Photos Pic Heavy-Need opinions is this knife damascus or BS damascus

P

PCL

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May 25, 2012
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I picked up this blade today and am trying to determine if this pattern welded or fake.








Plunge line



Looks like micarta

 
Looks like pattern damascus to me. Can't speak to quality of metals used though.
 
Blurry as hell on my end... can’t tell anything from the photos. Any stamps on the blade?
 
:) So far as I can tell from the rather out of focus pics , the Damascus looks real .

But there are loads of cheap , junky Damascus produced that's "real" but very poor quality . :(:thumbsdown:
 
The images are clear when you double-tap them. The knife looks like a typical Pakistani product. If so it is Damascus but the quality is frequently poor. Does it cut? And, is the blade heat treated at all?
 
I was curious so first I sharpened it, it slices paper and shaves hair. Then I tried the brass rod test and it flexed and returned true. So I don't know what to say.
 
JAGKNIFE said:
so it could have been a car fender or a soda can 6 months ago.....LOL
Click to expand...
Who knows. I've actually worked with decent pakistani damascus as well. There's at least one producer that also sells(sold?) billets that made pretty decent stuff.

Too bad that even if the base material is ok their heat treat sucks and their grinds tend to be abysmal.

I've given makers from that region of the world a fair try, but out of the three that have sent me stuff over the years none of them sent me anything that realistically should be sold for anywhere near what little they asked for their work.

I've (for now) given up on knives from that country.

Still buy the occasional mosaic pin or Camel bone scales from there though.
 
Looks real, should be pretty easy to spot a fake because its printed on it can be rubbed off. Also look at the blade spine, you should see the pattern continue from the front.
 
I have a Pakindistanian Laguiole with this variety of "damask" steel that I call "crapmascus". Cannot take an edge and is full of voids. I think mine was heat treated to the same degree as a letter opener. Looks a LOT like your steel. Mine only cost $5, including shipping, from Pakistan. Yours may be much better, though (it certainly CANNOT be worse!), and might be a good cutter. Use it as best as you can and enjoy it! If its anything like my Laguiole and you can sharpen it, you can sharpen anything :)

Zieg
 
The Zieg said:
I have a Pakindistanian Laguiole with this variety of "damask" steel that I call "crapmascus". Cannot take an edge and is full of voids. I think mine was heat treated to the same degree as a letter opener. Looks a LOT like your steel. Mine only cost $5, including shipping, from Pakistan. Yours may be much better, though (it certainly CANNOT be worse!), and might be a good cutter. Use it as best as you can and enjoy it! If its anything like my Laguiole and you can sharpen it, you can sharpen anything :)

Zieg
Click to expand...
On another note, humankind has been thriving for millennia with metal tools far worse than we would accept: Villagers and urban craftsmen and soldiers alike. You can do a lot with a knife like this, including admiring its patterns. It's easy to dump on them, but 300 years ago it might have been king $#!+.

Zieg
 
Like others have said, it could be real Damascus made from low quality metals.
All that really makes that pattern is forge welding/ folding a couple different metals together and corroding the metals in an acid solution.
Different metals corrode at different rates and this reveals the pattern the mixing of the two metals make.
Mix two cheap metals together and you might get Damascus but that doesn't make it a good knife.

The word Damascus in modern times doesn't necessarily mean quality steel it just means the metal the knife is shaped from used the process
of welding and folding different metals together to create a pattern on the finished product.

These days words like Sandvik, Hitachi, or Crucible should tip you off to a good blade steel more than Damascus.
For good Damascus a lot of the stuff that's Damascus with a VG 10 core from Japan is good stuff.
 
Last time I commented on Pakistani knives :poop: I got in trouble :eek::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::(

If you’re asking it’s probably not good steel.

As Doug Would say. “ it might cut, it might kill , it weeeeeeel break” :p
 
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