Cheap Wootz

[gjnza]

Basic idea is make a two brick forge with the bottom a hard firebrick cut as a crucible and melt mild steel, 6150 and cast iron in the right ratio to get wootz.

Well it did not work the first time round. Put in about 500g of metal, some glass for flux and just got a mess after an hour. Only a small amount of cast iron melted. I was a bit too optimistic :(

I dissasembled and just melted some cast iron with the glass to make sure that I can melt cast iron with the setup. It worked so I shut down and let the whole think cool off enough to handle and took the lump of glass and metal out. Sure enough the edge that I broke off was cast iron. I then cut it in half and lo and behold high carbon steel with no dendrites or pattern. :(

That was yesterday.

Tonight I tried a different track I melted a small amount of cast iron with some small pieces of 6150 (CrV spanner for those that don't know). I was thinking that if the carbon burns out all I need is for the V to melt into the resulting steel and I should get dendrites if it cools slowly enough. Sure enough the cast iron melted pretty quick. After some time and adding some more cast iron I stirred around with a 6mm mild steel bar. I found one of the pieces of CrV steel sitting at the bottom. :(

After a little more stirring I noticed that the mild steel rod was getting thinner. :| Stirred some more with the intent of finding the CrV. Nothing doing except my stirrer was getting shorter. :)

I then went and found some more small pieces of scrap steel, thin wall tube to increase the chance of it dissolving into the iron carbon matrix. My small stirrer bar had by this time succumbed. So I used a longer one. Both were held in tongs so I did not damage my hands too much. One 6 inch nail also eventually disappeared. :D

Now I am waiting for it to cool down so I can extract the proceeds. I hope there are dendrites. I may just have to go to bed before it is cool enough. SHMBO does not like going to bed alone. And for that matter neither do I.

Hold thumbs please I want dendrites.

Geoff

[gjnza]

Cooled down enough to get the 'billet" out. No pictures as the camera phone does not work at night.

I cut off one end ground it and etched with FeCl3. Did not look promising. No nice big dendrites. But looking at it with a loupe I do have small ones. :D I would need a microscope to show them to you. :( The sparks are high carbon but almost cast iron. So dendrites or not I may have too much carbon in the billet still.

I think this idea will work there will need to be some refinement of the basic concept.

Those who have forged wootz please confirm if my next step is correct. Forge at red heat carefully with lots of cycles in and out of the forge.

[gjnza]

Overnight something happened.

Lines appeared on the surface of the 'billet' that were not there last night. What happened overnight? They appeared in the areas that did not have any dendrites. Metallurgists please explain.

I would post a picture but I don't know how and I don't have the status for attachements. :(

If someone will post it for me I will email it.

[John N]

Hi, Sounds like you had fun! you need to post your pictures onto photobucket or similar, and then cut and paste the code it gives you into your text.

Im afraid Im pretty clueless on wootz, One of the 'big guns' might be able to answer some of your questions, Niko, Col KC, Owen or Ric, there are others but these are the names from the top of my head!

The only thing im sure about with wootz is im not going to try making it untill I know ive got a lot of spare time, it seems to be addictive!

[gjnza]

Hopefully this works

http://i635.photobucket.com/albums/uu73/Geoff-N/1stwootz.jpg

[John N]

In photobucket each picture has some different codes next to it, you need to cut and then paste the ' IMG' code, I think theres a few threads on doing this somewhere!

[gjnza]

I tried forging the billet but it was too hot short. I guess the carbon content was too high. I'll have to try again :(

[John N]

It may be worth posting on Don Foggs forum (they have sub-forum called bloomers & buttons, with a lot of know how on this very specialised sub area of knifemaking), im not knocking the BB cOlletive knowledge but theres more wootzy folks post there!

[gjnza]

I have not yet got round to trying the process again. Instead I made a kitchen knife for my wife.

http://i635.photobucket.com/albums/uu73/Geoff-N/DamKitchen.jpg

[fluffy]

Nice job.
I won't let my wife see it, you understand. :)


What handle material?

[gjnza]

I am not sure what wood the handle is, looks something like zebrano.

[jhobson]

Cast iron has a lower melting point than steel with less C. So you may be able to melt cast, but not wootz.
Grey cast iron has extra stuff in it (like Silica) to help it flow nicely into the moulds. You don't really want this in wootz.
White cast it what people tend to use.
Vanadium may help, but some people suggest it is not essential. In fact, they suggest the most important thing is to get the %Carbon correct. You probably don't need to worry about trying to add alloy elements. Probably more important to not add the wrong elements.
Your spanner probably has a chunk of chrome in it. Are you sure you want this?
Cool any mixture slowly and you should get dendrites with different composition in the middle of the dendrite compared to the dendrite boundry.

I would suggest: Check your raw materials and go with recommended formula. Get it hotter and make sure you have a complete melt (stirring is a good idea, but lumps are bad).

[tenderfoot]

does anyone think it is possible to melt leaf springs and coil springs together to make a wootz like steel? i can get the heat to melt even mild steel. i know 1095 is good (from coil spring) and chromium from 5160 is not good. maybe mild steel and cast iron (but i do not have a ready supply of either of those just spring steel). hmm this is gonna be a challenge :D

[gjnza]

From what I have read for grain boundries Vanadium is important. Chrome unless you are getting into the range for stainless is not bad, silicon is also not bad unless you get slag inclusions. I started with cast iron as it melts easily and gives me the carbon I need. I added V for the grain boundry and mild steel to reduce the carbon to around 1.5%. That was the idea. I am going to try again now that my frustrations are gone :) Hopefully this weekend. I am first going to rebuild the two brick reverb furnace. Maybe I'll get to take some pictures this time.