WOOTZ or SHAM?

[Jeff D]

Hi All and welcome Alex,

I was away and didn't see this thread until today. The term Wootz is the anglicized version of ukku wich just means steel. Wootz has come to mean a high carbon crucible steel with a "watered steel pattern". I have on a couple occasions noted that Zschokke blade 8 was eliminated from Verhoeven's study because of the hypoeutectoid carbon level. Before we condemn Verhoeven for "redefining" wootz we should consider a few things.

Verhoeven makes it clear that Fe3C (cementite) is crucial to forming the watering pattern. He also makes it clear that they can only form in the hypereutectoid state. Zschokke's blade 8 was rightfully dropped from his study because it could not contribute anything to the understanding of the formation of these particles. To my knowledge he doesn't call it sham.

When we look at the pattern on blade 8, it does have a sham appearace, my copy of the paper does not show the pattern clear enough to be conclusive. As Dr. Anne has stated it depends on your definition of sham. This is one blade that has been tested. Statistically this is meaningless. Other studies have been done, on wootz with carbon levels in the 1-2% range. Since sham has been considered to be wootz I assume they are part of this test, and therefore assume that not all sham blades are hypoeutectoid. It is certainly possible that the cementite particles are distributed in the pearlite matrix and still having the ferrite sham pattern ? This of course begs the question do we know the carbon levels of other sham blades.

I would love to hear more on this topic as there definately is a wealth of knowledge hear to clear this up.

Thank
Jeff