Stainless Steel. Thus, folding actually makes the blade weaker if modern alloy steel is used, although many Chinese sword forges seem to fold modern steel just for marketing reasons. The most common explanation is that steel is named after Damascus, the capital city of Syria and one of the largest cities in the ancient Levant.
It is one of the best known of the swords created by Masamune and is believed to be among the finest Japanese swords ever made. Forging is stronger than casting.
Damascus has an added advantage for things like kitchen knives, as the combination of metals creates micro-serrations on the edge that keep your blade super sharp.
A folded steel blade is typically made from high carbon steel. An experienced smith can control with great accuracy the quality of the steel in this way. Second, the folding produces the jihada, or patterns, for which these blades are so famous. Each time the block is hammered out and folded back, layers are formed. By folding only fourteen times, over 16, layers are produced.
Anne Marie Helmenstine, Ph. Chemistry Expert. Helmenstine holds a Ph. She has taught science courses at the high school, college, and graduate levels.
Facebook Facebook Twitter Twitter. The steel bears a wavy pattern, so it is also called Persian watered steel. Damascus steel is beautiful, very sharp, and very tough. It was superior to other alloys used for swords at the time. Modern Damascus steel is not the same as the original metal. While it may be made using the same techniques, the original Damascus steel used a metal called wootz steel. Wootz steel does not exist today, but moden blades made using high-carbon steel and forged with pattern-welding approximate Damascus steel.
Featured Video. Cite this Article Format. Helmenstine, Anne Marie, Ph. Damascus Steel Facts and Naming. Metal Profile and Properties of Tellurium. Sulfuric Acid and Sugar Demonstration. While it a marketing term applied to Katana, the term itself comes from the city of Damascus in Syria and refers more properly to Wootz steel - which was produced in India and exported to the middle East.
Wootz steel had some very unusual properties and its manufacturing secrets have been lost in the mists of time the last true Damascus Steel was made in the mid 18th century. Swords made from this "ancient supersteel" were both flexible yet very hard, and a study in found they contained nanowires and nanotubes click here for a detailed article on Wootz Steel. So straight off the mark, the term is misleading and should really be referring to folded steel..
Pattern welded and folded swords are similar but different techniques and produce quite different looking patterns in the steel..
Pattern welding was first developed by the Celts and later the Vikings out of necessity. Steel in this period was filled with impurities so they would minimize the chances of an impurity causing a catastrophic blade failure by twisting bars of steel together and hammering them out, then folding and repeating to evenly distribute the inherent impurities and minimize weak points.
The end result was not only practical, but also quite beautiful, and was not lost on the Viking appreciation of aesthetics.. Folded blades are, just as the name suggests, simply a bar of steel that has been hammered out flat and folded a number of times - each folding doubling the number of layers and creating a distinctly different pattern in the steel.
Most folded blades on the market are an attempt to replicate Tamahagane - the steel that traditional Japanese swords are made from.. Like with the Vikings, Japanese steel was extremely impure - and needed to be folded many times to try and even out the impurities. You can only fold steel so many times before the layers become redundant as I understand it. Dec 11, GMT bloodwraith said:. I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere that the reason the japanese folded their blades was out of necessity, because their steel was so crappy and low carbon content they folded the carbon into their swords through the layers.
I think there is a limit to how many times you can fold a sword, just like there is a limit to how many times you can fold a piece of paper. No so much a limit as you can refold and draw the steel over and over.
You do loose a fair amount of material with each welding heat and the billet gets smaller and smaller. Japanese steel is more of a consolidating process rather then pattern welding search the maker Jesus Hernandez and look at his site. Western work as we know it is about patterning in the steel. Each weld, you lose carbon, so there is a limit there. Also like Kerry Mentioned, material loss from scale, so there is a limit there.
The japanese did indeed fold they're steel to purify it, not spiritually, materials wise. EP, it's not hard, you write down how many layers you start with, then just count how many folds you do then multiply. Technically there is no limit, but due to the factors I stated above, you will eventually end up with a very small bar of very expensive mild steel.
Dec 12, GMT Anders said:. When you fold a bar over surely the bottom layer at the base of the fold actually gets doubled over, so when folding, the formula is actually more like X The only way to actually double the layers each time you weld is to cut the bar in half and stack it on top of itself.
That way two layers would double to four, four to eight etc. Matthew Stagmer Manufacturers and Vendors. The loss of carbon has to do with how many times you heat it not how many times you fold. There are ways of adding carbon back in aswell. So tech you could fold a piece 1,,, times or more if you wanted to.
The paper fold thing doesn't work here becuase when you fold steel you then forge it back out a ways and fold again. With paper there is no re-shaping or drawing back out. Did that make sence? Dec 12, GMT mattfod said:. Dan Davis Blacksmithing Moderator.
Matt: yep that makes sense.
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