Knifemaking Archives

How To: Forge Beveling & Blade Tipping

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May 27, 2022

Forge Beveling & Blade Tipping Are Necessary Skills For Any Fledgling Knifesmith To Learn. Here’s The Skinny On Both.

TIP: The most important principle in this section is to overlap hammer blows. The right edge of your previous hammer blow becomes the center point of your next hammer blow.

Forge-beveling allows a consistent pushing of the hot steel in all directions at each blow. The physics are consistent, predictable, and reliable. At each strike, the force of the rounding hammerhead pushes the bottom half of the blade and the spine in opposite directions. The tip-to-choil forces are contained for the most part by the blade’s mass.

It’s much like when the smith makes breakfast sausage patties. Imagine pushing the center of that sausage patty down with the heel of your hand (hammer) against the counter (anvil). The patty spreads out in all directions with a dimple in the center, the same as the steel. With repeated overlapping blows the bevel thins and widens downward as the spine stretches upward. The resulting geometry is a thinning and reshaping of the blade between the cheek line and the cutting edge. A bevel is forged and formed with your rounding hammer, anvil and blacksmith’s eye.

Once forge-beveling is mastered you can actually form a hollow “grind” by hollow forging (another lesson, another book).

NOTE: Look at a knife with the pommel to the left and the point to the right, cutting edge down and spine up. For reference and description, this is the right side of the blade.

This is the right side (i.e. right-hand side) of the knife blade. — This is the right side (i.e. right-hand side) of the knife blade

Setting the Bevel

The forge-beveling procedure is advanced forging. Beveling with a hammer is a blacksmith secret used by few these days. Learn this method and you will certainly be connected to the smiths of old.

This forge-beveling procedure takes me six heats or more, at minimum; three on each side. Theoretically, one heat per line, three lines per side (explained below in Half, Fourth, Eighth). Make these passes down the bottom half of the blade traveling its full length. Because you might be a beginner it may take many more passes than six.

You may need more heats due to being hammer shy or because of rookie hesitation. You may start and stop frequently due to under-heating, overheating, dropped blades, re-positioning your piece or “Where’s my hammer?”. All of those are OK. We all do them.

Half, Fourth, Eighth

Let’s go through the forge-beveling principle. First think of cross-section geometry. Develop a visual in your brain of the relative distance from the center point of the hammer face to the bottom one-half of your blade as you travel along its length from ricasso to tip.

Do this by visualizing one-half, one-fourth, and one-eighth. If we were to saw a blade vertically in half and view its cross-section, we would see that its shape is thickest at the top, along its spine. It holds that dimension down to the cheek (about the halfway point) and then dramatically loses thickness as it approaches the cutting edge. This is the bevel. Your bevel. Think halfway from cheek line to cutting edge. This is the 1/2 line.

This traditional way to set this bevel can only be acquired with dozens of latitudinal hammer strikes passing from left to right at those three descending levels: 1/2, 1/4, 1/8. Remember one-half, one-fourth, one-eighth.

Note and maintain a mental image of the three all important forge lines.

NOTE: This 1/2, 1/4, 1/8 business does not mean fractional inches. The fractions refer to the position of your hammer’s center face on the horizontal bar (i.e. halfway, a quarter of the way, and an eighth of the way from the edge to the cheek).

Remember this is a theoretical thing becoming a real thing. The blade is 1-inch wide, and the face of a 2.5-pound rounding hammer is about 1.5 inches. Think exact center of a hammer face on those latitudinal forging lines.

TIP: See the author setting the bevel on YouTube. Search for: Paul White FORGED.

Try not to strike above the imaginary cheek line that runs about halfway between the spine and edge. Your hammer passes will form the cheek line. The final cheek line usually falls well above the halfway point because maintaining that line exactly in the center is almost impossible with a round hammer face, your billet bouncing around on the anvil, and you’re trying to hit on exact points. However, the primary objective is to maintain the original thickness in the spine (1/8-inch) as far down to that halfway line as possible.

Blade Tipping

Each pass will require a slight upward tipping of the spine to acquire about a 10° to 12° angle to be set in the bevel as you hammer. It takes a simple inward twisting of the wrist to keep the blade from resting flat on the anvil face. It must be done at each horizontal pass. This smartly places just the right amount of bevel angle. After a few passes, the blade will “find” that angle as you place it down.

After a complete pass from choil to tip on the right side of the blade, flip the piece over, tip to 10° to 12°, place at the top of the anvil, and do the left side. This is the place to use your indexing skills. It takes most smiths some time and practice to fully master this concept. I’ll go over this beveling thing a couple more times. Read this whole section and look at the drawings and photos several times before doing this.

TIP: Sometimes it takes fewer total passes than I indicate in this book. This is due to the individual smith’s power and/or heat control and/or blade position and/or hammer penetration and/or steel composition. There are lots of variables. If your blade is almost straight after fewer than the recommended strikes or passes, back off on the heat and/or reduce the power or reduce the passes. If you place blows beyond what is needed, the blade will curve upward. Usually, fewer strikes per pass will be necessary as the beveling chore proceeds. This happens because the smith usually increases his or her power and confidence as time at the anvil is increased. Also, the bevel becomes thinner with repeated heats requiring less steel to be moved.

The forging sequence is as follows. Take a heat. Place the blade at the bottom of the anvil. Tip to 12°. Place overlapping blows down the blade on the right side at the 1/2 line. Take a heat. Flip to the left side of the blade at the top of the anvil. Tip to 12°. Forge down the left side at the 1/2 line at the top of the anvil. Take a heat. Flip to bottom. Tip. Place blows down the right side of the blade at the 1/4 line. Heat. Flip. Tip, down the left side at the 1/4 line at the top. Take a heat. Flip. Tip and down the 1/8 line on the right side. Heat. Flip. Tip. Then down the left side at the 1/8 line. Your blade should be nearly straight after three or five passes and however many heats as needed.

By hammering in this 1/2, 1/4, 1/8 method you will “set the bevel” of your knife in the traditional way, FORGING! Ninety-three percent of all bladesmiths set their bevels at the grinder. I have met only a handful of smiths that do this the old way. You’ll be the only blacksmith in the surrounding ten counties that sets the bevel with your three-pound hammer!

Do not strike randomly up and down the blade or space-out (i.e. not overlap) your blows and expect anything good to happen.

BLACKSMITH SECRET: To gauge forging heat have a wooden box close by and away from any direct light. Hold your blade in the box to see the true forging heat. Even when hot the “red” is sometimes difficult to see in a lighted room. However, the red will show in the shade of your box. This means you are above forging heat and will thus avoid potential edge cracks. Remember this is high carbon steel and your working parameters are narrower. Iron can be worked over a greater temperature without damage. At the end of each forging and before you lose forging heat in your blade use the last few seconds to straighten and align your work. Make all lines right with the world.

The successful counter-bend is placed at the “bottom” of the anvil with the choil just at the anvil’s corner next to the table. Several hammer blows are placed at the halfway point/line and then the hammer travels down the blade to the smith’s right.

