Damascus good or no good for swords?

Hello. I have seen a lot of swords made from Damascus steel like the cold steel Battle Gim at the top end and

other swords like the Masahiro - Folded Steel Samurai Sword and the Bud K Dark Dragon Katana Black

Damascus says it has been folded to deliver 2000 layers. Now I had seen something on here(it had

different kinds of swords steel and I had little info about them) and it said Damascus was bad to use for

swords. So what is the deal? is it just low-end Damascus sucks or what?

 

thanks for any help

 

It probably depends on the composition of the Damascus.

 

TL: DR: it depends.

pattern welded steel (aka "damascus") can be fine for swords or not, just like any other steel.
blade geometry becomes more important the longer your blade gets, as does toughness/durability.
edge geometry and HT are also critical.
last part of the recipe for success (just like any other knife) is the type of steel.

by 2000 folds, I suspect you actually meant 2000 layers -- and at that point, what you have is pretty much a homogenous steel.
old japanese swords are a good example of this - the forging, breaking, and rewelding process was how they worked impurities out of the metal and imported carbon until they ended up with a steel that's pretty close in composition to modern 1075.

there's a reason that a LOT of commercial damascus is only 512 layers -- it's easy to do, it's visually pretty, and it doesn't take a lot of extra steps.
if you start with 8 layers, then each following step is another stack of 8 pieces from the previous weld, it's a 3-step process.
first weld is 8 layers, second weld gives you 64, 3rd weld is 512 -- and you have minimal material losses from cleanup between steps and fewer chances of developing inclusions.

custom pattern working is a completely different critter and by playing with different thicknesses or adding new material into the stack, you get some stunning visual effects.

I do my damascus with either 1084 or 80CrV2 mixed with 5160 or 5N20 -- after the etch and polish, this gives me good contrast between the layers -- and since any one of these would make a decent sword, mixing them leaves me with a steel that will make a decent sword -- if I do my job right in the general blade shape, thickness, edge geometry, and HT.

the other thing you see a lot of these days is "san mai" -- this is a process where a hard homogenous steel is sandwiched between 2 layers of softer material. The outer cladding material is also generally stainless or stain resistant (and may be damascus -- like Shun kitchen knives). This is how japanese swords were made (as well as some Cold Steel and Fallkniven knives) -- there was a higher carbon core material wrapped in tougher sides and a lower carbon spine. this maximized the use of the truly quality blade steels and let them also use lower quality steels that were less labor intensive to make.
This was also a common practice in Western countries when making axes and tomahawks -- use a lower carbon steel for the body of the head, then split it and insert a tool steel bit for the cutting edge.

where "damascus" swords got their bad reputation is probably from folks buying very low cost decorative weapons marketed as "battle ready" from certain online stores where the steel was what is commonly and derogatorily called "pakimascus" - often a mix of mystery scrap metals that may or may not have been higher carbon steel.

I could keep going, but hopefully this answers your question.

 

Bud K is local to me. I haven't looked at their stuff lately, but in the past it was mostly low end junk. Sometimes they are a good source for things like Imacsa machetes.

 

Sheep shanking, of course

 

I don't know what passes for manners where you live, but here in the former colonies that said nope, not taking that crap anymore and if we are going to have a king and queen we are going to vote for them and decide on live tv, we don't cotton to asking people what they plan on doing with their swords. I don't care what you drink, how you vote, what music you listen to or what you do with your sword.

Silly Andy, asking useful questions expecting useful replies...

 

thank you so much for your suggestion

 

SMKW has the cold steel damascus viking sword on sale for less than $300 currently - they also have a damascus langseax on sale if you want something a bit shorter in length.