Old drill bits for damascus?

[Yvsa]

:
Thought about this when reading the "Shop Tip" thread.

In thinking for recycleable material for damascus wouldn't old shop tools like drills, end mills and the like make a good source?

Then I got to wondering what the coatings like TiN and Hard Chrome, etc might add to or take away from the finished steel?
Has anyone tried anything like this?

Tim L. & Mike S. this should be right up your alley and I wouldn't be surprised to hear that you've both done it.

When I was in the shop I could have supplied quite a bit of broken material like this to a knifemaker and since I have friends still out there working in the shops I bet I could still get quite a lot.
And some of y'all would be surprised at the amount of junk tooling laying around most shops that is pure junk and never or seldom thrown out.
Most places I worked would have given it away for the asking.
Something to think about for me anyway.

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>>>>---¥vsa---->®

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[AchimW]

If there's more than 2 % chrome in the alloy or a Ti or chrome plating the stuff is no good for making pattern welded steel (damascus), as you won't be able to forge weld it. The problem is that chrome- and titatium-oxides can't be removed or reduced by a normal flux such as borax. Besides that there are a lot of different steels suitable for making pattern welded steel. At a friends forge i saw a damascus knife blade made from some drill bits, hacksaw blades, screwdriver and a revolver barrel. The revolver grip was still there, with grip scales and all and served as a knife grip.

A similar piece of the same smith can be seen here:

http://pub4.ezboard.com/ftheneotribalmetalsmithstribalnow.showMessage?topicID=806.topic

Achim