Hi y’all,
I’ve been trying to get forge welds down to do some san mai but have been running into a rather consistent problem:
I keep getting these small delaminations either towards the end of forging to shape or during thermal cycling- they show up when I’m cleaning up/grinding the edge and are about a centimeter in length.
Here’s a pic for reference:
Steel is 52100 (.094”) core w/ 1018 (1/8”) clad. I’m using a double burner hells forge that I’m pretty sure is getting to welding heat and is reducing (orange flames coming off about 12”)
I clean the metal, tack the billet, into the forge. At orange heat I add borax and back into heat. Once at welding heat (bright lemon is where I take it to), pull it out and light tap, brush, more borax, back into heat. I do this 2-3 times then move onto the power hammer. I start forging at close to welding heat and then I kind of naturally will forge cooler to bright orange. My hammer is diy with mining rail peices as the die. They’re like a combination of flat and drawing die and work decent to get the billet to the desired taper/length I want it. Then I’ll let the billet cool and cut off the rebar and cut a little notch to form the tang. Back in the forge to finish the tang, little more taper with the hammer and stamp. By this point I’ve now usually gotten no visible delams. Then i thermal cycle 1650 for 10min, 1460 for 30, and finally 1460 for 30 & slow cool to 1260. Usually here is where I will notice the delaminations. If not here, then after quenching (1475 10 min into parks 50) I’ll notice them.
I’m kind of lost on what to do as obviously somewhere in my process I’m doing something wrong and it’s driving me nuts that I can’t get it right! I’ve thought that maybe I’m using too much Borax as I do use quite a lot out of fear of delamination (lol) and read on another post to try without any borax to get a stronger weld. Or maybe I’m starting with too thin of steel? I get about 90% of the billet welded but that small 10% just won’t stick! Lol.
Please, any help would be so greatly appreciated! I can be more thorough if clarification is needed
Thanks,
Andrew
I’ve been trying to get forge welds down to do some san mai but have been running into a rather consistent problem:
I keep getting these small delaminations either towards the end of forging to shape or during thermal cycling- they show up when I’m cleaning up/grinding the edge and are about a centimeter in length.
Here’s a pic for reference:
Steel is 52100 (.094”) core w/ 1018 (1/8”) clad. I’m using a double burner hells forge that I’m pretty sure is getting to welding heat and is reducing (orange flames coming off about 12”)
I clean the metal, tack the billet, into the forge. At orange heat I add borax and back into heat. Once at welding heat (bright lemon is where I take it to), pull it out and light tap, brush, more borax, back into heat. I do this 2-3 times then move onto the power hammer. I start forging at close to welding heat and then I kind of naturally will forge cooler to bright orange. My hammer is diy with mining rail peices as the die. They’re like a combination of flat and drawing die and work decent to get the billet to the desired taper/length I want it. Then I’ll let the billet cool and cut off the rebar and cut a little notch to form the tang. Back in the forge to finish the tang, little more taper with the hammer and stamp. By this point I’ve now usually gotten no visible delams. Then i thermal cycle 1650 for 10min, 1460 for 30, and finally 1460 for 30 & slow cool to 1260. Usually here is where I will notice the delaminations. If not here, then after quenching (1475 10 min into parks 50) I’ll notice them.
I’m kind of lost on what to do as obviously somewhere in my process I’m doing something wrong and it’s driving me nuts that I can’t get it right! I’ve thought that maybe I’m using too much Borax as I do use quite a lot out of fear of delamination (lol) and read on another post to try without any borax to get a stronger weld. Or maybe I’m starting with too thin of steel? I get about 90% of the billet welded but that small 10% just won’t stick! Lol.
Please, any help would be so greatly appreciated! I can be more thorough if clarification is needed
Thanks,
Andrew
