Silver-shibuichi mokume gane.

Here is another mokume gane post; yes this is still a sword smithing blog, but mokume gane seems to be the thing that will be paying the bills in the future, so I have to develop it. 

Here is a really good example of a silver, shibuichi, shakudo seamless ring (I did not make it), that shows the nice patination colors one can achieve with these alloys. For anyone interested, you can buy this ring at 

http://www.etsy.com/listing/58160560/mokume-gane-band-silver-shakudo-and

I cast some 25% shibuichi the other day, and had it drawn out to 0.5 mm sheet, and went ahead and bought some 0.5 mm silver sheet as well, so I should be able to try my hand at some silver-shibuichi mokume.

Also ordered some Balwin's patina from reactivemetals.com.

http://www.reactivemetals.com/documents/RMSvrs1-3-11.pdf

Shibuichi crucible in the forge.

Shibuichi casting setup.

New mokume billet.

Once again the day job has taken over for a few days, so I could not get a single day's work at the forge. 

Still here is a pendant that a jeweler friend of mine fashioned from a brass, copper, nickel silver mokume billet I forged. Looking better every time.

I also forged a 19 layer nickel silver, iron billet, and have been testing its strength, and trying to make a seamless mokume ring from it.

Looks like I might have to do some mokume billets and sell them wholesale to jewelers around here; it could at least earn me the rent for the shop, which would be nice...

Also I figured out I'll have to build my own rolling mill to flatten out the billets. I keep paying 5-20 Euros for every billet at a local shop, and also asked the price for a commercial rolling mill; 800 Euros for a Durston manual and 3800 for a power mill. I figure I should be able to build a decent powered one for less than 500, so I'll go for it.

New Japanese style anvil.

Once again a tool building post. I asked around for an anvil, and found a Ridgid-Peddinghaus 35Kg anvil going for about 550 Euros. I also checked various scrap yards for old anvils, but found none; I have seen some in the workshops of metal welders (I guess it is their grandfathers' anvils which they don't use or know how to use, but keep anyway) but they wouldn't part with them.

So I surfed around the web and figured out that the Japanese smiths use just a big block of steel. I also read that AISI 4140 steel will work, heat treated or not, so I managed to find the closest Uddeholm steel equivalent from a local Uddeholm dealer, namely Uddeholm Impax, a low Chromium-Molybdenum-Nickel steel. Had it professionally heat treated to about 52 HRc and voila!

Dimensions are 11cm x 26cm x 16cm, and weight about 35 Kg. Cost, 200 for the steel and 85 Euros for the heat treatment. Still pretty steep, but half the cost of a commercial anvil. 

And the hammer rebound is AMAZING!!!

Just inspiring!

Feeling immense gratitude to Ford Hallam for sharing his knowledge and passion, and for being an inspiration to metalworkers at large...

A short documentary film that follows classical Japanese metal artist Ford Hallam as he recreates a lost masterpiece tsuba by a 19th century master.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGMj7o6AwnM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pM0VnL30rDc&feature=related

Finally, belt grinder is nearing completion!

At Last!

Today I managed to assemble my belt grinder. It still needs a few hours tweaking and adjusting things, but on the first test run it worked like a charm. After a forge, hammer and anvil, a belt sander is THE most useful tool in the shop.

For people who do not know, it does not look like much, a couple of pulleys with a belt... 

Let me tell you, this has been the MOST time consuming machine to build, and I still have before me the tricky part of micro-adjusting it.

Details: 2hp 900 rpm 3 phase motor, 1 phase to 3 phase inverter with adjustable speed, 155cm belt, 20cm rubber contact wheel, machined aluminum crowned pulley with a scrap Subaru ball bearing.

Cost, approximately 700 Euros: 150 for the motor, 150 for the inverter, 70 for the contact wheel, 200 machining, 50 for the electric installation, and another 80 for odds and ends.

The design I went with after looking at tons of different designs on the net (http://www.cnccookbook.com/CCKnifeMakingGrinders.htm)

was a simplified version on one I found on an excellent set of youtube videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8ss_PZDWP0

and 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mF0WEeHlxw&feature=related

Happy New Year, and a real treat from another blog

Pierre Nadeau is an incredible Canadian who is probably the only westerner swordsmith apprentice in Japan at the time. You can read more about him at the following address.

http://www.soulsmithing.com/PERSONS/NADEAU/NadeauEN.html

For this year, Pierre Nadeau is intending to keep a blog on how he will be constructing a short sword, with weekly posts of every stage of the process.

Should be fascinating!

http://www.soulsmithing.com/Blog/

Also, here is an excellent video posted by Pierre Nadeau about a week ago 
on how to build a simple Japanese style charcoal forge. 
For all you purist buffs out there...