You can buy Forged: Making A Knife With Traditional Blacksmith Skills here

Bob & John Horrigan: Brothers In Arms And Blades

Mike Haskew

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May 24, 2022

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Bob & John Horrigan Made Knives Together. After The Former Died Defending The Country, John Kept Their Knifemaking Legacy Alive

It was a night mission, and it was dangerous—just like every mission, every moment in the deserts and villages of western Iraq or the mountains of Tora Bora in Afghanistan.
“You don’t have to come,” the others said matter-of-factly to Master Sergeant (MSG) Bob Horrigan. “You’ve only got two weeks left in the country.” The veteran Delta Force NCO, with 19½ years in the U.S. Army, three tours in Afghanistan, and a fifth in Iraq coming to an end, simply replied, “If you’re going, I’m going.”

True enough, Horrigan was just days away from returning to the USA, and he planned to retire from the Army in six months, then, in peace, to make custom knives in his shop and share that time with his twin brother, ABS master smith John Horrigan.

This night, however, there was dangerous work to be done. A raid was planned on a safehouse known to be frequented by terrorists, particularly Iraqi al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a ruthless murderer pledged to support Osama bin Laden. Horrigan

A veteran Delta Force NCO, Bob Horrigan served 19½ years in the Army, including three tours in Afghanistan and five in Iraq. He was killed during a raid on a safehouse frequented by terrorists, including Iraqi al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Bob was laid to rest with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.

When the call went out for someone to serve as a master breacher during the mission, blasting doors and first inside a building where hostiles might be hiding, Bob Horrigan said without hesitation, “I’ll breach.” In the town of al Qaim in western Iraq, the Delta Force team, accompanied by additional Special Forces personnel, moved toward the suspected Zarqawi safehouse. With MSG Michael McNulty at Bob’s side and the rest of the team close by, the two were first to enter the enemy compound.

Bob made it into a nearby room, and a machine gun opened up. McNulty was hit in the doorway. Bob was fatally wounded seconds later. Both died within a few hours.
“It was about 7 in the morning. I was at home, and Bob’s brother-in-law, Mark England, came to the house,” John Horrigan recalled. “Our sons were best friends, and I thought he was coming to tell me that my son had gotten into trouble. He said, ‘No, John. It’s Bob.’”
The news was devastating, and Bob Horrigan was laid to rest with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery, following a funeral service in Austin, Texas. He left behind his wife, Denise; young daughter, Courtney; older sister, Lisa; younger brother, David; many friends and relatives; and, of course, twin brother John.

To say Bob and John shared a special bond, even as identical twins, would be an understatement. Their mannerisms and speech patterns were so alike, and they experienced the joy of growing up inseparable. They also shared their love of service to their country, and later came a great interest in custom knives.

First Drop Zone

The brothers were born in Limestone, Maine, on Jan. 13, 1965. “I came into the world seven minutes before Bob, so I cleared the drop zone. We always said he was a hung jumper,” John smiled. “We’re identical twins, so I got into fistfights for him, and he got into fistfights for me. It was like the Doublemint®-Spearmint commercial, and it was that way in school and in the Army. He continues to be half of me. He is still here, and I can feel his presence out in the shop now and then.”

John made his first knife in high school. Instead of making a planter as his shop project, he found a piece of O1 tool steel and went to work on the knife. His son carries the same fixed blade today, first with a cherry handle and later with one of maple. For 24 years now, John has worked as a firefighter with the Austin Fire Department, the family’s hometown after moving from Maine to Florida and then to Texas years ago.

John enlisted in the Army in 1984, six months ahead of Bob. The two became Rangers, elite soldiers engaging in demanding training programs and taking on the most hazardous combat operations. They served in the 3rd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, and Captain Stanley McChrystal, who later reached the rank of general and commanded American forces in Afghanistan, led Company A.

John spent three years on active duty as an Army Ranger. Bob stayed in and spent about eight years with the 7th Special Forces Group and 9.5 years with Delta Force. Even among the elite of the 7th Special Forces and the clandestine Delta Force, Bob stood out. He attended just about every training school imaginable, including the Basic Airborne Course, Jungle Warfare Training Course, Special Forces Qualification Course, Military Freefall Jumpmaster Course, and several others. In 1987, he competed in the Best Ranger competition at Fort Benning, Georgia, and placed second.

He was a leader of hardened, highly trained military professionals, and among his numerous decorations were the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Legion of Merit, Combat Infantryman Badge, and Expert Infantryman Badge. The full list of his accomplishments during a distinguished two-decade career is literally too long to include in this story.
Several well-known authors have written about his exploits, including Brad Thor, Pete Blaber, Sean Naylor, and George Hand IV. In writing of the funeral of a central character in one of his novels, Thor is actually describing Bob’s funeral, an all-too-real and somber event.

In his book The Mission, The Men, and Me, former Delta Squadron Commander Blaber remembered Bob and wrote, “After unshouldering his ruck, Bob H. scotched forward on his belly. He stopped behind a small pile of rubble. Canting his head slowly, he spied the valley below. His eyes and ears strained to detect any unnatural noise or movement; Bob was focused like a man whose finely tuned autonomic nervous system is programmed to maintain perfect equilibrium between the thrill of the hunt and the thrill of the chase. Bob understood his status as both the hunter and the hunted. He liked it that way … Courage has been called a contradiction in terms, meaning a strong desire to live manifesting as a readiness to die. It described Bob and his mates to a tee.”

During those long deployments to combat zones, Bob stayed in touch with John, mostly via email. “He would send one to me, and I would respond,” John said. “The next morning there was another one waiting for me. Robert downplayed a lot of what was going on. He’d say, ‘Not much happening here … I’m bored.’ But he was lying. They were in firefights every day; he just didn’t want people to worry about him.”

In his book The Mission, The Men, and Me, former Delta Squadron Commander Pete Blaber wrote of Bob Horrigan (above): “Bob understood his status as both the hunter and the hunted. He liked it that way … Courage has been called a contradiction in terms, meaning a strong desire to live manifest as a readiness to die. It described Bob and his mates to a tee." — In his book The Mission, The Men, and Me, former Delta Squadron Commander Pete Blaber wrote of Bob Horrigan (above): “Bob understood his status as both the hunter and the hunted. He liked it that way … Courage has been called a contradiction in terms, meaning a strong desire to live manifest as a readiness to die. It described Bob and his mates to a tee.”

Meanwhile, there were those precious times that Bob came home, mostly during the Christmas season, and the twin brothers picked up where they had left off during a prior visit. One of their primary topics was—of course—knives.

$50 Sander

John was 21 when he left the military, and he visited a knife and gun show in Austin with a pair of his own custom knives and a couple of makeshift cardboard wheels under his arm that he used as sharpeners. He met Houston-based custom knifemaker Ed Thuesen, who also owned Texas Knifemakers Supply.

