As I mentioned [stderr] my first attempt at feather damascus was a bust, and left me with a half-split half-welded block of many-layered metal. Some gears in my subconscious clicked and I realized there was some symbolism there in the metal.
There are a variety of patterns in damascus steel-making, each of which represents a different way of laying up the bars, and manipulating them afterward. Each step brings with it a unique opportunity to fail: if you work too slowly, things may oxidize and not weld cleanly anymore. If you work too fast, you may wind up with inclusions or a mis-aligned weld. Two bars the have been forge-welded together are now one bar; you can’t re-position things.
When I was making Jazzlet’s breadknife, [stderr] I originally spec’d it as quite a bit larger. This is how it came out.
Jazzlet’s knife is done.
Old school mold-makers and modelers like Adam Savage use a technique for framing molds in which they cut cardboard boxes and glue them together with hot glue.
Before my big end-of-year spate of travel started, I did some forge-welding and made a few pieces of bar-stock. One of the pieces was intended for a bread-scoring knife for Commentariat(tm) member Jazzlet.
Post vises are popular with blacksmiths because they can clamp incredibly strongly and the ajax-style threading allows them to be tightened quickly with one hand.
It’s probably a good thing that there are lots of regulatory hurdles that prevent someone from getting easy access to high explosive. The forms you need to fill out to get licensed as a blaster in Pennsylvania are pretty limited, there’s only one option for “why do you want to become a certified blaster?” and that’s “mining.”
[Warning: body mods]
I get a lot of stuff in the mail, because I’m always collecting components for various projects. Today I went to the post office and there was a large box that was very heavy. It didn’t make sense because I usually don’t order anything that’s going to be very heavy, for when I am away; if I’m away for more than a couple of days, my neighbor up the street collects my mail for me, and I don’t want to overload her.