|
|
Historical Inspiration This forum is dedicated to the discussion of historical knife design and its influence on modern custom knife work. |
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#1
|
|||
|
|||
Viking sword
Just finished this 9th century-style blade, in 1018/1095 damascus with silver-over-iron hilt...inspired by several blades from the period:
|
#2
|
||||
|
||||
Nice work, Jeff. My good buddy Sylven just sent me those pictures yesterday... so I guess there's some synchronicity at work here. Welcome to the forum.
So what is the edge material on that? I stopped using 1018 / 1095 combinations after discovering that the carbon migration coupled with the low manganese in 1095 made for a really bitchy heat-treat. That being said, I used that same issue to get a soft spine/core a couple times by welding on a plain 1095 edge, carefully heating/forging thereafter and counting on the pattern-welded section to miss the curve in the quench. I also understand you've done some smelting? We'd love to hear about that too. |
#3
|
|||
|
|||
Wow, thats stunning!
What did you use to groove the iron for the silver overlay? |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
Sword details
The edge material is 1070, drawn down from 4" stock on a friend's Nazel hammer. interestingly, some damascus patterning showed up on the 1070 during the final etch so it must not be entirely homogenous material.
"bitchy heat-treat"? This is one of those metallurgical terms I'm not entirely familiar with, but the comination of 1018/1095 has cracked on me a couple times, I chalked it up to forgetting to warm the quench water. Oil quenching has always been predictable/not troublesome. What have you run into? The Vikings did mainly two types of inlay, the parrallel undercut grooves (super tedious!) and the random cross-hatching, which seems more common on the more curvy type R & S hilts. This corresponds to the koftgari technique, and that was my intention on this sword. The iron gets crosshatched with an engraver, scraped sideways. However, I only had two months to make this sword, instead of my preferred six months - six years, so when the koftgari was giving me issues on them pommel lobes I copped out and had it electroplated to fill in the grooves, sanded it flat and re-electroplated to a few thousandths so the electroplating will wear away more authentically. Has anyone done alot of koftgari technique? Got any pointers for working compound curves? Smelting is alot of work for a little bit of very cool metal. More on it later.... Jeff |
#5
|
||||
|
||||
Quote:
From much of my reading, I've discovered that the pattern welded sections of most Migration / Viking blades were made of two low-carbon materials differentiated by other alloying elements, such as phosphorus, with a high-carbon edge. One of the main reasons I was using high / low combinations in the first place was because I had originally thought that they were historically accurate for the core material. I did notice the lines in the edge material. Looks great. Curious! Quote:
|
#6
|
|||
|
|||
Nice work! Elegant and understated, a person has to look twice to notice some of the details. Are the dark lines a patina on the silver or are they showing the underlying iron? And either way, are the designs done with a chisel or burin, a dremel tool, or some other method?
Michael |
#7
|
|||
|
|||
Awesome. What kind of graver did you use? I have been meaning to make one, just havet got around to it. Not to mention the fact that I haven't actually seen one
|
#8
|
|||
|
|||
Quote:
Quote:
On the engraved decoration ? it?s oxidized silver, not through to the steel. Next one gets engraved then filled with niello, that lead/silver/sulfur alloy they used to up the contrast on decorations of that sort. I used three different engravers, depending on line width and surface curvature, and made a micro-burnisher by putting a tiny polished round point on a carbide scribe ? this worked amazingly well to smooth out the curves and line widths on the curved surfaces of the pommel, which were impossible for a non-engraver like me to do solely with the cutting tools. The gravers used were knife, flat and onglette, and for a description of various gravers, go here: http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nena...aving-10-4.htm |
#9
|
||||
|
||||
I really like the way you have an interupted twist pattern on one side and a continuous twist on the other. very nice.
here is a link to a bunch of lads from up here that are doing viking age smelting, they will be doing a smelt up here in the maratimes next summer at CanIronV they are called DARK they have some good links and some interesting reports on their smelts. Anyway I thought you guys would find that interesting. I would love to make a composit viking sword from smelted steel one day. eventually we'll have to start some kind of assosiation to make it easier for us all to do the smelting thing with the intent of making viking swords. thanks for showing us your work Jeff. |
#10
|
|||
|
|||
Awesome.
Thanks fo rthe link to the gravers. I think that the association is a great idea! I have smelted just a teeny bit in a crucible and have plans to make a bloomery furnace in the near futer but we will just have to see how it goes. It would be wonderful to pool our resources and have a few get togethers between us smiths that are really into the whole "dark ages" smithing bit. |
#11
|
||||
|
||||
Thanks for those links, Jake. I dug the clay for my smelter yesterday... now to root around the local bogs...
Jeff, I did a survey of niello recipes for a senior thesis which is up on my web-site if you're curious. Niello is great alchemical fun... |
#12
|
|||
|
|||
That CanIron5 looks like a interesting event, I like the viking smithing contest idea!
The pattening on the sword was inspired by a sword in the Groninger museum illustrated by Jaap Ypey. Since 4-bar swords are usually either interruped twist or chevron, I thought perhaps the smith mixed his bars up before assembly...or not, I like the way it looks. But the possibility I just spent a couple hundred hours copying a 1000 year-old mistake is appealing, too. We'll have to start a smelting thread and get our thoughts organized...find out why bloomery smelting is so hit or miss! Jeff |
#13
|
|||
|
|||
Quote:
A friend of mine asked me just last week for a Niello recipe, I think I'd best direct them to your page. |
#14
|
||||
|
||||
The ones with the lowest melting points will be the ones with the most lead. Fike's is really the best mixture, IMO, and melts around 700F.
I saw an actual PW Migration Era sword at an Ashokan Bladesmithing conference a few years back with a very nice eight-bar composite construction. One of the bars was very clearly and very mistakenly twisted the wrong way... |
#15
|
|||
|
|||
"I saw an actual PW Migration Era sword at an Ashokan Bladesmithing conference a few years back with a very nice eight-bar composite construction. One of the bars was very clearly and very mistakenly twisted the wrong way..."
Whoops! |
Tags |
blade, forge, forging, knife |
Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests) | |
|
|