You can make knives out of them (and most any iron). They will just dull faster in use and need to be sharpened more often than modern steel knives. I'm still fairly amazed at how well the edge on an ALL WROUGHT IRON knife holds up in use. And they resharpen quickly/easily.
Way too many people have "fantasy" expectations about the edge holding abilities of the knives they want (and hawks). They expect to be able to sharpen it today, use it hard, and have it remain sharp until a year from next Tuesday! Fantasy expectations. If you use a cutting edge on any tool, it will dull and need to be resharpened. Simple fact.
So you can make knives from those gun barrel scraps. And they will hold an edge in use longer than many people believe. And you might even get pleasantly surprise at the "mistery" steel in them. It might be low carbon, but it also could be some pretty good steel alloy. Although, that unknown steel alloy can pose a few problems with your heat-treat. So you might have to experiment a bit, or just heat-treat a little softer.
But you can also make other things from them. The one big thing to consider would be making traditional Indian hide scrapers in one of the three main styles/shapes - straight with on end flattened/flaired, with one end flattened/flaired and bent over 80 to 90 degrees, with both ends flaired and bent over 80 to 90 degrees (and in opposite directions or in the same direction). And you do not need to weld the ends together. Just heat, flatten/flair, and shape. Then file the scraper edge the way you want.
Making a pipe-hawk out of one? Do look showy, but not the best documentation. Again, you do not need to weld in a steel cutting bit, but you do need to weld the end together. The steel cutting bit only really helps if you are going to really use it a lot for chopping.
Just a few humble thoughts to share. Take them as such.
Mikey - yee ol' grumpy German blacksmith out in the Hinterlands
p.s. Last November, I talked around 2 dozen people through making their own hide scraper from sections of real gun barrels with a simple forge at the NAVC annual fall Conference.
http://www.navoyageur.org/index.htm There were many very happy people carrying their new hide scrapers around the rest of the Conference.
And a belated THANK YOU to all those who helped me out in rounding up enough barrels to use - one older modern Bess barrel, and many old single shot shotgun barrels. They worked great, and I've heard from a number of people who have already been using them on hide projects back home. (I just about ran out of barrel sections - there were so many people that stopped by in between other class sessions to "play" in the fire a bit. I only had 3 cut sections left.)
