3 ms·
I know this does not have anithing to do with knives but Samurai swords are made from four different kinds of steel. The core, back, sides and the cutting edge.
by scns 8y ago
I know this does not have anithing to do with knives but Samurai swords are made from four different kinds of steel. The core, back, sides and the cutting edge. The sword is straight when forged and the arc comes from the hardening when the cutting edge expands more than the rest. Source: witnessed in person the first time when a katana was forged outside of japan at a festival at the japanese culture institute in cologne. The swordsmiths have the rank of a priest and wear white robes.
- hef19898 8y agoFrom a pure material perpective, the issues, also for the Japanese, was poor steel and iron ore quality (as an other comment stated above). So in order to get all you inpurities out of the final product, melting processes weren't up to the task yet, you are basically obliged to pattern weld the shit out of your steel. Particularly in Japan, this was compounded by having iron ore mostly as part of a sand-ore mixture (without magnets getting the pure ore out without mixing it with sand is close to impossible). As a result the Japanese came up with a very smart forging technioque to solve that problem. And the swords, at least the high end ones, are pieces of art. Not fielding full-plate armor like the Europeans did, cutting remained a desired quality for a soldiers side arm. So they stuck with it. Simultaniously, the Europeans developed spring steel and weapons developed in a totally different direction.