- Joined
- Aug 25, 2003
- Messages
- 6,521
- Reaction score
- 1,484
Only in profile is that hunting sword correct. Most machetes are made from uniform 1/16" thick steel. You will not find that used on an original. Just FYI for anyone wanting to know, forging does nothing to improve modern steel. It is merely just one way of shaping it. Steel bars come from the mills after being heavily rolled under high heat and pressure from heavy rollers. At the point that it is finished it has elongated directional grains from the rolling process but will change to random shapes the first time it is heated to austenitization. These random shapes are very much like the chips in wooden flake board and cannot be hammered back to ever have direction again. The so called direction of grains in a bend or shape are actually the product of the elongation of impurities, voids, and inclusion during the rolling process at the mill. These elongated voids, impurities, and inclusions will not change as will individual grains do, and will allow stronger bends than would a curved product cut from a sheet. The steel grains are drawn to, and kind of, encapsulate the impurities, inclusions, and voids giving more strength for bends. However, steel shaped and hammered from a poured ingot does improve with forging as the hammer is doing the job of the mill rollers, but you cannot hammer grain direction into the steel, and the mill rollers are many times more efficient than a hammer.