“Ed saw those under my arm and said, ‘Don’t use that crap!’” John recalled. “I told him I couldn’t afford a new sander, and he said that he had a used one in Houston that he would sell for $50, but I would have to drive there to pick it up, and he wanted cash. I said, ‘Deal!’” Later, John bought a brand-new Bader sander and sold the used one to Bob—
for $50.

“I got into knifemaking, and then I got Bob into it,” John smiled. “He mainly made military fighters for guys in his unit, for Navy SEALs or whoever. He had more business than I did.”
At Fort Bragg, North Carolina, home of the Army’s Airborne and Special Operations Forces, Bob set up a knife shop in a lawnmower shed. Power was supplied with an extension cord, running through a sliding glass door to the shop’s tools. He enjoyed working with 440C and 154CM stainless steels, but he couldn’t forge on the Army post. Hence, when he needed a piece of damascus, John gladly supplied it.

“He wrote me a letter once telling me how much he loved coming home, coming to the shop and learning new things,” John remarked. “He would tell me that copying someone else was the highest form of flattery, and if you look at Robert’s knives they were similar to the knives I made. But he’s my brother, and I don’t care. Later, he got into his own designs, and now my best-selling knife is one of Robert’s designs.”

That legacy design is the Robert “Bob” Horrigan Military Fighter, available from John today in the notable style that has become popular in the military as well as the general public. The fighter is 11.25 inches overall with a 6.375-inch blade of 440C stainless steel and a handle of black linen Micarta®. The knife weighs 8.7 ounces and is accompanied by a Kydex sheath.

“I actually didn’t make the Bob Horrigan,” John related. “I made my Model 1 and others, but there were some guys from the 160th Night Stalkers who were on the mission that night and asked if I would make the Bob Horrigan knife. Now I make the Bob Horrigan, and I make them the way he did.”

Through the years, John has established himself among the best bladesmiths and custom knifemakers around. His daggers, tomahawks, and fighters are acknowledged as fine work, and his dazzling inlay with precious metals is something to behold. “I tell everybody that is my Picasso work,” he laughed.

Tremendous Spirit

Living quietly in Burnett, Texas, about an hour outside Austin with Donna, his high school sweetheart and wife of 33 years, John works in a 30×40-foot shop on his farm, dotted with chickens, goats, and bees. Donna says the shop is as big as the couple’s first house. They have two grown children, Matthew and Krystal, and two grandchildren, whom they adore.
Reflecting quietly, John observes, “The greatest thing that has happened since Bob’s death is that he brought me back to God, and that is the best thing he could ever leave me. Being twins, it was pretty rough, and it felt like half of me was gone. Bob came to me at the BLADE Show* two years before he was killed and said, ‘I’m coming back to God. At the time I just said, ‘Great!’ but when he was killed, God was what got me through it.

Designed by Bob Horrigan, the Robert “Bob” Horrigan Military Fighter is ABS master smith John Horrigan’s best-selling model. “I make them the way he did,” John said, including a 6.375-inch blade of 440C stainless steel, a black linen Micarta® handle and a Kydex sheath.

“I started living for Robert, for my family and doing what God wanted me to do,” John continued. “I know where Robert is now, and I know where I’m going. Bob killed a lot of people and that worried him. So he went to the chaplain, who told him that the Bible said not to murder. It didn’t say not to kill in defense of your country. So, he was good with that. I don’t think my brother ever had PTSD because he had God.”

John received his ABS master smith rating shortly before Bob was killed, and as he continues to live his dedicated life, he takes comfort in the fact that his brother, who also wanted the ABS designation, knew that John had achieved it.

In recent years, John has made presentation knives depicting the American flag for Delta Force and for former President George W. Bush, whom he met at Fort Bragg during a visit after Bob’s death. He presented the knife to “W” sometime later in Dallas.

John is generous with Honor Flight Austin, donating knives that raised $19,000 at auction, paying for 19 veterans of World War II to visit their memorial in Washington, D.C. At one auction event, he presented a Bob Horrigan fighter to Admiral William H. McRaven, commander of U.S. Special Operations Command. At an auction the following year, he presented a Bob Horrigan fighter to Medal of Honor recipient Sergeant Salvatore Guinta of the 503rd Infantry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team.

During each of these events, John has felt his twin brother right there with him. In service to his country, Bob made men. In the shop, he made knives with lasting, honorable attributes like those who carry them today. Noted John, “The sacrifice of these young men and women is incredible.”

For the elder Horrigan, every day is a tribute to his brother. Their love of the custom knife is an unbreakable link, and to be sure, every knife that John will ever complete carries something of Bob’s tremendous spirit with it.

Read More About The Horrigans

The Best Knife Handle-to-Blade Ratio

Knifemaking

Mike Haskew

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April 14, 2022

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It’s the critical cooperation of handle and blade that makes the knife perform. One supplies the cutting edge, while the other allows you to exert control. So, then, the age-old question follows in finding the right ratio of length for each in a knife of proper construction.

In many cases, the experienced knifemaker follows his gut feeling to achieve the best knife handle-to-blade ratio, his understanding of just what it takes. Instinctively, the design brings balance and function to the piece.

Certainly, the process would be simpler if a formula existed to guide the maker in the optimal handle-to-blade ratio. However, according to those consulted for this story, there is no such formula.

The best knife handle-to-blade ratio, they reason, is driven by intended use.

Use, Not Size

Best knife handle size — It’s hard to establish the best knife handle size because no two hands are the same.

“I base the ratio on use, not size,” explained knifemaker and BLADE® field editor Abe Elias. “For instance, when you look at the knife you carry every day, you’re not usually out there skinning animals or felling trees. You’re cutting open boxes and packages, snipping string or tape, and—if you trust the cleanliness of the blade—cutting a piece from a block of cheese or peeling an apple. In the end, everything is based on what you do with the knife.

“So when you look at all that, everyday use versus bushcraft or camp use, then you might say to yourself that you don’t need a lot of handle for torque or control if you’re cutting a piece of tape or your Amazon box open. If the blade is small, you don’t necessarily have to put a small handle on it; but, if the job doesn’t require a good, full grip, I’ll shorten the handle to make it easier to carry in an urban environment to do non-strenuous jobs.

“Bushcraft requires that you do strenuous stuff related to torque, and with carving or craft ing or skinning an animal,” Abe concluded. “Therefore, the handle must be full size to provide the ability to control the blade and put enough force behind it. Small jobs need control but not always a lot of force.”

Best knife handles — Instead of the knife’s size, knifemaker/BLADE® field editor Abe Elias bases handle-to-blade ratio on its use.

What Pleases the Eye

Don Hanson, making knives for three decades with the Sunfish Forge mark, has no exact, best knife handle-to-blade ratio formula, and he readily asserts that any standard such as a “handle length an inch longer than the blade” falls apart pretty quickly.

