>
> >Spot on, Jane - I calculated a blade about 1 to 1.5 kg, and the rest
> >losses in production.
> >
> >The 450 cubic centimetres describe the raw ingot.
>
> That's a heck of a lot of wastage for working iron. While there will
> be some loss from finishing, polishing and sharpening there'll be
> little or none in the forging. It's not a modern process where you
> cut off the bits you don't need and throw them away because it's
> more trouble than it's worth to reuse. Instead you hammer the ingot
> into the right size and shape for the blank you need and then
> hammer and fold it into the sword. Any cutting is done early on in
> the process and the scraps are recycled. A lot of the skill is in
> knowing how the hammering needs to be done to get the right result.
>
> --
> Donald Oddy
> http://www.grove.demon.co.uk/
>
Actually, that is not my understand of the=20 matter. Depending on the process, there is=20 considerable wastate. In the case of the pattern=20 welding method used by the vikings and the celts,=20 up to 3/4 of the bar was lost.
And once contaminated by carbon, the steel cannot=20 be immediately reused but has to be resmelted -=20 which I am not sure was readily achieved at that=20 level of technology. One of the problems with=20 steeling iron is that it is very easy to go too=20 far and add too much carbon and is impossible to=20 go back.
Traditionally, wastage was melted back together=20 and then turned into the much more brittle=20 wrought or cast irons.
Of course, there were methods of producing sword=20 blanks which are then used as the basis of=20 swords. These are sharpened and shaped to taste=20 (again, much wastage).
I suspect that the dwarfs might sell punched=20 metal blanks to those surrounding them. They're=20 not as good as something hand-forged but they are=20 extremely cheap to make.
Jeff
-- =46light to Peru - =A31000 Camping gear - =A3200 Native guide to take you into the mountains - =A350 Radiation detector to find mysteriously radioactive old tomb - =A3150 Sledgehammer to break down stone door - =A312.99 Awakening one of the Great Old Ones - priceless. There are some things man was not meant to know. For everything else, there's Mastercard. ------------------------------
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