ceramic triumph

[gfish]

I think I have found a good solution to the clay-adhesion problem: fiberglass reinforcement! I took a swatch of fiberglass left over from rocketry projects (12oz, if I remember correctly), cut it into 1cm squares, then teased out the individual fibers and mixed them into some fairly wet clay. Even just spreading a test section onto the blade made it obvious how much better this was. It spread like creamy peanut-butter, instead of the lumpy porridge I had got before. I let it dry overnight, and no cracks! So I held a propane torch on it until the clay was starting to glow. Still no cracks! We'll see how the heat-treating goes later in the week, but I have very high hopes for this combination. I'll have to swing by Fiberlay to get a container of precut fiber additives. Doing it by hand is slooooow.

Comments

[gfish.livejournal.com]

I'd like to get a bit at least to see if that's too short. Hopefully not -- fibers as long as the ones I'm using make it really hard to do some of the fine detail work needed to define the hamon in a traditional style. Doesn't matter for the machete, but eventually I'll want the capability.

[neuro42.livejournal.com]

I'll try and find it, I haven't seen it since I moved.