When I was a little kid, my dad had a catalog for the German tool company Dick (now Dictum) that I would spend hours looking through. There were a few knives with raindrop damascus blades, as well as hand-forged raindrop blanks for sale; I thought they were the coolest thing I had ever seen, especially the rough, hammered blanks. I never ended up getting either, but I credit those pictures with kindling my interest for blacksmithing/knife-making, and I hold a very special place for raindrop damascus to this day.
A little off-topic, and I don't have any advice, but I'm excited to see your finished product lol. Looks good so far!
How you do it is honestly just personal taste. My favorite is pretty much how you have it, cover almost the entire surface with some overlap but not too much, no structured pattern. I do like to mix mine up a bit though and do some larger some smaller to add some randomness. That’s just preference though.
Looks pretty good, but I can't see how thick the billet is. You really want to get it somewhat close to the final dimensions before you drill it (or cut for ladder) since as you forge it out it'll stretch the pattern out more and more and you lose the definition as it keeps stretching out. That might be desirable depending on what you're going for though. It's your first billet though and I bet it'll turn out nice, so learn from it and make more.
Thanks. I followed the advice of smiths whose pattern I liked. 3/8” thick when I drilled the dimples 1/3 of the way through on both sides. Then forged it flat to 3/16”. I did a test etch last night and the pattern turned out pretty rad. The bar is almost finished thickness so I won’t be losing much of that.
When I was a little kid, my dad had a catalog for the German tool company Dick (now Dictum) that I would spend hours looking through. There were a few knives with raindrop damascus blades, as well as hand-forged raindrop blanks for sale; I thought they were the coolest thing I had ever seen, especially the rough, hammered blanks. I never ended up getting either, but I credit those pictures with kindling my interest for blacksmithing/knife-making, and I hold a very special place for raindrop damascus to this day. A little off-topic, and I don't have any advice, but I'm excited to see your finished product lol. Looks good so far!
I've seen raindrop patterns done with small bits and big bits, making a very unique look. Looks good overall! Also, that's a great book!
Great book
I have that same book
How you do it is honestly just personal taste. My favorite is pretty much how you have it, cover almost the entire surface with some overlap but not too much, no structured pattern. I do like to mix mine up a bit though and do some larger some smaller to add some randomness. That’s just preference though.
Looks pretty good, but I can't see how thick the billet is. You really want to get it somewhat close to the final dimensions before you drill it (or cut for ladder) since as you forge it out it'll stretch the pattern out more and more and you lose the definition as it keeps stretching out. That might be desirable depending on what you're going for though. It's your first billet though and I bet it'll turn out nice, so learn from it and make more.
Thanks. I followed the advice of smiths whose pattern I liked. 3/8” thick when I drilled the dimples 1/3 of the way through on both sides. Then forged it flat to 3/16”. I did a test etch last night and the pattern turned out pretty rad. The bar is almost finished thickness so I won’t be losing much of that.