Newbie question, on Damascus.

Santi

Santi

Joined
Sep 12, 2000
Messages
2,483
I was told that: "Actually when you receive a good damascus, you don't have to do anything. The pattern is clear and ready to use."

But then why do we have to etch the damascus? :confused:

THANKS! :)
 
The pattern is there alright but something needs to be done to make it show to its fullest beauty. Most people etch it with mild acids to make it show up. Many times I will make damascus with nickel and tool steel, instead of etching I polish it and have it professionally hot (gun) blued. The contrast is the best.
 
The only reason to etch is to show the contrast in the steels.If you polish the blade to a mirror you wont really see the pattern untill the blade ages and tarnishes some and causes the differnt steels to look different in the blade.The etching just speeds up this process.
Also it is what people have come to expect over the years,and I guess that they are not ready for a change.
Bruce
 
I do not know were Santi got this information but a swoard maker once told me the same thing.
On the last blade I did with 5160/52100 pool and eye you could see every bit of the patturn at 1000 grit finish WITHOUT any etching. This supprised me as I had never seen it before that clearly. I mean that yes you can see the damascus patturn without etching if you play with it in the light most of the time but this one just plain old poped right out while I was hand sanding it in knife vice. Nothing for contrast but the patturn was clearly visable.
For those that care to look the etched picture is in the gallery.
 
I made some motorcycle chain damascus the other day and the pattern is clearly visible at a 220 grit finish. One part of the mix (it seems to be the bushing around the pins) appears very grainy (like when you over heat a blade during heat treat or forget to normalize) while another part of it looks like it was already damascus(it has a distinct pattern that flows with the shape of that piece) The other two parts look like normal steel however. I did the heat treat the same as I do for 1084. The hardened portion of the blade shows almost no pattern when unetched but the soft spine and tang are very bold.
 
This is true for most pattern welded steels. It is not true at all for true damascus (Wootz). If you polish this stuff, you don't see anything at all. On the other hand, you don't have to relief etch it.

Achim
 
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