Saw chain damascus

[ozzy1977]

Has anyone on here made any Damascus type material out of old saw chains? I have seen on google images a few and it looks very interesting

Cheers

Chris

 

[Mesquite]

I think Dave Budd said he did once

 

[Stew]

Nope, but I have a pile waiting to weld up when I get chance. I've done bike chain a couple of times, once to a finished knife and the other is still sat as a dirty lump.

There are some amazing chainsaw blades on BB.

 

[ozzy1977]

They sure look good but how well would the edge hold?

 

[Stew]

They sure look good but how well would the edge hold?

They're not supersteels but they do harden so will hold an edge.

 

[Dave Budd]

Yeah I've welded them up a few times, but never really been happy enough to finish them into knives. They are so full of holes and weird shaped bits that they invite crud to get caught when welding up That said, I did get a nice little blade made from one that Mad Dave gave me at the moot last year. Darn thing warped in the HT and I haven't had the heart to finish since then

They do hold a reasonable edge, but with the inclusion issues you either need to weld a fair amount of chain together to give you a chance at getting all of the voids closed up (ie massive reduction in stock under the hammer), or you laminate with a known steel in the core. That's how I plan to do it next time I get around to doing some. Another way is to do a cannister weld, where you fill a metal box with the chain and then swarf or powdered steel to fill the voids when you weld up.