Ratio best knife handles — Don Hanson said he does not have a formula for the blade-to-handle ratio. “I just do what looks good to my eye,” he noted. “With folders I make the blade as large as possible to still be able to fit inside the
handle when closed.” (SharpByCoop image)

“I don’t have a formula for the ratio,” he commented. “I just do what looks good to my eye. With folders I make the blade as large as possible to still be able to fit inside the handle when closed. I don’t think making the handle an inch longer than the blade on a fixed blade is accurate. That would not work for bowies or fighters, where blades are typically seven to 12 inches. On these the handles are usually 5 inches.

Now, it could be true for a hunting knife if it has a 3.5-inch blade. A 4.5-inch handle would be perfect for that hunter.”

The Golden Mean

Hanson allows that the mathematical “Golden Mean” ratio may be helpful, though he does not specifically use it in his work. Without launching into a prolonged Algebra lesson, two quantities are in the Golden Mean if their ratio is the same as the ratio of their sum to the larger of the two quantities. Dust off that old high school math book for the actual formula and a clearer definition.

“Handle-to-blade ratio is function first,” Hanson added, “but in this time of images on the internet and magazines, the visual aspect is very important. Sometimes we see a knife that looks pretty good but just doesn’t seem right—and it’s not apparent why. In most cases the handle-to-blade ratio is off.

“The Golden Mean ratio is a good way to get handle-to-blade ratio right. I don’t use it, but most knives that look right will fall within the parameters of that ratio. Still, there is no rule or ratio in folding knives. The handle is always longer than the blade.

“A folder just looks bad when the blade is too small. I just design knives that function well and look good. I rarely measure anything or use any rules. The knife has to look good to get someone to pick it up. Then, if it feels good in the hand you have a winner.”

Best knife handle to blade ratio for knives — The old adage that the handle should be about 1 inch longer than the blade doesn’t work with large knives. “In period pieces such as an 18th century Scottish dirk, the grip was typically in the 4-to-5-inch range despite a blade length that could be up to 16 inches,” Vince Evans (inset) noted. His Scottish dirk repro was the cover for the March 2020 BLADE®.

Function, Comfort, Looks

According to Vince Evans, a full-time maker since 1981, some handles do require a certain length or shape depending on function, and some hunters prefer a small grip that is completely in the hand to avoid getting in the way when field dressing an animal.

“Personal preference probably plays a big part in that idea,” Vince said. “In period pieces such as an 18th century Scottish dirk, the grip was typically in the 4-to-5-inch range despite a blade length that could be up to 16 inches. Knives of the past tended to have more similar grips than modern ones.

“People carried a knife all the time for various purposes, so I would think that the ratio worked out naturally over time, and I would imagine that overall weight had a lot to do with the size.”

“Aesthetically, if you have a blade that is too big for the handle, it can become wonky,” Joe Flowers, a knife designer for Condor Tool & Knife, reasoned. “If you don’t balance the blade with the handle on a fixed blade, it can become messy. The human eye picks up on imbalance, so, if you have a short blade and a long handle, you’d better have a good reason.

“For fixed-blade bushcraft knives the most popular example is a 4-inch blade with a 4.5-inch handle, with a point down the center line. As a designer, especially recently, I’ve tried to jump out of the ‘rule’ rut that I’ve made more or less for myself.”

Best knife handle sizes — The White River Knife & Tool M1 Backpacker makes nice, tight curls. “Bushcraft requires that you do strenuous stuff related to torque and with carving or crafting or skinning an animal,” Abe Elias observed. “Therefore, the handle must be full size to provide the ability to control the blade and put enough force behind it. Small jobs need control but not always a lot of force.” (Abe Elias image)

Ergonomics are an integral component of the best knife blade-to-handle ratio, and the user surely appreciates that balance in the field.

“I’ve done a lot of research on human hands/tool use ergonomics,” Flowers offered. “More ergonomic knives have less geometry in their handle design for long-term use. Sometimes these handles don’t look very special, but after the third hour of whittling a kuksa [a Scandinavian drinking cup carved from birch burl] or an axe handle, you will appreciate them.”

Flowers adds that torque and dexterity dictate handle length in relation to a knife blade. In other words, if more force must be applied, then more surface area in the right points of contact with the hand allow the user to apply that torque.

“If it’s something like a neck knife,” he interjected, “you probably aren’t going to be applying that much torque, and are using it more for miniscule tasks such as cutting line rather than chopping down a tree. The handle length can sometimes dictate what the blade is capable of doing. An axe with a 3-inch handle would work differently than one with a 23-inch handle.”

The perfect combination of handle and blade is ultimately put to the test with intended use. In the absence of a formula, the true judgment may be found in the fatigue or the number of blisters on the palm when the job is completed.

Overthinking Handles?

Years ago, a well-known knifemaker offered Elias some advice.

“He said two things,” Abe smiled. “‘You’re spending too much time on your handles. You’ll never get your money back for it. And your handles are too long. They should be the bare minimum.’ Now, my whole thing is that the knife is only as good as your ability to control it.

“I will ask a customer what size their hand is. I’ll ask them to go to a store and find a pair of metric-sized gloves that fit and give me the number. That way I know the dimensions of their hand and can work from that accordingly.

“Still, it would be good to say that there is some kind of ratio that always applies, but like I’ve said, I don’t have a mathematical formula—I have a use formula.”

The best knife handle-to-blade ratio is, after all, the product of evolution, experience and the trained eye. Placing these elements in perspective produces the balance and control necessary for the knife to function as it should, while also making a pleasing presentation from a visual standpoint.

9-11 Knives: Custom Memorials To The Tragic Day

Mike Haskew

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March 7, 2022

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9-11 Knives: Custom Memorials To The Tragic Day

The atrocity that shocked the world continues to transform it, and knives, too. Here is a look at some of the memorials 9-11 spawned from that fateful day.

It began as an ordinary Tuesday. It ended with the world changed forever.

The atrocity of the terrorist attacks at 8:45 a.m. EDT on Sept. 11, 2001, will never be forgotten. Now, 20 years after planes crashed into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, retrospect brings not only memories of sadness and profound loss, but also an acknowledgment of the heroism of 9-11 and the humanity that emerged.

A measure of that humanity took the form of custom knives made from the twisted and scarred steel of the World Trade Center (WTC) buildings—forged once in the conflagration of that terrible day and then again in tribute to lives lost, and for the benefit of those who miss them and live on.

Keith Kaiser (right) was in Ladder Company 131 of the New York City Fire Department that reported to the World Trade Center on 9/11. In 2003 he enlisted several leading makers to produce knives with blades made from WTC steel. Those makers, with the exception of Mel Pardue, from left are: Bob Terzuola, Bob Dozier, Allen Elishewitz, Gil Hibben, and Pat and Wes Crawford. (Eric Eggly/PointSeven image)

Ladder Company 131 (L131) and Engine Company 279 (E279) of the New York City Fire Department (FDNY) were housed in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn on 9-11. Keith Kaiser was a member of L131. Moved later to enlist the support of several custom makers to produce knives with blades made from WTC steel, Keith remembers the horrific day vividly.

