Fun with "Fossil"

EdCaffreyMS

EdCaffreyMS

"The Montana Bladesmith"
Last month I went up to Jim Clow's, and decided to do a bit of experimenting with my "fossil" damascus. I loaded up some "cans", and rather then using 1084 powder, I tried 1095 powder with 10% nickel powder added. I really like the results!

Since Jim has a MONSTER press, I did 3 1/2" cans, and forged them up while I was there. Jim also has a cool "toy" for twisting, so he blancahard ground the "can" off, then we rounded it out to about 2" and twisted it. Afterward I took it to a 1 1/2" X 3" x 12" loaf. Took a bit but after I got back home, I annealed it, then sliced it on the big bandsaw.

Since I had changed to 1095 powder, I had to experient to nail the heat treat, and after sacrificing a couple of blanks, got it down. I really like the results, and think from now on I'll be using 1095 powder, with varying degrees of nickel from now on.

So far I've got a Bowie blade......





And a drop point hunter blade......



 
Very interesting. Kind of a meritage of Damascus patterns. A Damascus celebration. Damascus homage. Very cool. How many unique Damascus patterns are in the blade?
 
Gosh, I don't really know. I keep all the "triangle cuts" out of billets that I accorion fold open.....tossing them all into a big bucket....then when I make "fossil" I just grab handfuls and fill the "can". I do know that they materials are all 1080, 15N20 and some pure nickel. I think what made these so interesting was using the 1095 powder with 10% nickel added, and then twisting the billet.
 
I really like these, you do great work. Is the powder for filling in the voids? And yeah, I'm new.
 
Hi Roger!

You've got it right. When making mosaic damascus, I choose to "accordion fold" them....generally mosaic is created is such a way that all the cool pattern is located on the ends of the billets. I forge them into sqaures, the size that I want the width of the blades to be. The I lay out a series of triangles down the billets, and cut out those triangles with a bandsaw....this gives me a "bar" of damascus thats in a "zig-zag" configuration. I radius all the sharp corners, the heat and forge the "zig-zag" into a flat bar....making what was the end pattern, show on the flats of the bar (s). For a long time I was toting all those cutout triangles off the the scrapyare. Now I "recycle" then by using a piece of square tubing.....capping one end, then filling it with those triangle.....then the powder is added to fill all the airspace, and then the end is capped/welded closed. it goes into the forge, depending on the size of the "can"....it can be from 3o mins to an hour in the forge.....then it's pressed or power hammered to weld everything inside the can. I leave it a bit oversized on the final forging, then anneal it, mill off the exterior can, and then go into marking/cutting the accordion fold.

Here's a video I did recently on the process:

[video=youtube_share;8n4gdtxW5KI]http://youtu.be/8n4gdtxW5KI[/video]
 
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Those are my favorites of the fossil damascus I've seen. I think the nickle and twisting helped but also
think the fact the all of your fossil pieces were triangular helped.
 
Hey Romey!

What's cool about adding nickel powder to 1095 is that as long as you stay below 10% nickel, it doesn't affect the hardenability! I've got to "play" with it some more (building myself a flipper right now with it), and I've found that the nickel content makes it pretty darn tough too! Moreso then a straight 1095 would be.....the down side is that toughness translates into working it too.....chews up lots of belts....and cutting the stop pin slot in a flipper blade is a "carbide ONLY" operation. :)
 
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