Damasteel® is a Hot Isostatic Pressed (HIP) Powder Metallurgy (PM) made steel allowing for properties that are typically found in the today’s best performing knife steels.
The uniqueness of Damasteel® – the patented manufacturing method – is that this is combined with a beautiful traditional made Damascus style pattern. Damasteel® starts with the perfect billet, a solid piece of steel. This perfect steel billet has no boundaries and never had any boundaries between the two alloys. Making use of their craftsmanship Damasteel’s® blacksmiths then make the unique patterns.
Therefore the Damasteel® product meets the beauty of traditional Damascus with the perfection of the modern manufacturing methods with the highest possible cleanliness creating a repetitive stainless patterned steel that can withstand abuse.
Damasteel® ® History
A researcher – Pelle Billgren – whilst working at a steel mill in Söderfors, Sweden came up with the idea and process of utilizing the HIP PM process for patterned stainless steel for knife applications together with Kaj Embretsen one of the top knife makers in Sweden. The steel mill is today named Erasteel and is the world largest HIP PM high speed steel maker. Pelle formed the company Damasteel® in the late 1990’s. The ownership changed in 2012 from Pelle to Per and Kristina Jarbelius. The company therefore remains a family owned company today employing twelve people. The product is sold all over the world and Barmond (Special Steels) Limited is their distributor for the British Isles
Production Process
A stainless steel melt is poured into a tall tower. As the liquid passes through a nozzle it is dispersed into droplets with a blast of inert gas. As these droplets fall to the bottom of the tower they solidify into powder. This powder will contain all the alloying elements of the melt and each powder particle is essentially a very small ingot. This powder is collected in a carbon steel casing bucket at the bottom of the tower.
Next there is a cold compaction press to allow for the subsequent HIP at high temperature and high pressure. Out of this will come a solid piece of steel which already has the perfect structure. This can be compared to conventionally made steel which at this point in the steel process as an ingot will have a very coarse structure in need of a break down in subsequent forging or rolling processes to become a good piece of steel. Subsequently, the Damasteel® product will be forged and rolled into a usable size but the only purpose for the Damasteel® product is to achieve a desired size not to improve the structure of the steel because it is already perfect from the start.
At this point Damasteel® takes the product from the steel mill and our blacksmiths lays their hands on every bar using traditional forging techniques to create the visual effects of the intricate patterns. Every pattern is handmade by our blacksmiths and special care is taken to ensure the highest quality and receptiveness of the pattern. This is a true work of art and the skill of the blacksmith is reflected in the result. However the steel was perfect from the beginning and as delivered by Damasteel® it will remain a perfect metallurgical product.
Damasteel® Products
Damasteel® produces six different steel grades. Four of them are decorative Damascus patterned steels. Three of them are intended for knife making. They are:
Damasteel® DS93X™ Martensitic Damascus Patterned Steel
Damasteel ® RWL34™ Martensitic Steel
Damasteel® Nitrobe77™ Martensitic Steel
Damasteel® DS95X™ Austenitic Damascus Patterned Steel
Damasteel® DS92X™ Gun Barrel Steel
Damasteel® DS96X™ Stainless Gun Barrel Steel