silver_pilate
Well-Known Member
A while back, I picked up some W2 rounds from Don Hanson III and had them power forged out into bar stock. Last week, I was able to get my forge up and running, and I hand forged my first-ever forged blade out of his W2 (keep in mind I've been stock-removing for years). Here's the blade after rough forging. It's not pretty. Not pretty at all, but there is a distal taper, it has been beveled with the hammer, and my blows were landing fairly square as there were no excessively deep hammer marks I had to grind out 
:
Here it is after I did some clean-up:
I spent the afternoon in the shop working on this blade after heat treating it yesterday. Here's the blade after I clayed it:
I used satanite for the clay. First I applied a super thin layer of satanite, dried it with the heat gun, and normalized the blade. Then, I brushed off the first layer of satanite, applied a new one, and then applied the thicker clay (around 1/16") to the blade. I again dried it partially with the heat gun prior to putting it in the oven which was around 450F (turned off and cooling down) after normalizing. After a few minutes, I brought the blade up to 1450F and held it there for 15 minutes. I quenched in Park's #50 at 78F. In for one-thousand, two-thousand, three-thousand; out for one-thousand, two-thousand, three-, and back in the oil to cool to oil temp. The satanite came off nicely after it cooled down. I tempered the blade and that gets us to today.
I cleaned up the flats using the disc grinder (I LOVE that thing), and cleaned up the bevels and plunges on the grinder. I went through the grits from 400 to 2000 by hand, and then I cleaned with alcohol and etched in a 4:1 ferric chloride:water solution for a 30 count. After it came out, I polished with a paper town, red rouge, and WD40 followed by 0000 steel wool and WD40.
I'm very pleased at how it turned out, though next time, I'll have my clay terminate a little higher on the blade to raise the hamon.
Thanks for looking!
--nathan
:
Here it is after I did some clean-up:
I spent the afternoon in the shop working on this blade after heat treating it yesterday. Here's the blade after I clayed it:
I used satanite for the clay. First I applied a super thin layer of satanite, dried it with the heat gun, and normalized the blade. Then, I brushed off the first layer of satanite, applied a new one, and then applied the thicker clay (around 1/16") to the blade. I again dried it partially with the heat gun prior to putting it in the oven which was around 450F (turned off and cooling down) after normalizing. After a few minutes, I brought the blade up to 1450F and held it there for 15 minutes. I quenched in Park's #50 at 78F. In for one-thousand, two-thousand, three-thousand; out for one-thousand, two-thousand, three-, and back in the oil to cool to oil temp. The satanite came off nicely after it cooled down. I tempered the blade and that gets us to today.
I cleaned up the flats using the disc grinder (I LOVE that thing), and cleaned up the bevels and plunges on the grinder. I went through the grits from 400 to 2000 by hand, and then I cleaned with alcohol and etched in a 4:1 ferric chloride:water solution for a 30 count. After it came out, I polished with a paper town, red rouge, and WD40 followed by 0000 steel wool and WD40.
I'm very pleased at how it turned out, though next time, I'll have my clay terminate a little higher on the blade to raise the hamon.
Thanks for looking!
--nathan
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