“Because of the proximity to lower Manhattan, both companies started to gear up,” he recalled. “As we were approaching the tunnel into lower Manhattan, we saw the second plane hit the south tower. The engine company went into the buildings first, and the ladder company soon followed. L131 was in the lobby of the hotel on the ground floor of the south tower when it fell. We breached a wall and got out a group of civilians before we realized what was going on. The engine company was never found.”

Five members of E279 were killed, and the FDNY lost 343 firefighters in all. Since then, according to Kaiser, nearly as many have died from 9-11-related cancer and other illnesses. His older brother, Wayne Kaiser, an electrician who worked to restore communications in the wake of the terrorist attack, recently died of illness due to extended exposure to toxic dust and debris.

Keith was seriously injured on 9-11. “Oddly enough, my getting injured probably saved my life because I was not able to dig in the pile subsequently,” he said. “I was looking for something to occupy my mind and time, and one of the men lost from my company, Christian Regenhard, was a knife collector. I thought I would try to get my hands on some steel and get knives made out of it for charity and to keep me involved.”

Early efforts to get the project started were difficult, but Kaiser persisted. Eventually, he contacted several of the biggest names in custom knives and secured their commitment to contribute to a benefit for the New York Firefighters Burn Center Foundation. Bob Terzuola, Bob Dozier, Jerry Fisk, Pat and Wes Crawford, Allen Elishewitz, and BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall-Of-Fame® members Gil Hibben and Mel Pardue made one knife each with blades incorporating steel from the fallen twin towers (page 90, August 2003 BLADE®).

Murray Carter holds the last two knives he made of WTC steel as part of a special fundraising project that included FDNY343 (fdny343.org) and Building Homes For Heroes (buildinghomesforheroes.org). (Murray Carter image)

“It was planned with the help of Christian’s father, who was a New York City police detective,” Terzuola said. “Seven knifemakers, including myself, volunteered their time and materials. Keith presented the idea to us and offered to supply a piece of steel from the wreckage of the fallen towers to each knifemaker, from which they could make a knife of their choosing.”

The knives included signature works: a Dozier damascus folder; an Elishewitz folder; a CQB from Terzuola; a Hibben dagger with scrimshaw handle; a skeletonized folder from the Crawfords; a damascus folder from Pardue; and a damascus stag Sendero hunter from Fisk.

The task brought the added challenge of making the Trade Center steel usable for knife blades. “It was low carbon structural steel,” Dozier related, “and I asked Daryl Meier to make damascus for me. At the first show after 9-11, Keith brought some steel to me and wanted me to make a knife with it. I wouldn’t take it. A friend of mine who was a state police investigator here in Arkansas said to leave it alone because it was evidence. Then about a month later, a big cardboard box came in the mail and there was the steel. I cut it into pieces and Daryl made some ladder-pattern damascus.”

Once the knives were gathered, they became tangible remembrances. “They were placed in a beautiful cocobolo box with a beveled glass top that was etched with the World Trade Center,” Terzuola commented. “The idea then was to put them up for auction for the benefit of the burn center. Keith sent them around to various museums prior to the auction, and after several years they almost became permanent exhibits in some places.”

Keith reached out again to Terzuola, who helped arrange an auction, and the set sold in June 2020 with the proceeds benefiting the hospital. “Keith sent me the knives, and I cleaned them up and got hold of Rock Island Auction in Illinois, one of the top auction houses for knives and firearms,” Bob states. “They did a beautiful two-page spread in their catalog and after the auction sent a check directly to the burn center.”

Murry Carter Knives 9-11 Custom

Like so many others, the atrocity of 9-11 touched custom knifemaker Murray Carter significantly. He was asked to partner with FDNY343, an organization of retired New York firefighters dedicated to keeping the memory of those lost on 9-11 alive, and Building Homes for Heroes, a charitable enterprise that provides homes for those injured while serving their country and in the 9-11 attacks.

Ryan Johnson was just starting up his RMJ Tactical when 9-11 shook the world. The U.S. military was looking for something that would punch through body armor and the RMJ Eagle Talon hawk, featured on the cover of the March 2002 BLADE®, filled the bill. RMJ Tactical took off and is one of today’s leading hawk makers with such models as the Shrike.

Carter has produced several kitchen and outdoor knives, each incorporating a laminate of Trade Center steel with a 1084 carbon steel core. The motivation to produce the knives was strong, and Murray notes that the components of fire, water and stone were present both in the 9-11 incidents and the making of the knives. He reasons that fire enabled the forge, water quenched the blades and stone honed them into tools. Conversely, fire brought the towers down, water hampered rescue efforts, and lives were lost in the crush of stone.

“So, the same elements are here in the knives, and they bless people daily,” Murray explained. “When iron is red hot, that’s how we get steel, and some of the victims were burned, the elements fused in a chemical trade. The depth of the fusion was dependent on time and it was brief. So, I didn’t want to do much grinding in order to leave these elements in the surface of the steel.”

One of Carter’s kitchen knives was auctioned for $10,500 and the proceeds were given directly to Homes for Heroes. He calls the effort, concluded in the spring and autumn of 2017, an honor and one of the most humbling tasks of his long knifemaking career.

RMJ Tactical 9-11 Spike Hawk

Ryan Johnson was just starting up his Chattanooga, Tennessee-based RMJ Tactical when 9-11 shook the world. He had always been interested in tomahawks, and was making pipe and spike hawks before that desperate day. Then, things changed quickly.

“I had made a spike hawk and a gentleman saw one of them on my website,” Ryan remembered. “He was with Air Force security forces and said, ‘We’ve got some guys securing air strips, and we’re looking for something that will punch through body armor.’ He said my French-and-Indian-War-style hawk looked perfect for the job.”

The seven knives from Keith Kaiser’s 9/11 memorial project were placed in a beautiful cocobolo box with a beveled glass top etched with the World Trade Center. (Eric Eggly/PointSeven images)

The first shipment of five spike hawks had just gone out before 9-11. “The same guy called me up and he was already in the Gulf,” Ryan said. “He said to get busy making these things because they would be big.”

Like lightning, the demand for hawks soared—not only with the catalyst of 9-11, but also with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that followed. “I received a call from a gentleman working as an attaché to Donald Rumsfeld [Secretary of Defense] and made him a hawk. He sent me a picture back of him in his office at the Pentagon with a letter that said when the planes hit the towers, all the brass in the Pentagon were out in the hallway in front of his office passing that hawk around. A few moments later, a plane hit the Pentagon. Just before that happened, an admiral had walked by and said, ‘This war will be fought by hawks at the ends of the hands of soldiers.’”

A short time later, a story on Ryan’s hawks appeared in the Chattanooga newspaper and was picked up by the Associated Press, ultimately appearing in countless media outlets. “The article was on making hawks for the military,” Johnson recalled, “and before long Green Beret units were getting in touch with me and asking why they weren’t getting hawks. When you look back at the early days of the wars, Task Force Dagger included the first 300 special forces and others into Afghanistan. We had hawks going in with them.”

Orders kept coming, and civilian deliveries were postponed to fill the demand from the military as RMJ Tactical got started. Twenty-five Eagle Talon hawks went to Marines in the town of Najaf, Iraq, just before the battle for control of the city of Fallujah.

