I’m a huge fan of “forged in fire” and it seems to me that technology hasn’t done a great job of improving this craft. I mean except for things like a power hammer, how is it possible that we’re not able to control a quench.
There are so many “castrophical failures”from what seems to be competent bladesmith. I don’t understand how in 2020 there are still variable in that process that we are unable to control.
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I’m french so sorry in advance if there are error in the text.
In: Technology
Also remember it’s a staged television show. The odds that things are engineered to fail for “better TV” are very high. Many of those failures could be deliberate.
> how is it possible that we’re not able to control a quench.
We are, when we’re not being filmed for a Television show that needs drama to be entertaining. There are several liquids used for quenching in modern smithing, and very effective methods of maintaining quench temperature.
> I don’t understand how in 2020 there are still variable in that process that we are unable to control.
Artificial limits placed on the smiths by the creators of the show.
One of my neighbors was on the show. He compared it to being asked to build a house, on a time limit, with access to only what you’d find in a Junior High School’s wood shop.
Most metal working is automated these days. And there isn’t a great deal of demand for high quality knives and swords. Metallurgists get paid by other industries: guns, cars, aerospace, chemical engineering.
Things like forged by fire and other hand crafted forging is more for the novelty than practicality.
There are modern ways to make knives for example, but they don’t make good TV shows or collector items.
Metallurgy has come a looooooooong way since the metal ages, and has allowed us to understand how the crystalline structures form in metals and at what temperatures they exist. When the metal is quenched, the formation of those structures “freeze” at the stage they are in. However this freeze creates a lot of internal stresses in the metal because the behavior if metals makes them expand while being heated, and contract while cooling. If this expansion and contraction is too extreme, the energy between the crystalline structures forces the metal to break or shatter at the grain (boundary between crystals) where the difference is the highest.
This is made more difficult to control in the real world than the predictive equations materials scientists use because there are always impurities in the material. Depending on how the impurities interact with each other, the core metal, and their concentration, they can make the boundaries stronger or weaker.
And even in the most highly controlled forge with the purest of materials, there is just the simple issue of human error. Mistakes and accidents can just happen.
There are a few reasons that come to mind as to why this might be happening but if I had to wager on any specific one, it would likely be something along the lines of supply and demand.
Think about it. Blacksmiths, while still prevalent in many parts of the world, simply aren’t in as high a demand as they were years and years ago. Most blacksmiths now a’ days usually work in a sort of repair and restore environment. Now that’s not to say all of them, but many have switched to this line of work, because that’s where the demand is.
Classical Blacksmiths like those that make swords or armor like those you’re referring to, haven’t seen demand on a large enough scale that improvements in technology and technique are urgently needed. Keep in mind, the power hammer you mentioned is still under the direct control of the Blacksmith itself for the most part, they still need to do the hard part of molding and shaping the metal to whatever is required. The power hammer is just there to make life a little easier.
Most of the metalworking industry has seen a massive shift from using people, to using machines. And why wouldn’t they? Machines are far more precise, efficient, and cost effective. If a machine breaks, an engineer comes in and repairs it. If a blacksmith suffers an injury, who knows how long they’re going to be out for. Machines don’t need insurance or a paycheck. Workers on the other hand do.
Machines? They only need maintenance and repairs at best, otherwise they’re thrown out and replaced. Workers? They need to be fed, housed, insured, kept happy, and much more. All that comes at a cost to the employer who has to pay these people.
**TL;DR – Classical Blacksmiths that actually do lots of metalworking and such just aren’t in as a high enough a demand where they can afford to innovate. Not even close in comparison to industrialized complexes that work with metal on daily basis from start to finish. Whether it’s in a factory or in a refinery, most of the work has largely been taken over by machinery to do all the heavy lifting. This means less Blacksmiths and conversely, more Engineers. Forging HAS improved over the course of time, just not as you expected it to.**
Thank you all for your answers, I learned a lot !
It seems like technology have not improved forging is because it makes for good rating on TV.
We’re getting so good in metallurgical forging that it would became boring if we were to show the real metallurgical technology of 2020.
We’re able to know the calculate to a close percentage the shrinkage during forging and since you mentioned quenching, we can do such precise case hardening that you’ll get a uniform thin layer of super hard surface while retaining the softness in the core. We’re talking about millimeter tolerances if you’re not too fussy about it.
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