"Forgeplaying" with steel - Interesting damascus pattern - 30 pics

[ArielSalaverria]

I love my new toy! The ammount of new stuff that you can do with this powerful tool is only limited by your own imagination.

I'd like to thank the pioneers of the hydraulic press forging and dedicate this thread to them!




To make this blade I used 2 ball bearings with a 3" outter diameter. The electric welding not only fixes the supporting rod, but also prevents the inner pieces from moving.









On the oven til they reach 850C




Flattening them.











First step finished (I'm only showing one, but I did this to both of the ball bearings) Now it's ready to get forged.




After heating it on the oven, I place some borax on the piece.




Place it on the oven til forging temperature (about 1300C)

[ArielSalaverria]

Using the forge, I completely forge the different elements that compone the ball bearing (inner and outter containers, bearings and spacers)






Once I have both pieces forged, I place on on top of each other to forge them together too.




Again, after heating it on the oven, I place some borax on the piece and then I place it on the oven til forging temperature (about 1300C)




Using the press again, I forge both pieces together.






I cut the resulting piece in two.







I weld the pieces together on one side using an electric welder. I also add two pieces of 52100 separated from the ball bearings ingot with a layer of .5mm thickness 1010 (to get a different color later)

[ArielSalaverria]

Adding some borax.



Press forging




Press forging to the desidered blade shape.





Finished blade (7" blade and 4" tang)







One side of the blade already ground flat (no bevels yet)





Acid etched.











Once I finish some pending orders, I will continue to work on this and post pictures again.

I hope you enjoyed reading this at least a bit of how much I enjoyed making it!

Thanks for looking,

Ariel

[Matt Walker]

Ariel .. Real nice. Thanks for shareing. Matt

[rhrocker]

Thanks Ariel !!! I love to see your pictures of work in progress. Now that you have a press (congradulations! Looks like one hell of a big cylinder!) I'm hoping you really start developing patterns and such, and post them. You've always been completely unselfish with showing your work, and describing the process to us. We sure appreciate it!

[circlepknives]

Greaty stuff Ariel, can't wait to see more new and interesting stuff from you. Hell pretty soon people will be asking you to make unique Damascus for tthem.

Looks like an interesting pattern, can't wait to see the final result on a knife.

[INDIAN GEORGE]

Looking good. :cool: I like the paint job on your press.

[mete]

Great work! ... Perhaps this is a language problem but that is a roller bearing rather than a ball bearing. Most roller bearings are made from a low carbon alloy steel and carburized .Maybe that's why there are those markings.

[Ackerman Arms]

That's sweeeeeeeet. I to enjoy your posts and I love pics.
I'm with rhrocker, that is a Huge cylinder.
Keep up the good work.
Sean

[Mauro Cba]

Hi, a very diferent pattern, i like it.
I would like to know the power of the press? i saw one with 80ton power and good price, this is good for forging?

Mauro.

[sjaqua]

Originally Posted by mete

Great work! ... Perhaps this is a language problem but that is a roller bearing rather than a ball bearing. Most roller bearings are made from a low carbon alloy steel and carburized .Maybe that's why there are those markings.

Might be why he adds the two thick outer layers of 52100, to the pattern. That would put a higher carbon layer along the edge and along the spine.

[ArielSalaverria]

Originally Posted by sjaqua

Might be why he adds the two thick outer layers of 52100, to the pattern. That would put a higher carbon layer along the edge and along the spine.

Exactly!

Yep, those are roller bearings instead of ball berings, it was a translation issue, thanks for the correction

Mauro, 80 tons sound excellent. Mine is up to 65, so you should be more than OK with it!

Regards,

Ariel

[Thubalkain]

Buenas amigo, sou brasileiro, n?o sei se me compreende, caso contr?rio escreverei em ingl?s. Achei seu trasbalho muito interessante! Gostaria de saber uma coisa: seu martelete (power hammer) foi feito por voc? mesmo, ou voc? tem o projeto?
Obrigado, parab?ns pelo trabalho.

[sjaqua]

Originally Posted by Thubalkain

Buenas amigo, sou brasileiro, n?o sei se me compreende, caso contr?rio escreverei em ingl?s. Achei seu trasbalho muito interessante! Gostaria de saber uma coisa: seu martelete (power hammer) foi feito por voc? mesmo, ou voc? tem o projeto?
Obrigado, parab?ns pelo trabalho.

Ok, for the rest of us I ran it through a Babel Fish machine translation. I then went in and fixed a few machine errors by hand. The Brazilian dialect is not handled well by machine translaters programed with a european dialect. Any translation errors are therefore my fault. It comes out as........

"Good friend, I am Brazilian, I do not know if the list understands me, if that is not the case I will write in English. I found this very "trasbalho" (???) interesting! I would like to know one thing. Did you make the "martelete" (???) (power hammer) yourself, or did you have it made for you? Thank You, Congratulations on the work."

[Thubalkain]

Thank you Sjaqua for your traduction, "trabalho" is work, and "martelete" is power hummer. I wrote in portuguese because Ariel was from Argentina, but I' sorry because the other friends in this forum.
Thank you for all.