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| Before the etch. |
My partner has gotten his BIG 2 burner forge up and running. It can reach welding temp so he has been experimenting with damascus billets made of cable and various types of high carbon steel. The billet for the knife above is cable damascus and 5160 spring steel. He folded the billet several times so it has over 200 layers, Your humble narrator then forged the blade to shape.
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| After the 5 minute etch. |
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| After about 2 hours in the etchant. |
After profiling and getting the bevels ground and ready for heat treat we did a quick etch with hot vinegar (don't use the nice glasses, the woman of the house will get cross!) so we could get an idea of how the pattern turned out. A very lovely random pattern was revealed to us. Then is was back to to the HBI shop for heat treat and all the grinding and drilling that makes a knife not a prison shank. Then is was time for about 2 hours in the vinegar to get a nice etch. It was a happy thing to see the emerge. Update...256 layer count. Then I gave the cutty parts a light buff to make them shine and put on some linen micarta scales with some stainless steel Corby bolts.
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| The finished knife ready for a sheath |
Thanks! There will be more on the way. Three different billets are in the works. I have enough for a small knife left in the piece that the finished one is from.
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