Hybrid kris for comment

[kai]

Hello Xas,

For example, stolen railroad tracks- 1084 steel, if I researched correctly- was mentioned by several historical references to have been used by pandays in the mid to late 1800s (mid- from foreign trade, late- exclusively in Luzon) and sold/bartered as "quality steel." This steel source became even more popular during the American era (early 1900s-preWW2). Parts of certain ship vessels made of steel were also cannibalized for trade. In these cases- if such steel sources were used to make swords, won't the end product qualify as monosteel?

Yes, if a sword would be fully made from these common sources of modern steel with limited forging, the resulting blades would be monosteel. 1084 steel is an especially good choice in a low-tech setting since quenching will be successful under a fairly wide range of process parameters; also the hardened blade can still be easily sharpened and will not be prone to breaking. 1095 steel could yield better edges/hardness if quenched correctly but this is more difficult. Thus, 1084 is a good choice for longer blades in a rural setting.

If monosteel would be folded onto itself several times in a traditional SE Asian blacksmithing forge, it might exhibit (non-contrasting) laminations again.

In many cases though, this precious steel would have been only utilized as the central layer of steel for the later edges of the sword and sandwiched between 2 layers of laminated mild steels made from salvaged other materials (cheaper and less likely to break due to lesser carbon content).

BTW, leaf springs from Japanese trucks continued to be of laminated steel (IIRC even after WW2).

Regards,
Kai