Two new forges

After the demise of my last forge, I decided to redo them both. Luckily I found some Kaowool Cerachem 1430 C rated ceramic blanket and Kaowool Hardener (which is a liquid that hardens the surface of the Kaowool, so it does not decompose and leave fibers in the air) and some proper firebricks.

The first forge is a vertical Don Fogg type which I insulated with 5cm of ceramic blanket, and will be using for knife and sword forging, and maybe steel making (I might have to build a sturdier one though, if I want to do really long burns in it). By the way the metal container is an old oil drum I found at a scrap yard.

The second is a remake on my earlier, recycled water-heater, horizontal forge, which I lined with about 10cm of ceramic blanket  and which I'll be using more for welding mokume billets and welding in general. Even though the burner is not aimed ideally (I understand that it should run tangential to the inner surfaces, so that the flame forms a vortex) the domed top does make the flame turn, leaving fewer cold spots.
In the back you can see the torque plates for the mokume gane, and a small crucible for casting shibuichi; more on that later...

Failure by fire...

Well, things were going pretty well for a while, so for the sake of cosmic balance I had to suffer a setback. I tried making some homemade steel - oroshigane, the way Michael Bell taught me in Oregon, and things were going pretty well. Filled a graphite crucible with about 2 Kg chips of antique wrought iron and charcoal dust, sealed it with fire clay, and put it in a vertical forge. 

 

Managed to bring up to 1050 C degrees with just my atmospheric burner, but alas...

 

... after about an hour the whole forge was on fire, so I had to abort everything. The reason; back before I met master Bell I had built my two forges with the materials I could find at the time, namely rockwool and a fire cement used for building fireplaces. Well, it is proven now that these materials cannot stand forge temperatures. So I have to go out and look for some proper ceramic blanket and refractory cement to insulate my forge...



....better luck next time.

Mokume gane second attempt

Second attempt with 21 layers of alternating silver nickel, bronze, copper, bronze. 

Found out that this particular bronze melts at around 850 C, so I used it sort of like a glue between the other two metals. 

What I learnt is that temperature control in the forge is not as important as keeping a really reducing atmosphere in there to avoid oxidation and hence delamination. Also you really have to dig deep into the layers afterwards to get an interesting pattern.

Thoughts on next time, find a proper way to polish and patinate, as well as maybe use different thickness in the metals to get a more active pattern. Also maybe get a rolling mill...? (Gosh, more money to spend on machinery... this has got to stop. Or maybe I have to find a way to sell mokume gane to jewelers in Europe...)

Mokume gane

I just tried my hand at making some mokume gane. Its still at an experimental phase so it has just a few layers, but it came out surprisingly good!

A press is pretty useful for consolidating the billet, and generally just pretty as you can see below.

Started out with 12 layers of copper, bronze and nickel silver, which had to be meticulously sanded and cleaned.

Stick them between some stainless steel torque plates, in a controlled temperature forge (by the way, this is my horizontal forge on a modified sidearm venturi burner going up to 1140 C at only 30 psi or 2 bar).

And voila, after some press work, forging, and sanding a pretty acceptable mokume plate. You might notice that no bronze appears in the final product, that's because bronze melts at around 600 C while the billets needs about 900 C to weld, so upon pressing it the, by now molten, bronze was squished out of the billet (ending up like really thin bronze wafers or chocolate chip like forms on my shop floor).

So the next try should maybe be without bronze and with a lot more layers... 

I'll keep you posted. By the way, for those of you that have no idea of what I am talking about, google mokume gane on wikipedia, 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mokume-gane

or have a look at the following article "Mokume for the Bladesmith"

http://www.knifenetwork.com/workshop/tut_mokume_jloose.shtml

or another good post, from which the first image in this post originates

http://www.faceters.com/askjeff/mokume.shtml


Addendum: I have come a long way since this post, but I see people being led to this one by google. For more info and details, you might want to check my other mokume gane posts such as the following:

http://gaijinto.blogspot.com/2011/02/silver-copper-mokume-gane-pictorial.html

Caterpillar yellow!

Well just another post on my progress, which is Seriously Slow (well I am just ordering or constructing parts for a new belt grinder, so I have little to show). 

In the meantime took some time to spray paint my press. The only yellow available was Caterpillar yellow, so here it goes. 

The Dexter-like setting was necessary so I would not cover my whole shop in a light layer of yellow...

Dexter lurking around the corner...?

Finished press. Cute, no?

20t Forging press finally finished!

Finally, the mini (20 tons) hydraulic press is finished! I sincerely hope 20t will be enough, but after downloading plans for a full hydraulic press, a 75lb air hammer, a mechanical power hammer, and a McDonald rolling mill, I realized than all those designs would require more time, knowledge and money than I have at my disposal currently. Hence I opted for an air over hydraulic press. You can find photos on this address http://www.knivesplus.com/minihydraulicpress.html
a full discussion of several isssues, and more photos here http://forums.dfoggknives.com/index.php?showtopic=9932
and some videos of it in operation here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwZ-GYUZZEY.