“I got a phone call concerning those 25 hawks,” commented Ryan, “and it was from the wife of a Marine officer. She said there was a plane leaving that night with room aboard for the shipment if we could get it ready. I called my friend Richard Carmack and knew his kids might have the time to help wrap the handles if I could provide the pizza and a movie. Now, Richard makes sure things run right here, his son Jonathan is our production manager and I’m still working in design.”

Conclusion

The atrocity of 9-11 and the lengthy conflicts that emanated from it continue to echo through the lives of every American. Remembrance is tinged with vigilance and the pledge to never forget the sacrifices of those lost.

Here are the beginning (bottom level), middle (mid-level bar of steel) and end products (top level) Murray Carter used to forge weld World Trade Center iron into a usable blade with a 1084 core. The blade is water-quenched for maximum sharpness and edge retention, and the blade surface still retains the soul-infused character of the WTC steel. (Murray Carter image)

Though nothing is for sure at this time, there may yet be other knives produced with the venerated World Trade Center steel. Terzuola still has a small amount of the steel but probably not enough for another knife blade. He is considering a knife with Trade Center steel bolsters and G.L. Hansen Micarta® that includes a thin blue line in its composition. Proceeds from the sale of such a knife would go to benefit a law enforcement officers relief fund.

Stainless Damascus: Challenges In Forging

Knifemaking

Daniel Jackson

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February 24, 2022

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Stainless Damascus: Challenges In Forging

Stainless damascus knives look fantastic and resist rust in the process, but present the knifemaker with a host of challenges.

It’s not easy forging stainless steel. It’s harder still to forge damascus patterns out of it. Nonetheless, those who specialize in forging stainless damascus for sale to both factory and custom knifemakers, who spend their days before a power hammer turning out billet after billet, say the material is as hot as ever. Meanwhile, they’ve developed a couple of tricks to keep the welds sure, the patterns crisp and the innovation marching forward.

“There’s just things that I’ve been able to do now that I thought I wouldn’t have been able to do when I first started,” said Mike Norris, a smith of stainless damascus since the mid-1990s. “For instance, I actually make Turkish twist damascus in stainless.”

Norris runs a one-man operation in his Kentucky shop. In a moment when he wasn’t moving between his forge and Blanchard grinder, he explained part of the process. “When you forge carbon steel, you can use flux. You can just stack the layers up and flux ’em and stick it in a fire and make it weld like that. With stainless, you have to have a controlled atmosphere around the billet,” he explained. “Flux doesn’t work on it.”

Stainless Damascus Forging Process

If the weld in a carbon damascus billet doesn’t take, a smith may have an opportunity to get another whack at it. No so with stainless damascus. There’s one shot and if it doesn’t fuse, the billet heads to the scrap pile. Moreover, no oxygen can touch the stainless steel during the process. While other smiths build a can, fitting metal in some kind of container, fusing it shut and then launching into forging, Norris uses stainless foil.

Herucus Blomerus outfits his HB 18 PHIRI folder in a blade of Intrepid stainless damascus forged by Chad Nichols Damascus. (SharpByCoop image)

Stainless damascus is as popular as ever, Norris says. His patterns most in demand are Fire Clone and Hornet’s Nest, and he typically forges them from 19C27 and 302 stainless and D2 tool steels. In the past few years, he said he’s seen many makers grind blades from san-mai, a blade material with a core of hard steel sandwiched by softer ones.

Tired of seeing a core sit off center on a finished knife, lopsided between two outer layers, Norris developed straight-core san-mai. He’ll cut a damascus billet in half, sandwich it between sides of an XHP stainless, and forge weld it all together. The result keeps the core centered and the pattern undistorted. That way when the maker takes the steel to the grinder, the core is “gonna be there every time,” he said.

All that effort helps the end-user rest easy, Norris opined. Instead of worrying about caring for a carbon blade, a stainless damascus one has the corrosion resistance and can look good doing so. One other benefit, Norris said: it can hold its contrast. The knife Norris has taken bowhunting for about two decades—made with one of his early billets of stainless damascus—looks almost as good as the day he made it. “And,” he exclaimed, “I’ve skinned a lot of deer with it!”

Experimenting With Stainless Damascus

Forging stainless damascus requires a willingness to go off map. It’s not the land of 1080 carbon steel.

Fire Clone stainless damascus by Mike Norris is the blade steel for a Jonas Iglesias folder. (Image courtesy of Mike Norris)

Chad Nichols of Chad Nichols Damascus can typically devote time to experiment in December, when business slows down somewhat and he and his shop of five have a little extra time. Plus, the summer temperatures in his Mississippi-based locale can sometimes get downright hellish.

Chad’s shop turns out a range of knife materials, including titanium damascus, Mokuti, carbon damascus and stainless damascus. Boomerang and Wave Pool have been damascus patterns popular with his customers, as have the san-mai-type billets.

According to Chad, damascus essentially breaks down into two basic patterns: raindrop and ladder. Lately, though, he’s been trying out new types of steel. He’s been forging san-mai billets with unusual core steels. Hearing recently that CPM MagnaCut, a 4V-type of steel, might be the next hot blade material, he started using it as the core.

Tempest by Brian Nadeau offers up a blade of stainless damascus in NitroV by Vegas Forge. The frame is titanium, zirconium and AKS Timascus™. (SharpByCoop image)

And just how do you go about working with a new steel?

“Guess,” Nichols blurted, laughing. “Start off with a pretty good educated guess and go from there. I mean, it still is steel, each one has a characteristic, but you just got to kind of baby step it until you figure it out. Then take notes.”

Once he’s figured a steel out, it’s smooth sailing—mostly.

“The first time, yeah, but after that, it’s just like anything else. I’ve been doing it for almost 20 years and if there’s one thing, it will take you to school,” he said. “Each one of them moves different, takes the heat different. There’s some steels you have to be super careful about not overheating them like by 20 degrees.”

Yes, sir, some like it hot.

Pattern Making

According to Jesse Harber, president of Vegas Forge, it was just seven years ago that the average consumer didn’t know what damascus was. Now, they see it on Forged in Fire and know.

Chad Nichols Damascus has been trying out new types of material combinations lately, including forging san-mai billets with unusual core steels. (Chad Nichols Damascus image)

The vast majority of Vegas Forge’s business is stainless damascus. Because it works with mosaic damascus—building patterns in a can, sealing it and applying the heat—Vegas can also put, say, a proprietary logo straight into the steel. Out of the 16 patterns Vegas Forge offers, Herringbone and Spirograph are the hot ones. They are patterns born out of some serious development.

A few years ago, “we modified from MIG welding to TIG welding, which gave the can a lot tighter seals, so there’s no holes in it,” Harber said. “And we advanced the system that we used, actually worked with some engineers out of California, a couple of good old Russian boys. That’s probably the biggest advancement we’ve made.”

The thing they try to prevent? A bad weld, something that would become all too apparent if the billet was milled and the steel started peeling apart.

