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 SE 6-1 Camping S. Steel Detachable Knife 4" Body List Price: Sale Price: $3.95 You save: $2.65 (40%)  Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionNew camping utensil set. This sturdy tool is made of high quality stainless steel. It includes a sharp knife, fork, spoon, corkscrew and bottle opener. A great tool for weekend camping! The tool even separates, so you can use the knife and fork in different hands...  |
 Cold Steel GI Tanto Knife with Secure-Ex Sheath List Price: Sale Price: $26.29 You save: $10.70 (29%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 2-3 business days DescriptionThe Cold Steel GI Tanto is a no-nonsense tactical knife designed for practical uses--from camping and hunting, to any day-to-day use where a strong and sharp blade is called for. The knife features a broad, seven-inch Tanto blade of 1055 carbon steel with a hard spring temper that has been ground to a razor sharp edge and point... |
 Cold Steel Leatherneck-SF Rubber Trainer Knife List Price: Sale Price: $6.19 You save: $4.19 (40%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionNow you can practice with some of our most popular knife designs, in relative safety, with our new rubber training knives. We have rubber training versions of our Peace Keeper™ I, the R1 Military Classic, Recon Tanto, Leatherneck-SF, and the Black Bear Classic... |
 Cold Steel Recon 1 Tactical Knife with G-10 Handle Tanto Point with Black Blade, ComboEdge List Price: Sale Price: $59.99 You save: $60.00 (50%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionCold Steel is famous for raising the bar in the knife industry. The Recon 1 continues the trend with its tough-as-nails build and chainsaw-like performance, setting a standard that's tough to beat. Every facet of the Recon 1's construction has been over-engineered to make it as strong, durable, and effective as humanly possible... |
 Cold Steel Recon 1 Tactical Knife with G-10 Handle Clip Point and Black Blade List Price: Sale Price: $58.65 You save: $61.34 (51%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours DescriptionCold Steel is famous for raising the bar in the knife industry. The Recon 1 continues the trend with its tough-as-nails build and chainsaw-like performance, setting a standard that's tough to beat. Every facet of the Recon 1's construction has been over-engineered to make it as strong, durable, and effective as humanly possible... |
 Cold Steel Ti-Lite Zytel Handle, 4-Inch List Price: Sale Price: $35.00 You save: $34.99 (50%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionThe Cold Steel Ti-Lite tactical folding knife evokes the sleep speed and rebellious lines of the classic 1950s-style switchblade. Unlike most switchblades, however, the Ti-Lite is legal to carry nearly everywhere... |
 Cold Steel Rubber Training Recon Tanto List Price: Sale Price: $4.19 You save: $6.80 (62%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionNow you can practice with some of our most popular knife designs, in relative safety, with our new rubber training knives. We have rubber training versions of our Peace Keeper™ I, the R1 Military Classic, Recon Tanto, and the Black Bear Classic... |
 Cold Steel True Flight Thrower Paracord Wrapped Handle (Sheath) List Price: Sale Price: $21.58 You save: $13.41 (38%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionThe Cold Steel True Flight Thrower beats the competition by a wide margin. For strength, we use 1055 carbon steel and finish it with a black, baked-on protective coat. This makes for a hard, yet resilient blade that will "bounce-back" from any throw... |
 Cold Steel Kobun Black Kraton Handle List Price: Sale Price: $30.16 You save: $19.83 (40%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionThe Kobun, from creative cutlery company Cold Steel, is a Tanto-style boot knife named after the Japanese word for "soldier." The sleek, lightweight knife has a blade made of Japanese AUS 8A stainless steel, with a reinforced point that's highly resistant to bending and breakage... |
 Cold Steel Bowie Blade Bushman, Black SK-5 Steel, Cordura Survival Shth List Price: Sale Price: $20.88 You save: $14.11 (40%) Eligible for free shipping!Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days DescriptionFor the money, the Bushman® knife might be the strongest survival/outdoor knife in the world! Unlike most hollow handled survival knives, there is no joint or seam between the blades and handles that requires a mechanical fastener... |
Damascus Steel – the High Tech Weapon of the 12th Century
Damascus Steel is a broad category of metallurgical techniques used to make higher technology knives and sword blades in the 12th through 18th centuries. Prior to the Bessemer process which allows steel to be made in large quantities with exact control over the amount of carbon in the mix, steel was made in an artisanal method – it was made in small batches, and making a batch large enough to make a sword was a technical challenge.
Steel is iron with carbon impurities; the best time to mix in the carbon impurities is when the steel is hot. The archetypal image of a blacksmith striking sparks from a red hot steel blade that we see in movies and popular culture stems from needing to distribute the carbon (from coke or charcoal) through the blade. You'd hammer the steel while it's glowing hot, turn the blade over, hammer it again, and reheat. The aim of doing this was to make sure that the carbon granules were broken to the right size in the alloy. (Modern steel making allows much greater precision than merely hammering the nodules out). The more carbon there is in the steel, the harder it is, and the more rigid the steel is.
Damascus steel, in spite of the mythologies that have built up around it, was simply a technique of taking high carbon steel ingots (usually "wootz" steel imported from India), hammering or drawing them flat, and then putting a layer of charcoal over them, then a layer of higher nickel alloy steel over it (nickel keeps steel flexible), then hammering them together, often times trying to fold the steel back so that there's a pattern of high carbon steel (providing rigidity) and softer nickel steel (maintaining flexibility and the softness needed to sharpen the weapon with period tools).
Damascus steel shows a distinctive pattern – the high carbon steel is darker than the nickel steel, and there's a pattern of cells that can look almost like snakeskin or running water through the blade, as the hot blade is quenches in pickling brine. (This brine will tarnish the high carbon steel before the nickel steel). Similar patterns can be found in pattern-welded steel swords from Northern Europe and the "folded steel" swords of the Japanese, both of which have been mythologized (as has Damascus steel) into weapons that can cut rock, bodies and machine gun barrels.
Damascus steel fell out of fashion for two reasons. The first is that it's incredibly labor intensive to make, and the second was that with the Bessemer process, modern steelmaking allowed for comparable steels at a fraction of the cost. Indeed, the leaf springs in a typical automobile or light truck can be ground down to make better swords than ever existed in antiquity in terms of quality and ability to hold an edge.
To look at a selection of Damascus Steel knife blades visit our Damascus Steel Pocket Knives page.
About the Author
Kirk McCormick has over 20 years experience in law enforcement and has enjoyed the outdoors for over 40 years. He writes on a variety of knife related topics. You can contact him through: www.NorthAmericanKnives.com; www.SwissArmyKnifeMall.com or www.PocketKnivesMall.com
