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Historical Inspiration This forum is dedicated to the discussion of historical knife design and its influence on modern custom knife work.

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Old 10-02-2003, 01:27 PM
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J.Arthur Loose J.Arthur Loose is offline
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MIgration / Viking Single edged sword

I'm posting pics of a Migration Era blade I'm working on... I'm going for an interrupted twist with a laminated edge. Below is the first major step: two bars of 12 layers ( high count for Migration Era! ) have been twisted in alternate directions with sections of the straight layers edge up.

I've changed design somewhat since I haven't been able to get my tempering oven up in time for the NYC Knife Show... I'm making it a 26" older style seax.





Welded together & squared away. You can sort of see the pattern:




The billet with the edge welded on and lightly etched. The piece will be drawn out to almost twice the current length of 18", which will emphasize the straight sections a bit more and make the twists just about 45 degrees to the blade.



So here's the blade forges to shape:



...and heat-treated with only minor kukri-warpage ( the edge stayed true! ) the warping, oddly enough, happened during the normalizing; which may be why some swordsmiths normalize after forging & grind lightly... I may leave the curve though. It is interesting to me...



Click here to see a close-up!

...More to come...
:cool:


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Last edited by J.Arthur Loose; 10-26-2003 at 05:40 PM.
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Old 10-02-2003, 03:45 PM
whv whv is offline
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Cool

this ought to be a beauty, jon. is this for an order or on spec?
thanx


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Old 10-02-2003, 04:26 PM
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Looking good. Can't wait to see what it looks like when it's done.

What other plans for the blade? Fuller? Inlay? Name of the blade?

Jamie


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Old 10-02-2003, 08:02 PM
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Wayne,

That piece is just for fun & selling on the way to the New York Custom Knife Show, if not at the show itself. I'm planning on having a couple variations for the show in addition.

It's time to go full length!

Jamie,

The piece in the book actually has a slight fuller along the spine and a bevel along the edge. I'm not sure if I'm going to go for a full flat grind or the fuller & bevel... depends on how cocky I feel come grinding day. :cool:

Here's a trial piece in a twist & split, which I'll also be doing in a very similar blade to the one above. In the book picture this looks much more like the pattern on the blade:



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Old 10-03-2003, 05:33 AM
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Nice work and great project! Looking forward to the finished sword...


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Old 10-03-2003, 11:40 AM
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Awesome! I've been thinking of a single edge blade since I got the Viking sword book earlier this summer, but I have to work on a lot more smaller pieces first. A couple questions for you Jon, do you square the twisted pieces first before welding, or are they welded together as rounds? I would think some curve would let the flux out, where flat pieces might be a bit more likely to lead to slag inclusions, but it seems like too much curve and they would want to slide apart sideways when you hit them. If you square them before welding, is it by forging or grinding? Are you still doing this with a hand hammer, or have you moved up to a press or power hammer? And the twists look really tight and even, is this done by hand? Forge heat with selective water cooling or torch heat? Finally, on the raw materials, what size did you start out with? I'm guessing strips about 3/4 inch by 12ga or so to get 12 layers?

Sorry to toss so many questions at you at once, but Vikings got me into smithing, and I can't rest until I can do the kinds of stuff they did (maybe I won't be able to rest even then, we'll see). And you're doing some of the best contemporary work in this area, so any tips you can offer to help others get there will be greatly appreciated.

Michael
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Old 10-03-2003, 12:45 PM
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Quote:
A couple questions for you Jon, do you square the twisted pieces first before welding, or are they welded together as rounds? If you square them before welding, is it by forging or grinding? Are you still doing this with a hand hammer, or have you moved up to a press or power hammer? And the twists look really tight and even, is this done by hand? Forge heat with selective water cooling or torch heat? Finally, on the raw materials, what size did you start out with? I'm guessing strips about 3/4 inch by 12ga or so to get 12 layers?

Before twisting the rods initially I forged the *nearly* round so I could keep good track of the twists. Then forged square, but the welding surfaces & the sides were ground clean somewhat to eliminate the dips caused by the corners of the twists. I still use my heavy-duty treadle hammer for drawing out, but did most of the welding here by hand. I heated whole sections of the billet and clamped in a vise & twisted with a modified pipe wrench at close to welding heat. Selective quenching would way stress the billet & a torch would take forever. It's been my experience that twisting with any stressed part of the billet at a significant temp difference is begging for delamination.

The original billets were 12" x 1.5" x 1" and drawn out to about 1/2" x 30", which was cut in half to form the two spine pieces. The edge was about 1/2 of a billet of the same original dimensions.


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Old 10-03-2003, 02:59 PM
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Cool...I was just about to ask you the same question! Glad I checked this forum first .

What book is that?


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Old 10-03-2003, 03:38 PM
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Great stuff Jon, it's really good to see your skills at work on some more historical items, and getting bigger is always better!

I'm definitely looking forward to seeing the finished article. Take pictures as soon as it's finished, I doubt you'll be keeping it for long.

Roger


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Old 10-05-2003, 02:07 PM
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Thumbs up

Beautiful work Jon..., can't wait to see the finished product.


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Old 10-06-2003, 03:28 PM
mstu mstu is offline
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Don, here's a link to a picture of the book:
http://www.boydell.co.uk/3691.HTM
Highly recommended. I got it with a discount and free shipping from amazon earlier this summer.
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Old 10-06-2003, 03:34 PM
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And thanks Jon, can't wait to see the finished product. Anything else you could offer about the construction process for this type of blade would be appreciated.
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Old 10-26-2003, 05:41 PM
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Bumpity bump bump!


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Old 10-27-2003, 02:06 PM
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Quote:
Originally posted by J.Loose
Bumpity bump bump!
Don't tease ... show more!

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Old 11-03-2003, 08:35 AM
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Wow J,
You make that look easy
Making damascus is one thing, you are now on the next level.
Putting pattarns in the blade is fun, but getting them exactly where you want them is another story alltogether.
Then keeping it all straight,ect...
My hat is off to you Sir. A fine job indeed!
BTW, that 2" twist is not as easy as he makes it sound, the whole billet wants to turn.

Now, can you do this in pocket knife sized blades?
(the challenge is on)

Beautiful blade and nice explanation, well done!
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