The Hybrid stainless damascus pattern by Mike Norris is the blade material for a folder by Alister Bastian. (Mike Norris Damascus image)

After forging the stock down to an inch thick, “from there, we’ll use the rolling mill to roll it out. It takes a lot more time to do it that way but the pattern stays crisp,” Harber noted. “It doesn’t blend or blur the layers together from all the impact.”

Amidst all the innovation, the “crazy wizardry” of pattern development, Vegas Forge has expanded outside the knife industry. It also supplies round stock to jewelry makers for men’s rings, for instance.

As it turns out, plenty of people appreciate the ease-of-care and mesmerizing patterns from a good piece of damascus made from stainless steel.

Stropping: What It Is And How It’s Accomplished

Paul White

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February 24, 2022

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Stropping: What It Is And How It’s Accomplished

What is the purpose of stropping? Is it the same as sharpening a knife? We’ll answer those questions and more as we explore how to put the finishing touches on a blade.

Burr is a term used to describe the turned-over edge of a freshly sharpened blade. The burr can be seen as an ultra-thin, wire-like structure at the edge. When sharpening you are bringing one edge surface closer to the other edge surface with alternating and even strokes, left-right-right-left against an abrasive such as a sharpening stone or metal grade sandpaper or strop. By alternating sides you simultaneosly remove surface material from both of the sides forming that burr. Sharpen back-and-forth, one side and then the other, and the burr appears.

What Sharpening Does To A Blade

At first the two opposite sides are divided by the blade’s edge thickness and there is no burr. This is seen as that paper thin shiny line from tip to choil. As one side is brought closer to its opposite side (i.e. sharpened), one side or the other will eventually meet the other and the thin shiny line will disappear.

At that point there isn’t enough mass to support the edge against the hard-abrasive surface, and the super-thin edge rolls/curves over in the opposite direction, forming the burr. The burr can be seen with the unaided eye and felt with your thumb. The objective at this point is to switch and sharpen the edge from the other direction with a yet finer grit abrasive. This maneuver makes an even smaller and thinner burr on the opposite edge. After you sharpen several times like this in opposite directions, with finer and finer grit paper, the burr will be reduced microscopically and be difficult to see or feel but will still be there. This final use of fine grits of abrasive is considered, and is called, a hone.

What Stropping Does

At this point switch from a superfine hone-grit paper (1500 plus grit) to a leather strap, belt, or section of a belt, called a strop. The fine sandpaper hones, and the leather strops. Strop with the same back and forth motion, strop the blade’s edge against the leather. This action bends the now unseen burr back and forth against the leather and the burr finally breaks free. The edge thickness is now just paper thin or less. So “paper thin” doesn’t sound like the edge would bear up during use, being this thin, right on the very pinnacle of the blade’s edge—but it does.

With removal of the burr the edge acquires maximum sharpness and can be re-honed repeatedly without subjecting the blade to recurring sharpening cycles with lower grit sandpaper. This maintains the thin-and-sharp element of your blade.

Choosing A Strop

Make your strop from a strip of leather belt (10-inches long) glued to a bit of yardstick or lath material. Glue a strip of 800-1500 grit wet-n-dry sandpaper to the other side for a hone.

The same exact motion is used on the leather side of the strop stick. When the smith is “into” the motion it is similar to a continuous figure-8 movement. Most of the time the leather is enough to restore the blade’s edge without using the sandpaper side of the stick.

How To Strop

Stropping is a low-angle slap and slide motion. The leather actually sharpens the microstructure of the blade’s edge. It 1) bends the burr back to a sharp edge or 2) bends it back and forth till it breaks, like bending a wire coat hanger back-and-forth, revealing a new raw edge. Visualize a barber in an old-west, cowboy movie slappin’-n-slidin’ his straight razor on a big leather strop. Slap-n-slide your Frontier blade on the 800 to 1500 grit black W/D sandpaper 10 to 15 times then on the leather the same number of swipes. When your edge dulls you can often just strop with the leather, forgoing the hone altogether, in the restoration of a keen cutting edge.

After stropping, if your knife edge isn’t near razor sharp, go back to your wet-n-dry-sharpening action with the higher numbered sandpaper grits (400, 600, 800) then strop again.

Testing The Edge

Feel the edge with your thumb, perpendicular to the edge. Never run your thumb or fingers vertically up or down the blade. It will cut. With time you’ll be able to tell in an instant various level of sharpness with just your thumb. With time you will feel the burr and know the angle of any blade with just a touch of your thumb.

Another sharpness indicator is the use of an old leather belt or scrap of leather. Almost any “sharp” knife can cut a sheet of paper but stiff leather is the true challenge. First, use a knife of known sharpness. Cut a bit from the leather. Note the force needed to peel off a few pieces of leather. Use the same piece of leather on subsequent blade edges you sharpen in the future. By comparison, the quality of those blades’ sharpness can be gauged.

**This article is an excerpt from Forged: Making A Knife With Traditional Blacksmith Skills available at ShopBlade.com.**

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Who Made the First Damascus?

BLADE Staff

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February 1, 2022

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The origins of damascus steel date to as early as 1500 BC.

The allure of damascus steel lies not only in its beauty and utility, but also in the mystique of its origins. Though its development began in ancient times, the word damascus has grown to encompass more than one method of steelmaking, and the earliest method is believed to date back to 1500 BC.

“Damascus steel today can mean at least three things,” explained blacksmith and steel authority Rick Furrer. “First, there’s pattern-welded steel where a bloom of steely irons is welded into a solid mass which then has a pattern. This is the oldest of damascus-steel-making technologies and one which most blacksmiths reproduce with layers of modern steel welded together.

“Second is crucible steel, where the material is fully melted in a container and then the resulting ingot is forged into a bar, which may or may not have a surface pattern. Third is overlaid or inlaid wire, gold, silver, copper or such into a base metal surface such as steel or silver to make a surface pattern. Some call this damascening or damascene.”

Those who have studied the origins of damascus tend to agree that pattern welding did happen first and that it occurred in the Far East, the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East, Indonesia and Europe. Crucible steel production is also referred to as wootz, and its beginning, for some, is easier to pinpoint.

“Some call crucible steel, or wootz, the original damascus, but pattern welding predates it by more than 1,000 years. Pattern welding was in Europe by 1100 BC in Greece and easily by 600 BC in Central Europe. It was very widely spread by 400 BC,” observed Furrer, who in 2011 participated in the filming of a Public Broadcasting System NOVA segment on the famed Viking swords from circa 800-1000 AD with the Ulfberht inscription. The extremely low slag content of the Viking blade steel may indicate a new development in steel processing in Europe, or that the Vikings were forging blades from imported crucible steel.

“The earliest examples of blades made from wootz steel date from around the first century BC,” related ABS master smith Kevin Cashen, “and the oldest examples of the material seem to come from India. While the Indians seem to have been the first to produce crucible steel, they were soon followed by other cultures in the Middle East such as the large production centers in what would now be Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Pattern welding is a trickier process to pinpoint, date or credit to a given culture as it is very old, and just about any people working iron would have produced welded blades on some level.”

