Steel bar labeled "WOLFRAM"

[Sam Salvati]

I got this bar of steel from a buddy of mine, has "wolfram" stamped into it, any of you blokes ever seen anything like that?

[Brakkie]

going on a bit of a wild guess here since I'm not a knife maker nor do I deal with steel very often.

But could it be a tungsten bar? Tungsten is sometimes called Wolfram as well and can be pressed into a typical bar shape like you describe?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tungsten#Production

[JungleBert]

There's a place in the UK called Wolverhampton and the name Wolfram has connections to it, it may be it's Roman name?

[ANDYLASER]

It will have a high tungsten content. If you get the HT right, you can produce superbly sharp knives with it.

[HillBill]

wolfram steel - a very hard heat-resistant steel containing tungsten

75 % iron, 18% wolfram, 4% chromium, 0.7 ~ 1.5 % carbon, and 8 % nickel.

Excellent for things like drill bits etc.

[nitrambur]

There's a place in the UK called Wolverhampton and the name Wolfram has connections to it, it may be it's Roman name?

That's Wulfrun

[JungleBert]

oops!

[timgunn1962]

Wolfram is another name for Tungsten. Tungsten was used in some of the early "High Speed Steels" to give hot hardness. It is still used in HSS, but normally together with other alloying elements.

As HillBill says, you've probably got one of these high speed steels. Tungsten is extremely dense and I suspect you'd have noticed if you had pure Tungsten; It's a bit more than twice as dense as steel.

If you are thinking of forging it, be very mindful of the hot hardness and experiment carefully. I don't forge (yet), but if I wanted to play heaty beaty with a likely high speed steel, I'd probably not use a shiny new power hammer on it until I'd made good and sure it would move between a hammer and anvil I could afford to damage.

Also bear in mind that hard and brittle usually go together, so take extra care over safety and consider what will happen to the bits if it shatters when you hit it.

Regards

Tim

[Sam Salvati]

Thanks guys! I heard it was more common in the UK on another forum so I figured you guys could help me out. I'll see if I can send a bit out for analysis to see exactly what I have, I only have about a 3 foot bar of it but it's worth the 40$ to know exactly what I am playing with.

[rmcpb]

Wolfram is the German word for Tungsten. The chemical symbol for Tungsten is W which really catches out lots of people. Have a look at this page for a bit more info.

[Sam Salvati]

INteresting, I wonder why it isn't called wolfram anymore?

[rmcpb]

Cause we speak english Who knows? Do we really care? Its a great trivia question though!!

[Howard Clark]

Turn the lights off and put a piece of it against the grinder. If it is tungsten steel (and it is), the sparks will be dark red, fairly short, and simply go out with distance. No explosions, or anything interesting with them, and W suppresses all other elements spark modifying tendencies when present in significant amounts. Even O-1 has enough W to mostly suppress all the other sparky things that can happen from alloying elements in steel.

I don't like wolfram steel, myself, especially not for forging. You results may be different than mine. Good luck !

[Sam Salvati]

Rob, heheh good point

Howard, red sparks, will try that tomorrow. What didn't you like about it?