Total cost was about 1000 Euros, which appears pretty steep, until you start checking prices for used hydraulic presses (I got quotes in the range of 3000-4000 Euros)... Around 550 Euros is the cost for a single phase, 3hp, 100lt air compressor, 300 Euros for the air over hydraulic jack (the brand is Mega, which is Spanish I think), and another 150 Euros for the steel frame, return springs, and various odds and ends. Plus I was really lucky to have a friend who is a professional welder TIG the whole thing together (took us 6 hours, cost me nothing but gratitude to said friend, and about two hours of post midnight excruciating eye pain due to welder's eye...).
Also I figured I could also use the air compressor to build a small air hammer in the future.

Right now, since my cheap Chinese belt grinder went kaputt, the next project is to build a proper belt grinder... and THEN I might actually get to doing some real swordsmithing work. Last quote I got for a 1.5 hp belt grinder was over 1000 Euros, so I guess I will have to build that myself as well. Oh well...

Japanese sword etiquette

Again, since I have little to show in terms of my work (day job having taken over for the last few days), here is an excellent video on proper sword etiquette by Grey Doffin of the JSSUS (once you see it, make sure you load the second part as well).

Sword etiquette is really important; many times, non Japanese people just go grabbing a sword, touching the blade, waving it around, etc. I have even had people bang a blade of mine on a bench to see if it was really hard...

Even an amateur blade made by a gaijin like  myself does not deserve such treatment!

Such behavior, apart from being really rude, could also be dangerous. A Japanese sword is basically a really long shaving razor... not to talk about all the spiritual aspects, which is another subject completely.

The video is pretty long, and might be tedious for some people, but it goes to show how complex the subject really is.

Iaido

Still not much time to work as I was out of town for a few days, so once again I'm only posting a link.

I recently started Iaido at one of the best schools here, http://furyu-dojo.org/en/, in order, both to get an understanding of how a sword is to be used, as well as to be able to legally make one (swords here are considered weapons by the law, essentially indistinguishable from firearms).

The video link is from a different iaido school than the one I am attending, but at that level of expertise that does not matter much.

Koshirae

Not enough time to work, so not much to show. I have actually been working on building a 20t forging press and experimenting at making mokume gane, but more on that when I am finished.

For the time being, here is some eye candy...

from an excellent site I came upon. Enjoy!

http://www007.upp.so-net.ne.jp/m-kenji/koshirae/uchigatana-goshirae.html

Just to end a common misconception

There is a particularly common misconception that Japanese swordsmiths do not use power tools, and that everything is hand-made. Here is a video of master Hirokuni Hiroki (a mukansa level smith, that is a master of masters, mukansa means without or beyond judgement) using a power hammer. Japanese smiths are very strict about the quality of their work, but they are human just like us, and using a powerhammer doesn't mean that the work still does not require considerable skill.

As our iaido teacher eloquently put it, the famous smiths that have many apprentices can have them do the heavy work, whereas lesser known smiths, for lack of manpower, will use a power hammer.

Workshop tools

Just a glimpse of the multitude of tools necessary for carrying out all aspects of making a Japanese blade.

Japanese planes and saya chisels.

Various polishing waterstones (in this case synthetic trueing stone, 220, 600, 1000 and 3000 grit).

Metal working tools (mainly used for making the habaki) and some needed accurate measuring tools.

On a different note... The mystery of true damascus steel

Diverting a bit from Japanese blades, here is an excellent link to a very illuminating article on true damascus steel (as opposed to pattern welded steel which looks similar but is a layered composite of different steels). 

http://projects.olin.edu/revere/Cool%20links/damascus%20sci%20amer%20jan%202001.pdf

The subject might be a bit too much for non blade obsessed people, but I find it fascinating as it presents a whole different metallurgy of steel than that used by the Japanese. The technique was lost since the 18th-19th century, and is only now being rediscovered.

I am dreaming of making some myself in the future... 

Next phase of Tanto project

Now that the habaki is roughly finished I can go on with the next item, the scabbard or saya. 

Here is a video that gives an idea of what that is about...

New Tanto Habaki

Just finished the second habaki for the Tanto. It took considerably less time than the first one, as I worked on the disc grinder instead of using just files. The lines came out much more consistent as well. It is still not perfect, but I guess perfection is the unachievable goal we aspire to.

Time to start working on the shirasaya
(resting scabbard for all you people not acquainted with the myriad Japanese terms).

Finished (but not yet polished) habaki

The habaki fits pretty well on the blade. Especially the lines in the back line up perfectly with the mune.