Technological Advancements Of Demascus

As technology evolved, production methods improved and fueled the availability of high-quality blade steel. Performance and purpose have contributed to the growth of the industry and the changes in the scale of production through the centuries.

“All of these steel processes were driven by warfare and weapons technology,” noted ABS master smith Steve Schwarzer. “As soon as someone discovered a new method, everybody who wanted to survive jumped on that new method. The moment the local smith developed a method to heat steel to a totally liquid state and control the carbon, the need for wootz and pattern-welded blades fell to the wayside except for the very few who viewed it as art. When the Bessemer converter came into use [in the 1850s] and steel was produced in tonnage at any carbon level desired, there was no need to use the labor-intensive process of making one small piece of material at a time.”

The basic tools used by early makers of pattern-welded damascus were quite similar to those used by the modern bladesmith—hammers, anvils and forges. Dan Farr hammers hot steel in his shop. (Dan Farr image)

Nonetheless, the craftsmanship and performance of forged damascus is timeless. Modern damascus makers take advantage of improved technology and know-how. The ancient producers worked with basic tools and equipment during a process of both production and discovery. The early makers of pattern-welded damascus combined bloomery steel with varying properties, says Cashen, but the basic tools were quite similar to those used by the modern bladesmith—hammers, anvils and forges.

“One difference is possibly the absence of the fluxes we use today,” Kevin added. “The simple bloomery products of that time period, when worked in a charcoal fire, would weld much more easily and not require the oxygen barriers that we have become so accustomed to today.”

The early crucible process would have involved sealing some amounts of premade iron along with certain organic/carbon-bearing materials and fluxes into a clay crucible that would have been placed in a charcoal-fired furnace, which would usually have been fired by a bellows or natural air drafts.

“The clearest difference in either method now compared to then is the fuel we have at our convenience today,” Cashen commented. “Gas-fired forges and furnaces make the tasks much more convenient than the arduous, dirty labors at ancient charcoal fires.”

Staying True To The Steel’s Roots

Maybe it is true that the more things change the more they stay the same, particularly as it relates to damascus steel. Surviving examples of either pattern-welded or crucible damascus are impressive in their quality. Modern bladesmiths produce damascus and mosaic damascus/canned steel that simply defies description, the beauty of the patterns speaking for themselves.

One of the differences between the way damascus is made today as opposed to centuries ago is the use of flux—applied here to a twisted billet by Tim Britton. (Britton image)

Damascus also originally occupied a transitional period in human history. As the Bronze Age waned in Europe, basic iron blades began to appear and pattern welding followed. In the East, iron blades of piled construction were made and pattern welding may have taken place concurrently with it, both being phased out as the crucible process came along. Most experts agree that Europeans were introduced to crucible damascus/wootz during the Crusades.

“With the wootz made by high-temperature smelting in a crucible and forming a cake, bulat or ingot, this ingot was then formed in a very slow, methodical process to produce a beautiful pattern of iron-carbide ferrite and cementite banding,” Schwarzer commented. “This was called watered or damascus steel. It is thought Europeans encountered this material for the first time during the Crusades near Damascus, Syria. Then, this cast material was traded all over the world.”

ABS master smith Al Pendray is well known for his work in wootz steel. Along with John D. Verhoeven, he is listed by the U.S. Patent Office as one of the inventors of “a method of making a steel article having an external surface appearance and an internal microstructure resembling that present on an antique ‘Damascus’ steel sword or blade.” Pendray contends that the earliest crucible damascus was made in Persia and quickly got the attention of Westerners who came in contact with it. “Wootz is ultra-high carbon and will take a real clean edge,” he remarked. “With all the nonmetallic stuff and impurities floating to the top in the process, it’s also a super clean steel.”

But Why Call It Damascus?

As intriguing as the steel itself, the name damascus has a mysterious origin. While the obvious link is to the ancient capital of Syria, the answer to the source of the steel’s moniker is open to speculation.

“One such story maintains that only wootz can be called damascus steel because it was wootz that the Crusaders first encountered in the Middle East, with the town of Damascus being the trading hub for its distribution, thus lending it the name,” Cashen offered. “This theory ignores the fact that there were also damask cloths [with intricate patterns formed by weaving], and that the treatments on many materials involving carving, inlay or otherwise were worked with an intricate flowing or water-like pattern called damascene. It is also worthwhile to note that an old Arab term for water is damas, a coincidence that’s hard to ignore when you consider the number of cultures that refer to patterned steel as ‘watered’ or having ‘watering.’”

Speculating about the origin of the name is intriguing, but Cashen says it is what it is. “In any case, the number of centuries that any steel with a pattern in it has been called ‘damascus’ sort of renders all of these speculative picky semantics irrelevant,” he noted. “Languages evolve, and the word means what it does today. When this is taken into consideration, any steel possessing an induced pattern could be safely referred to as damascus, with pattern welding or crucible steel being the more specific types of patterned steel.”

According to Master Bladesmith Steve Schwarzer, modern steels are far superior to even the best of the ancient materials because of quality control and repeatability.

Finest Blades Ever

As with many highly prized skills, individual bladesmithing and the production of high-quality damascus steel in small quantities has been eclipsed by mass production, given the availability of modern equipment and technology. However, the steel still owes its lineage to the blacksmiths of ancient times. Additionally, today’s bladesmiths keep the tradition and the skill alive like no mass production process can.

“Modern steels are far superior to even the best of these ancient materials because of quality control and repeatability,” Schwarzer mused. “What modern steels don’t have are beauty and the visual fingerprint of the steel artist’s hand. The damascus blades being made in modern times are far superior to the ancient blades because the modern smith is using these very sophisticated steels and modern scientific techniques to produce the finest blades ever made.”

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Overthinking Handles?

The atrocity that shocked the world continues to transform it, and knives, too. Here is a look at some of the memorials 9-11 spawned from that fateful day.

Murry Carter Knives 9-11 Custom

RMJ Tactical 9-11 Spike Hawk

Conclusion

Stainless damascus knives look fantastic and resist rust in the process, but present the knifemaker with a host of challenges.

Stainless Damascus Forging Process

Experimenting With Stainless Damascus

Pattern Making

What is the purpose of stropping? Is it the same as sharpening a knife? We’ll answer those questions and more as we explore how to put the finishing touches on a blade.

What Sharpening Does To A Blade

What Stropping Does

Choosing A Strop

How To Strop

Testing The Edge

This article is an excerpt from Forged: Making A Knife With Traditional Blacksmith Skills available at ShopBlade.com.

Get More Knife Sharpening Info:

The origins of damascus steel date to as early as 1500 BC.

Technological Advancements Of Demascus

Staying True To The Steel’s Roots

But Why Call It Damascus?

Finest Blades Ever

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**This article is an excerpt from Forged: Making A Knife With Traditional Blacksmith Skills available at ShopBlade.com.**