaids thats all. (and a drive to the local ER if needed;))

The maker who was helping me test decided to start cutting up soda cans. He was bisecting them top to bottom. On the first cut the knife sliced right through the can and into the back of his hand. He still had a little line of a scar the last time I saw him.
 
Mr. Clark,

Be careful what you wish for...

OK let's see. Your in Corona and I'm in Ventura... I figure 100 to 105 miles give or take... Not too bad.:D

Now to find the time for a road trip and a box of bandaids. ;)
 
I work from aprox 10am-1pm and 5pm-? Monday-Friday.
All day Saturday.
I try not to work on Sundays but you are more than welcome until it is time to leave for church (aprox 2:30pm).

Let me know.
 
I hope this thread sticks around for a while because then LM hits the knife market it will answer a lot of questions! :D

Thanks for clearing up the thermal conductivity issue, nhamilto40. I earned my degree in electrical engineering, not in metallurgy but I'm as eager to learn as anyone.

I wonder what the magnetic permeability of LM1 is, because this property would enhace its value as a casing material for electronics. Any sort of metal would already be better than plastic for EMI and RFI shielding. I tinker in hifi on the side and I appreciate the value of EMI and RFI shielding on electronics, especially with cables and transformers. And with anodizing, I bet we'll see some pretty colorful and wild designs in the future.

What exactly happens to LM1 when heated too much? You mentioned that it softens but does it remain soft after it cools? What if just an part of an LM1 piece reaches this temperature?

Mr. Clark, I live in LA so a trip to Corona sounds very interesting. Need to pick up a rayskin and TekLok anyways....;)
A good friend of mine is interested in traditional Japanese tantos so maybe he can come along as well.
 
nhamilto40,

As someone pointed out in an earlier response Talonite has been criticized on the same basis that you are skeptical about LM1.

However, Talonite is very popular as a blade material and a number of us swear by our Talonite blades.

It sounds like LM1 has the potential to compete very favorably against Talonite escpecially for production companies.
 
wow, very interesting material.. I wish I was cali longer and not having to go back to school or else I would be out in corona cutting up something since i'm like an hour away in Huntington beach. but ohh well. Looks interesting keep us updated, thanks for all of your work.
thanks
trevor
 
Gee... Mr. Clark is being very nice to offer us a "look-see" at this new stuff as well as the opportunity to cut up a storm.

As there appear to be several of us in the area that are interested maybe we should pick a Saturday a few weeks off that fits well in his schedule and several of us try this stuff out together. This way we limit the interruptions to his work schedule.

We could then add more information and first hand experiences to the discussion. We could each bring a couple of items for destructive testing and have at it. I will donate another (as Mr. Clark has told us this was done already) steel belted tire to the mix. I guess this should be done near the end of the testing as it caused severe dulling the last time. Maybe slice the sidewall off first to see how that works (can cause quite a bit of binding slicing through rubber) before we send the blade through the belts. I'm sure I can find a few other items (2X4's etc.) in the garage to bring as well. (Don't worry... I'll haul all the pieces back home.)

Would this be acceptable to you, R.W.?

If so would 1/11, 1/18, 1/25, or some other date work best for you?

Who would be interested in this type of "Field Trip"?
 
The 11th or the 25th sounds fine. I will be in Vegas on the 18th so that one is out. Didn't get the loupe this morning but I will try to pick on up on Saturday. I was dealing with other VERY interesting things all day.

Thanks to whoever sent that e-mail! You know who you are and where you sent it to. Well, it paid off in spades! Could I be any more criptic?:D
 
Hey Ron, maybe I'll stop by sometime next week and see how things are going with your LM1.
 
Anything new must be explored fully - at least we aren't like the firearms guys where it's Glock (or Sig, or 1911, or whatever) or it's crap.

I think that this will be a neat material. The demo is certainly pretty cool - but then any demo can be rigged.

But, R.W. Clark certainly has my respect as a maker. If he says he's been chopping ebony for 10 minutes with a knife and it's still edge popping sharp, my ears certainly perk up.

The Jury's out - but the initial results are promising. RW, please do us all a favor and keep us posted as new information comes available.

Kevin
 
Pretty much have to agree with Kevin on all his points and want to thank Ron for posting what he has learned and experienced.

I also want to point out that he took a risk in messing with a new material (time and effort could have yielded other results not as promising) and that it took guts to air it out here knowing there would be some heat ;).

For what it is worth I did not read any hype in his post at all and I am glad the discussion has resumed. Thanks Ron.
 
i am very intrigued
how much would it cost to make a knife out of this so i can abuse the crap out of it? :)
it would be fun to be ahead of the tech curve for once :D
but seriously, how is the pricing compared to other steels, stellite/talonite etc?
 
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