Interesting keris making video

[A. G. Maisey]

Yes, I've heard of it, but frankly, I'm rather dubious about the way it would react in a weld. The melt point of both iron and gold is fairly close,I think from memory, gold about 1100C , iron about 1100C to 1500C, so it might possibly happen that they could form a weld, but it may not bond well. I don't know, but my guess would be that even if it did form a weld it would not be a strong joint.

In Javanese and Balinese belief there is a lot of very improbable stuff. Additionally, in the keris belief system, amongst people who are not directly involved in the making of keris, there is a lot of misinformation and erroneous belief. Very often "information" is presented in a way that reinforces that belief. For instance, the way in which this video has been made is in fact misinformation in that it shows the way lay people want to believe keris are made, rather than the way they are made. Still, I found it very interesting because it shows a small scale smelt process that probably did exist at some time in the past, and the actual hands-on forge process is a good, solid representation. The window dressing is BS.

The video was made by a bloke who lives not far from my Javanese address, and it has been made to entertain, but stripped of the window dressing it is good, solid stuff. My guess is that it was probably made in Madura or Bali, but much of the background is in a Balinese context, so it might have been made there.

I find the commentary in Krama Inggil very peculiar, as not a lot of people in this day and age are conversant with this speech level. Moreover it is Surakarta Krama Inggil, which limits 100% understanding even more. It would reach more people if it had been done in Indonesian. But this was the whole objective of the video:- to impress, and it surely does do that.

Good video. Technically correct process. Very informative. But a bit more elaborate than it needs to be.

[Sajen]

Very good video, thank you for sharing!

Alan, why is the commentary vocalize in second part of the video?

Regards,
Detlef

[A. G. Maisey]

You mean "sung" Detlef?

Artistic effect. As I said, the video is for entertainment.

[Pusaka]

Im thinking of how sometimes the metal with the lower melting point actually acts as a solvent to melt the metal with a higher melting point.
Brass has a melting point of 930C whilst Nickel melts at 1453C yet if you add nickel to a pot of molten brass the brass will dissolve the nickel and you end up with nickel brass.

Same for mercury and gold, mercury will dissolve gold and the two will form an amalgam.

I'm also thinking of the alloy used to make expensive gamelan gongs in Bali. It consists of a blend of gold, silver, copper, zinc and Iron. Normally we would never think of adding Iron to such a mixture but I guess when the other components are molten they act like solvent to dissolve Iron into the mixture.

I have seen a few keris which had a yellowish/brown pamor and I often wondered why it had that color since pamor is usually white/silver or gray

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey

You mean "sung" Detlef?

Artistic effect. As I said, the video is for entertainment.

Yes, have meant sung! Thank you for the answer!

[Pusaka]

Here is an example, notice how the pamor of this blade has a golden color, could such a pamor result from a more exotic pamor alloy possibly containing gold or other metals as in the video?

[David]

Originally Posted by Pusaka

Here is an example, notice how the pamor of this blade has a golden color, could such a pamor result from a more exotic pamor alloy possibly containing gold or other metals as in the video?

I could be mistaken, but i thing that yellow hue is more likely the result of a bad staining job.

[Richard Furrer]

I like the video quite a bit.

...reminds me of early African work.
I use the "pipe" containment method from time to time....good to know its traditional.

As to gold/iron alloys. I'd have to look at the binary phase diagrams for those two, but I'm sure some form of eutectic can be reached. I am not sure that new alloy would forge well or show any evidence of a gold color when completed.

Many cultures have the multi metal in their blade making processes. One would have to chemically test the final metal to see what, if any, made it through the processing. I'd imagine in trace amounts it neither helped nor hindered the process.

On thought on the gold:
I'm sure it never happened, but one may suspect that it requires several ounces of gold to make a thing...only to have that gold transmuted from the process and not being found in the final work piece.....it may have jumped in time and space to the neck and ears of the smith's wife some weeks later. Just a thought.

Ric