A few recent projects.

[randallss7]

 

[Cowcatcher]

Very very nice work!

 

[randallss7]

Alabama Damascus, and Ironwood burl.

 

[Bocephus123]

Alabama Damascus, and Ironwood burl.

Welcome to the Dark Side.. Very Nice!!

 

[randallss7]

So I recently finished a project I've been working on for a while when time allows a homemade forge press. I got around to making the 1st set of die for it just some 8" flattening die. Any way I wanted to try making something on it so I made a 15n20 clad 80crv2 San Mai billet. The forge weld turned out perfect, however I was wanting a stronger contrast between the steels. Any way the knife turned out solid but with less pop than I was wanting.



this one is 15n20/80crv2 laminated (San Mai) Contruction nothing fancy just a simple sturdy knife. with some Osage scales heated up with the torch just a tad. Sheath has a little experimenting also I never hand carve on a sheath cause I'm not very good at it, but since it was all an experiment I did a little hand carved deer skull, not very well placed but wanted to do it anyway.

 

[08H3]

I'm curious, what did you dip the laminated blade in? I use ferric acid/ apple cider vinegar solution for etching myself.

 

[randallss7]

I'm curious, what did you dip the laminated blade in? I use ferric acid/ apple cider vinegar solution for etching myself.

same except just regular vinegar.

 

[08H3]

same except just regular vinegar.

I’ve seen guys get good results from a coffee dip too, maybe try that next time?

 

[mike miller]

ci

I’ve seen guys get good results from a coffee dip too, maybe try that next time?

coffee works well, if easier you might go with phosphoric acid with vinegar. You don't have to make a new batch for each knife.

 

[randallss7]

ci

coffee works well, if easier you might go with phosphoric acid with vinegar. You don't have to make a new batch for each knife.

I have several etching tricks i do, coffee works good to really darken the pattern after etching with a stronger acid, thats better as a 2 stage proccess, the last damascus knife in this post was etched with acid mixture, then over night in extra strong instant coffee. Sanding with high grits to knock the tops off the acid restant metals expecially on damascus. I use heated muriatic acid some times and for stainless damascus and if i want a rediciously deep etch. Just on that knife i used the formentioned method. My main goal was to get a solid forge weld. Im just getting into making my own shop made multi steels, i will be doing a lot of experiminting for sure. Im going to swap the 80crv with 1095 next time, 1080, 1084, 1095 seems to pop with the. 15n20, so i will try a combination of all those things, thanks for the suggestions. I just finished my homeade forge press thats the 1st thing ive made on it.