Thread: Damascus steel and razor care

Gentlemen

I am nor entirely certain that this question should be posted here but I am beginner so please have some patience with me.

Looking through some of the wonderful threads in this forum showing beautiful razors made from Damascus steel several questions comes to mind. One that I have been thinking about is how difficult is it to maintain a good edge on these ? Mixing different kinds of steel and forging them together could make the sharpening rather difficult.

It is no worries at all.
They perform just the way any other steel would do.
That is if they are made properly.
Hopefully, some of the makers will chime in on this subject.
My comments are made solely as a user who has a fair few Patterned steel razors

There are several good articles on Damascus/Woots/patterned steel around on SRP.
In addition, I seem to remember reading about it on Wikipedia as well.

Originally Posted by Birnando

It is no worries at all.
They perform just the way any other steel would do.
That is if they are made properly.
Hopefully, some of the makers will chime in on this subject.
My comments are made solely as a user who has a fair few Patterned steel razors

There are several good articles on Damascus/Woots/patterned steel around on SRP.
In addition, I seem to remember reading about it on Wikipedia as well.

Thank you !!!

Point taken I will check in the Wiki next time

It's just like any razor. It depends on the hardness. Some are a little more difficult and some are very straight forward.

You just have to keep them oiled so they dont rust. I use a silicone gun rag and wipe my blade. Some makers use a sandwich. You have three layers of steel. Two damasks with a solid core. That way you avoid the inherent saw-tooth edge. That micro saw tooth edge is what makes damasks knives cut so nice but not necessary what you want in a shaving razor.

Most 'Damascus' steel in modern knives and razors is cosmetic. Once you go over a certain number of folds in the steel [snips long technical explanation] the steel is effectively homogeneous even though it has a nice wavy pattern to it.

You might get true Damascus/woost steel from a highly specialized custom maker, but you can bet a brick to London that anything from a factory involves the cosmetic look pretty stuff.

I think it is all cosmetic, in that it doesn't make a better razor than even the plain high-carbon steels which have been available for a very long time. How often (from the days when straight razors were a highly competitive big business) do we hear of a Victorian laminated razor?

Quality damascus steel, made from start to finish by a person or people who understand razors (not just knives), needn't be at any disadvantage to homogeneous carbon steel, in effectiveness, ease of maintenance etc. Others may be made from commercially available damascus billets by people who don't know or care what a good razor does.

Being on eBay is a discouraging sign, and even if they aren't, perhaps the material was. If I wanted to make a damascus knife, I would use an eBay Indian blank with some confidence. But not a razor.

As already stated above, care measures are no different than for any other steel razor.

Todays damascus steel razors (apart from those from highly specialised artisans) are just plain pattern-welded steel. The old damascus formulation was (from what is known about it) a type of wootz steel that depends on certain trace elements in the iron ore (which is why it 'disappeared' when the original wootz ore was changed to another source). It doesn't even have to be patterned - a lot of early examples have no discernible pattern (although a pattern can be revealed by treating the surface with acid - the revealed pattern can be polished away again).

There were quite a number of vintage and victorian razor makers using damascus steel, such as Isaac Walker, Wade & Butcher, Geo. Wostenholm, John Williams, William Revitt, etc, plus good number of post-Victorian makers. As to whether the steel used was true damascus steel or not is another question, though. Some examples seem to have had the pattern stamped or etched on, but some did use the real thing, albeit highly polished with no patterning visible.

Regards,
Neil

Some early Victorian razors may well have used the wootz steel which came from India (originally via Damascus, although I would guess that the land route was superseded by then.) I don't believe there was any practical reason for it to be laminated. I would suspect that it was far more common for "Damascus steel" or "India Fine Steel" to be stamped on blades of domestically produced steel.

I have "Reminiscences of the Great Mutiny 1857-59" by the former Sergeant William Forbes-Mitchell of the 93rd Highlanders, who formed the core of the British assault troops in the relief of Lucknow. He has an appendix on swords, which although not himself a swordsman, he had frequently seen used to terrible effect in desperate combat. He strongly condemns the Birmingham practice of making swords of spring steel, and tempered so that they can be bend hilt to tip. He considers them far inferior in cutting power, due to their bluntness and tendency to vibrate, to sharp swords of damascus steel, which he describes as being as rigid as cast-iron, or a razor.

But even writing in 1892, he describes the true damascus blade as something few have seen, and recounts conversations of the 1860s which suggest that the art was practically dead then. This is supported by the Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wootz_steel . (That same article describes its carbon content as 1.5%, which is high, so perhaps lamination, possibly with other steels, would be required for shock resistance in a sword.) I would be sceptical of claims that there was a substantial trade in wootz/damascus steel to the west at that time.

That's very interesting, particularly about the swords. Wootz originated in India though, and was used in the far east - even an arab chronicler of the 12th century mentions that ‘the Hindus excelled in the manufacture of iron and it is impossible to find anything to surpass the edge from Hinduwani or Indian steel.’

I don't think anyone claimed that there was a substantial trade in it to the West??? Revitt, for example, cast his own in Sheffield.

Regards,
Neil