Pattern Welding Practice Material

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gijaney

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Oct 17, 2004
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Hello, I have a few questions I was hoping someone would be able to help me with please. I am primarily a custom-rustic-"functional art" woodworker, though I did blacksmith for a few years, primarily to add embellishments to my wood projects. I've forged a few blades (salvaged leaf/coil spring/ truck axle material etc), and tried a bit of coal-fired pattern welding-pretty unsuccessfuly:grumpy: I own Hrisoulas' books, and have perused much written material on the 'net, yet nowhere have I found quite the info I need. So here goes.
I would like to get more involved in bladeforging, and had what I thought was a great (?) idea insofar as practice in welding of a "non-critical " application pattern-welded product. I have an idea for a table with some embellishment, only, unlike in the past, I'd like this addition to be composed of pattern-welded material. I need quite a bit, four strips , 1/4 inch thick, 1 1/4-1 1/2 inches wide, and each approx 36 inches long when finished. Quite an order. I would really like to use pure nickel sheet , merely because it'll provide such wonderful definition and contrast. So my question is, what steel type would you recommend for this absolute beginner to practice with,hopefully something that won't break the bank, yet provide a proper substrate for the nickel to adhere to. High carbon, low, or would salvaged coil springs etc. fit the requirements. Perhaps welding various steels together would be a more intelligent prelude to eventually working with nickel?
I figure if this works out, I'll have learnt a bit about forge welding, structural integrity won't be quite the issue as it would for a functional blade, and I'll have that much more experience when I eventually decide to build some more blades for myself.
Thank you very much, and I appreciate all your ideas and correspondences for this newbie.
 
If the patterned material won't be hardened and is not highly structural, almost any available metal will work. For cost and ease, leaf springs (5160/9260) will do fin, but will require a lot of preparation.
If you want to make life a little easier, order a stick of 1.5"X.25" 5160 from Admiral. That will be 21 feet (They will cut it into 3 foot pieces for you). Use .040 nickel strips between the layers. Cut the 5160 into eight 6" pieces and one 36" long. When stacked with the long one in the center it will give you a nice big handle (When done with the billet, you can cut the handle off and use it for short pieces).Stack the pieces with nickel between. Add a strip of nickel every time you fold. This won't break the bank (except for the nickel) and will give you lots of practice metal. This size billet should give you a 36"X 1.5" long piece when done.
Stacy
 
also an alternative to nickel you could use 15n20 which has a fair amount of nickel in it I just happen to sell it in the form of used commercial Band saw Blades
up to 10" wide and .078 thick at $1.50 per pound, ( when I have it..)
more often I have the smaller stuff Opox .045 thick and around 6-7" wide.
I'm not trying plug here but just saying there is an alternative..
I'm out of it all right now but my guy tells me maybe this week..

if you go with 1095 as the main mix you can get it real reasonable from Admiral and you only need to buy about 8' feet of what ever width you want..
just my 2 cents added. :)
 
Are you forging in coal or propane?? Gas forges are much cleaner to weld in. It is very difficult to get a good weld using nickel in a coal forge. If all you are doing is making table legs mild steel would work also. The Blacksmith who taught me made me practice with mild steel to get the forge welding down before I moved on to high carbon steels. If you are looking to make a blade or two out of these billets then I would recommend the 1095 as it will forge to the nickel a little easier. I also agree with the 15N20 instead of pure nickel. Much cheaper and easier to weld. It works great with 5160 also.

Good Luck
Chuck
 
Well thank you , fellas, for all the suggestions . The pieces I'm trying to fashion will be attached to the table around the edge, circumferentially, I guess you could call it. The table will be approx. 22"x50", therefore the requirement for 12 linear feet of pattern-welded material, although this will be broken up into 4 L-shaped pieces of about 36" length- I've already figured out how to hide the seams where the butt-ends will meet. I'm also going to have to do some math ,I guess, in order to determine how much everything will stretch after the folding process. Probably aiming for 150 to 300 layers. No hardening required either. And thanks for making me aware of the 15N20-had no idea such existed, and it's good to know that it's less expensive than pure Ni- this self-unemployed, starving artist needs to cut costs wherever feasible. All will be done in a gas forge, as I need all the help and control I can get.

Haven't even built the table yet. Guess I should start.
 
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