I know what you did last summer.

Ah well yes, I may have liberated a tiny smidge of iron from the cliffs whilst on holiday. But in my defence I'm pretty sure the laws relating to keeping things on coastal areas relate to items washed up, not tossed off the cliff, and I don't think in the grand scheme of things anyone will miss this smidge amongst literally tons of pre WW1 french artillery barrels tossed into the sea after Germany's occupation of the small rock off the french coastline.

Iron is deeply fascinating material and with some knowledge of working various grades of this material from the good bad to the downright Ugly I have gained a proper appreciation of the joy of wrought iron at its very best grade. The finest grades are rolled welded and rerolled many times over to achieve a very fine structural grade. I fully expect it to reveal the finest strands and "clouds" upon polish and light etch.

A kind of misinterpretation (or catch 22, depending on which way you look at it), of iron in cutlery, is that it will rust, reality and practice is the opposite to this. It is remarkably resistant to rust, iron has a huge list of trace elements which allow the material to form a protective coating or patina slowing further corrosion to an incredibly slow rate even in the harshest environments, for example exposed to both salt and oxygen. The finest and most refined grades of iron was known as "black iron" Rolled and rerolled many times it must have been hugely inefficient to produce and used structurally on ship hulls, artillery, bridges, it earned the nick name due to the apparent black skin formed from content chemical exposure, seemingly protecting itself from oxidation. I suppose this is where the annoyance comes in cutlery, as it will patina, it must patina by its very nature, this can of course be an annoyance to those who have lovingly brought out the beautiful natural clouds in the fine stands by polishing with natural stones. Of course all the time you use the material it will be working against you with acids in foods and oxygen to form a protective layer once more. Its up to the user how to work with this anomaly, perhaps it works best on traditional wide bevel knives, where you maintain the wide bevel and enjoy the clouds and activity between iron and core, allowing the rest of the knife to form patina. And if you enjoy polishing too much, well it could be perfect for you in that respect.
Either way you can be safe in the knowledge that if you should happen to misplace your knife by the seaside for a hundred years or so, your iron cladding will be there long after the steel core has corroded and retreated into its iron jacket.

Good iron is of course a makers dream, having welding temperatures lower than mild steel, allowing wonderful clean open welding with minimal carbon loss of the core material.


So there it is enough nonsense from.........to the iron...

Here is the ickle piece I rescued and it came home with me on the back of my Motorcycle.



At this point I have pickled the piece in Hydrochloric overnight, which other than removing the barnacles appears to have had very little effect on the iron, other than making it go very black!





You can still see a misplaced pilot hole, testament to how little this material has corroded since enlisting in the French artillery prior to WW1.



Just under a 20lb chunk.



Plan is to straighten the material to keep the grain naturally aligned, and forge into a couple of bars, one from the section without holes for blade stock and then reweld the piece with holes and forge into a chunkier bar for some bolster stock.



























So after a couple of hours forging I have some great stock for san mai and single bevel work, and what a pleasure it is to work this amazing stuff:big grin:


Thanks all, hope you enjoy my little article and like me look forward to seeing the work it inspires.

Wow Will! This is amazing! Thanks for this.

dude will, this is just the coolest! thank you for sharing, your knowledge and passion are always inspiring. cheers!

So freaking cool!

Love to read about stuff like this. What a special bonus for whomever ultimately purchases a knife made from this particular piece.

Wow! This is very impressive.

really awesome

Fascinating and impressive in equal measure. True master at work.

Now if you'd be so kind as to throw a piece of 1.2442 in the middle there, we'll call it a day!

That's the coolest thing I've seen so far today :doublethumbsup:

Loving these WIPs, Will. Keep 'em coming!

Excellent use for reclaimed iron. Thanks for sharing with us!

Very cool. Thanks for sharing this. Look forward to seeing the final results.

This is looking like a lot of fun

I love to see artisans working with reclaimed or found materials. WIP, Will!

Thanks all for the comments, what a great response! :big grin: I will keep you all updated as I make the first laminations.:detective:

Quick test piece in the iron/1.2442 today. I wanted to get a bevel finished in it, its the cleanest iron I have ever seen, that means no clouds at this stage with J nats.... I will get this piece finished up and give it a light etch to reveal its secrets....

Its a single bevel Utility hunter, about 100mm blade length, 4mm forged tapering blade and tang, hollow back, which will be next finished with wa stones to get the Ura perfecto.... Its Uber hard, just had a quick flash temper, will be 65hrc on the edge. 1.2442 and black iron rocks!

And we have clouds.....to satisfy my curiosity I polished the bevel to a very fine hazy nagura grit and gave it a bit of the old warm vinegar trick, its certainly the cleanest iron I have ever worked, zero lines of fine dust like inclusions breaking up the strands as you get even on quite good wrought, this is more like a very fine very clean damascene pattern, as in the ancient crucible steel, I think a high polish and a very subtle etch will be the way to go. Will let you all see when I have something photographable.

Will, do you plan to make some knives with hand forged finish (along the way like the single bevel hunter above)? I think that would go nicely with the iron and its history. I am looking forward to see those clouds

Yes I do, a Yanagiba next, following a very traditional format and thanks...

Getting there, made some mistakes today, over etched and it just makes little pits.... but left them in for the time being for some character.

Very very dilute ferric washes, followed by progressively finer natural grit really works well this would happen naturally when you use the knife exposing to acids and maintain it, (baby it) with finger stones.... its coming along anyway, fun to play with the stones and finger stones..... Kin sharp now too.

Crappy phone pics in in natural light help show the super fine strand more.... When its finished I will set a tripod up and do it proper...









Some fine grade iron indeed. :biggrin:

Wow, that looks super cool! May be making another trip to the coast?

Just want to share some updates of the rather unusual properties of this iron having done a few blades out of it its not like anything I have ever worked, kind of hard and soft. Having heat treated it in a couple of san mai now have become convinced that it has a degree of hardness/memory. I hardness tested the cladding of this piece today and it was 52hrc, which must indicate some carbon content, yet its clearly from wrought iron based/folded. I must then assume that it has some carbon steel folded in or carbon introduced to the iron to make it less prone to distortion in the shockwave of cannon fire. Its making dam fine blades though.

Another odd property I noticed very clearly today on a forged piece is the way it makes scale, or rather lack off. Its a bot like the way it corrodes, forming a protective skin then very little oxidation under that. This was the piece after soaking at 830 degrees celsius for 20 minutes. It formed very thin scale, you can see where the scale cracked the discolouration of the otherwise spotless and still shiny metal!





Here is that piece getting finished off, all forged geometry taper bevels and slightly hollow forged.



And this Gyuto I finished before xmas



Both with 1,2442 carbon core.

I would love to get a piece of this crazy Iron/steel tested, if anyone happens to work in such a facility please get in touch