Lovely Old Barung With Twistcore

[Roland_M]

Nice blade indeed. But I believe, this is not a twistcore, it is thin layer of twisted metal on each side. This would explain the unusual wild look of the twisted layer. The twisted bar was forged into two thin layers.
My suggestion for a final treatment, just polish the blade a while with soft kitchen-paper and Ballistol or another oil of your choice.

Roland

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Roland_M

Nice blade indeed. But I believe, this is not a twistcore, it is thin layer of twisted metal on each side. This would explain the unusual wild look of the twisted layer. The twisted bar was forged into two thin layers.Roland

Roland, I have wondered this exact same thing myself, but keep getting consistent feedback that it is Moro twistcore.....

[Robert]

My congratulation on a most beautiful addition to your collection.

Best,
Robert

[Philip]

Originally Posted by Roland_M

Nice blade indeed. But I believe, this is not a twistcore, it is thin layer of twisted metal on each side. This would explain the unusual wild look of the twisted layer. The twisted bar was forged into two thin layers.


Roland

I agree. The pattern on each side does reveal a twisted structure, but to be twist-CORE, this structure would have to go the entire thickness of the blade, with the edges being "stack"-welded to the cutting and dorsal sides. In this case, the core is what protrudes as the cutting- and back-edges and is laminated in sandwich fashion between the twist-pattern layers on each face.

There are Moro keris blades that show all the signs of being a twist-core construction, the format bearing considerable similarity, in principle, to sword-blades of Anglo-Saxon and Nordic Europe during the early Middle Ages.

[kai]

Hello Phil,

I agree. The pattern on each side does reveal a twisted structure, but to be twist-CORE, this structure would have to go the entire thickness of the blade, with the edges being "stack"-welded to the cutting and dorsal sides. In this case, the core is what protrudes as the cutting- and back-edges and is laminated in sandwich fashion between the twist-pattern layers on each face.

There are Moro keris blades that show all the signs of being a twist-core construction, the format bearing considerable similarity, in principle, to sword-blades of Anglo-Saxon and Nordic Europe during the early Middle Ages.

The origin of the word twistcore may be based on a solid piece of "twist" - however, I don't think the definition needs to be that strict! Otherwise, there would be no twistcore barrels!

The most important features seem to be:
1. forged from twisted bars
2. exposure of the core of the "twist" by removal of the surface.

If anything, symmetrically applying the forged twisted bars to a sandwich construction needs even more skill IMVHO...

Regards,
Kai

[kai]

Hello Roland,

I believe, this is not a twistcore, it is thin layer of twisted metal on each side. This would explain the unusual wild look of the twisted layer. The twisted bar was forged into two thin layers.

Thanks for chiming in! I was also trying to figure out how this pattern got forged.

I was considering a complex stacked construction instead of twistcore - kinda like the blotchy pattern sometimes seen with barung blades but crafted with the intend to obtain a regular "fishbone" pattern.

However, the margins of the pattern do seem to support your notion that this twistcore got flattened a lot and sandwiched onto the central steel layer; this certainly explains the distortions but still is a real feat to forge with only a traditional workplace!

Regards,
Kai

[Gustav]

There are two twisted bars on each side. The blade as end product is much to wide and long for the size of these bars - so while forging out in the length and width the control over the appearance of twisted pattern was lost. We see it the best towards the tip of the blade - always the trickiest place to control the pattern.

Normally there would be more bars on such a blade, like on ex-Gavin's Barong (or yataghans)

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...istcore+barong

and/or the bars would have been kept narrow

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...istcore+barong

The smith simply wasn't experienced well enough to work with twisted bars and didn't know the relation between the size of the bars before the forging process (let alone some tricks like increasing the amplitude of the twists) and the blade at the end of process.

That could be a hint to a slightly later date of production or/and a more "provincial" place of production.

[Ian]

Gustav,

Thanks for your very interesting observations. You seem to have some experience with twist core techniques. Do you forge your own blades?

Ian

[Gustav]

Ian,

no, just had some interesting conversations with a person who does forging with a focus on pattern welding.

Actually one can understand a lot about different appearances of twistcore and other patterns just using plasticine of two different colours.

Gustav