Damascus Tulwars

[ariel]

Just to show ...
Two Tulwars, one with a brass or copper ( the metal seems quite red) handle covered with thin layer of gold ( not much left of it) and wootz blade.
Another with serrated edges and mechanical damascus.

[katana]

NICE ;)

[Flavio]

Hi Ariel, very nice, but what do you mean with "mechanical damascus"? Thank you :p

[ariel]

Mechanical damascus means that the blade was constructed from several pieces of steel: softer and harder ( high carbon). These were arranged, twisted, bent etc to result in a layered pattern.
Wootz is crystalline damascus: inherently exhibiting fine pattern with proper heating/cooling.
Bladesmiths on the Forum: am I wrong?

[Richard Furrer]

Hello All,
Yes indeed.
Mechanical damask is better called pattern-welded and is made from several pieces of material forge welded together. This can be bars or steel or a consolidated bloom. the billet (stack of welded pieces) can be manipulated in may ways to alter the pattern..twisting, folding, drilling etc to show the underlying layers. The material in this process does not become liquid, though slag and flux can be liquid and are forced away from the steel with hammer blows.

Crucible steel (like wootz) is made liquid (melted) in a container of some sort and the resulting cooled mixture is called an ingot and is then forged into a blade with no welding.
The surface pattern seen is the result of the chemistry within the solidified ingot.

Ric

[Flavio]

Thank you for your answers :) Anyway Mechanical damascus doesn't have anything to do with the use of machineries? It's still handmade

[ALEX]

Flavio, "mechanical damascus" is produced by mixing several different steels together. The "true damascus" aka "oriental damascus" or "wootz" is made of just one special steel. Both mechanical and wootz steels need to be manually forged, so "mechanical" just means "not natural" in a sense ;)

[Flavio]

Thank you Alex :)

[josh stout]

What is the last picture showing? The pattern is very different and looks more like wootz.
Josh

[ariel]

What is the last picture showing? The pattern is very different and looks more like wootz.
Josh
That's true. It belongs to the sword with the "golden handle" and I clearly said that it was wootz.
The serrated one is mechanical.

[ALEX]

Flavio,
Here is a link which explains it little better:
http://damascus.free.fr/f_damas/quest.htm

[Flavio]

Thanks again, Alex :)

[Richard Furrer]

Hello All,
I would recomend this article by Kevin Cashen:
http://swordforum.com/forge/roadtodamascus.html

Kevin is a talented smith with a genuine interest in history and science.

I would also recommend this PDF file:
"Metallurgy of Steel for Bladesmiths & Others who Heat Treat and Forge Steel", 200 + pages, By John D. Verhoeven Emeritus Professor, Iowa State University, March 2005

http://mse.iastate.edu/files/verhoeven/7-5.pdf
It is a large file of 8.1 Megs

Perhapse the best publication on the subject of steel and blades.

Ric

[josh stout]

That's true. It belongs to the sword with the "golden handle" and I clearly said that it was wootz.
The serrated one is mechanical.

So you did, I guess my eye skipped over that part.

They are both lovely and the two blades are a striking contrast.
Josh