I'm just a little edgy here today.
On Sunday I leave for a week in Wisconsin at Door County Forge under the guidance of Ric Furrer to learn how to make Wootz from raw materials.
It has always intrigued me to create my own steel and then work it down into a usable knife.
If you don't know, Ric is the one that the Discovery Channel filmed for Nova in "The Secrets of the Viking Sword".
I'll be there all week.
Please wish me luck.

Wow Karl, it's a a great opportunity for you that I am sure you will take full advantage of.

I watched "The Secrets of the Viking Sword", a very good production!

Have a great time, looking forward to hearing about it.  Safe journey.

Steve
-------
Potomac Forge
Member, W.F. Moran Jr. Museum & Foundation
ABS AP

I hope you guys have a lot of fun Karl. I wish I was with yall but I'd have to clone myself and you wouldn't want that.    :eek:

And you have a point.  But I do wish you could be there.

Have a great time Karl. Saw that show, was excellent.

Have a great time Karl. The event sounds like a fun trip.  I wish I were going also.

Chris

Wow-I'm envious. Can't wait to hear what you think after taking the class. Smelting and coming up with your own steel for a blade has always been interesting to me. It's not the same by a long shot as what you'll be doing, but I've looked into doing an Aristotle furnace to at least get a bit further down the line of making the steel. Don't forget to post pics    .

Jeremy

Had a great time today and should have four good ingots in the morning.

Show pictures?  

Any pictures or updates, Karl?    

Sorry guys - I'm just kind of chained to my workbench right now and have had little time to edit a huge volume of pics I have on many topics.
Wootz being one of them.
The class was an eye opener.
What I learned is that there are a lot of variables here on this subject and a lot of methods and materials to use.
It will be a while before I can get it all sorted out in my head.
What we did was take a basic approach.
Lots of coke was burned.
Crucibles were placed in a coke oven and ingredients were melted.
Then forged down.
We all came home with two bars of questionable content.
Time will tell on that.

Crucibles are placed in the forge and filled with coke and blown super hot - 3000* - and maintaned for about 1 hour and then let cool overnight.






Glass is placed on top which acts as a flux to trap all the impurities and as it cools this rises to the top, as it is the lightest material:




This is the ingot when removed: About four pounds.

Can't wait to hear how it turns out!  Thanks for posting.  

Thanks for sharing. This is awesome.

Woohoo! Oh man, I can't wait for more on this, Karl. So cool.....    


 


Jeremy

Any updates on this exercise?