This semester I am taking a patterned metals class with
Tedd McDonah (a piece of his
mokume work pictured above). We are learning how to make
mokume gane and
Damascus steel. On Wednesday half the class fired their billets. My turn is next Wednesday. After I fire my billet I will do a more detailed post on the process and take you through the whole thing. For now, here are some teaser photos. Oh, and just in case you didn't know...100 degrees outside and a 2000 degree forge makes for one very hot night!!
The picture above is of the metal stacked in alternating layers in the
torque plates ready for firing. We did billets in combos of copper, nickel silver, and brass.
Putting the billet in the forge.
Heating up the billet until bonding of the metals takes place.
The metal sweat beads above are evidence that the layers have bonded.
Removing the billet from the forge.
Clamping in a vice to remove
torque plates.
The billet after being removed from the forge.
Hot forging the billet down to a thinner gauge.
The billet after it has been hot forged. The next step will be to roll it down in the rolling mill to a workable size and then pattern it and roll it out even more. Stay tuned for a more thorough post on the process!
This semester I took a patterned metals class. The first part of the semester we made mokume gane (which I keep meaning to post on) and the second half of the semester we made damascus steel. Damascus steel is a very technical, labor intensive process that yields beautiful patterned and strong steel. We started with two different types of steel, cut them into pieces, welded them in a stack of alternating layers, forged them out into a long strip, and repeated that process until we had a stack of 120+ layers. My billet ended up being 150 layers. A lot of people in the class made knifes, but I just wasn't into the whole weapon thing so I made I made a sheet to work with for jewelry purposes. Its about 10" long and 3" wide, and maybe about 16 gauge thick. I can't wait to work it into something!
Photos Courtesy Tedd McDonah.
