[intense music]
♪ ♪
[rock music]
♪ ♪
- I'm trey wright, and I'm from greenwood, mississippi.
I love making something of nothing,
and that's why I like forging,
but the greatest joy is raising my kids.
The kids come out and watch me work in the shop,
and my oldest tells me I need to do this,
and I need to do that because she's trying
to emulate the competition by critiquing my knives.
[laughs]
- my name is nathan sistare, I'm 19 years old,
and I'm from colorado.
I'm a full-time student studying biology
to hopefully become a veterinarian.
I've always found bladesmithing to be relaxing
and helps me kind of deal with college chemistry,
and it's just fun to hit hot metal.
♪ ♪
- I'm isaac gardner, and I'm 24 years old.
I'm a full-time jeweler.
As a jeweler, there's a lot of small detail work
and making sure that I have something that's,
one, comfortable, two, strong and, three, looks amazing.
So as a bladesmith, I focus on the same three aspects.
♪ ♪
- I'm paul sutt. I'm from new jersey,
and I'm a personal trainer.
I've been a lifelong martial artist
and a weapons expert,
and when I had the opportunity to learn how to forge,
I jumped on it as fast as I could.
It's just my passion.
- Well, bladesmiths, welcome to the forge.
You guys were handpicked for very unique
and challenging bladesmithing competition
where we're going to test all of your skills.
Now, there's three rounds of this competition.
At the end of each one, you're going to present
your work to our panel of expert judges.
They're going to decide which one of you will be leaving here
$10,000 richer,
carrying that tile of "forged in fire" champion.
The judges for today's competition are
abs master smith j. Neilson,
historic weapons recreation specialist, dave baker
and edged-weapons specialist doug marcaida.
♪ ♪
bladesmiths, you guys are going to be
taking part of a competition we are calling the civil forge
because the weapons, the challenges, the testing,
they're all inspired by a period in american history
that forged it into what it is today.
That is the civil war.
Now, guys, before we get into it,
you have a decision to make.
What kind of steel you want to use to build your blades?
You've got two options.
♪ ♪
you're gonna have to choose between these bags of grapeshot
and the cannonballs,
both of which are good high-carbon steel.
- Oh, yeah.
- Now, today we are not going to ask you
to build your signature blade in your signature style.
No, gentlemen,
we've got something much more interesting.
I want you to build an iconic blade from american history
that's not so well known today,
but during its heyday in the mid-19th century,
it was very popular and widely used.
Gentlemen, you are going to be building this...
♪ ♪
the arkansas toothpick.
- Oh, yeah.
- A popular weapon in the u.S. During the mid-1800s,
the arkansas toothpick was a large double-edged dagger
used by soldiers during the american civil war.
This versatile dagger was both a practical survival knife
and a combat weapon.
The sharp, acute tip was designed to inflict deep stabs
and cuts in close quarters with enemy combatants.
It's rumored that some soldiers were seen
using the tip of the knife as a toothpick,
which is how it got its name.
- Now, gentlemen, when you're building your blades
I need you to follow these parameters.
Your blades need to measure between 12 and 14 inches.
You need to have a double-edged blade
that has a dagger tip.
Now, by the end of round one,
you wanna be set up for a coffin-style handle,
and you need to be quenched and hardened.
- I've always had trouble with daggers.
They're a challenging knife.
It's hard to keep them symmetrical,
so I just see a real challenge ahead of me.
- Now in round two of the competition,
you're going to add those coffin handles,
turning them into fully functioning weapons,
at which point, we're gonna be testing
for strength and durability
in a test we like to call "tilling the earth"
and a log chop, and then we're gonna check
if your edge has held up in a water canteen slice.
You will have three hours in round one of the competition,
so work hard, pay attention to the clock
'cause your time starts now.
[rock music]
♪ ♪
- so would you go for the grapeshot,
or would you go for the cannonball?
- I'd go for the cannonball, just quick and easy.
It's just a matter of drawing it out
and cutting off the excess that you don't need.
- Don't roll away, man.
- The challenge with grapeshot is the 1/4-inch balls
that you put into a canister with powder and steel.
- Okay.
I think my best bet is gonna be to do canister.
I don't wanna do the cannonball
because it's a big round piece of metal
and for this time competition I think I'll be better off
being able to control how much material I have.
I want to make my can as far as possible,
so I decided not to use white out.
I don't want to have to peel it off later
'cause that's just extra time and energy wasted.
- In a competition,
unless you're asked to peel the can, don't do it.
- I gotta make this thing look as good as possible.
I'm going to make canister damascus
because I'm not messing with that big old cannonball
and trying to draw a knife out of it.
- Trey and nathan got their cans in really quick.
- That's because neither of them used white out.
- No, they didn't.
- I've never made a dagger before.
I guess there's a first time for everything,
and it may as well be here.
- If I won $10,000, I could donate a portion of it
to down's syndrome awareness.
My youngest daughter has down's syndrome
and I'd like to spread the knowledge
that people with down's syndrome are wonderful people.
There's a stigma about it. It's just not there.
- So it looks like we're gonna have two smiths
who are going to go the canister way
and two with just a ball of steel.
- I've used canister damascus and have had moderate results,
where with the ball bearings,
I've had good results every time.
- Look at what isaac is doing.
See while that metal is heating up in there,
that's the time to make your plan.
- I know because of my background in jewelry
that the small details
are what make a large project come together,
and so I'm careful to mark out on my envelope my parameters.
[whistling]
♪ ♪
- so right away I decide
that I wanna go with that cannonball.
I've never made a canister before.
- A lot of the steel seems like it's a lot easier
than getting 100 forge welds inside the canister.
Prove a lot less likely to have delamination.
- All right. Well, let's give it a shot.
I want to just move the metal a little.
I'm not in a hurry.
I know it's gonna take a while to get that
drawn into a nice billet.
One more pass, and I'm good.
♪ ♪
- the initial forge weld is the most important.
If I don't set these welds, it's gonna be bad.
I'ma have to start all back over or do something else.
- It looks like trey is compressing it down too cold.
We've seen several times where the canisters
haven't been heated up enough.
You start working on them, and they start falling apart.
- I think the welds are setting.
I'm feeling good. I'm thinking everything
is gonna be okay.
- When you're setting a weld,
your first couple of heats need to be fairly gentle.
- Very small presses on his first pat,
just like setting a weld in anything else.
You don't want to stress the weld.
- Feeling good.
I think my weld took pretty solidly, so keep on moving.
- Bladesmiths, you guys have two hours remaining.
- Once I forged that cannonball
down to some semblance of a bar,
the next thing I'm gonna do is I'm gonna
focus on the pre-form.
- This particular dagger tapers to a point.
It doesn't go parallel lines and then down to a point,
so that's one thing hopefully that they pay attention to
in making this kind of dagger.
- Right now I'm just bringing down a taper to the point
so that as I flatten it out
I'm not gonna get a big rectangular shape.
I'm gonna get a nice tapering dagger shape.
That's all about moving material to where I need it
to minimize the amount of grinding
that I have to do in the end.
♪ ♪
- I'm gonna hammer in the point,
and we should be good.
When I hammer the point in, I have to be very careful
'cause it's easy to mess that point up
an cause a big mushroom.
In a competition like this,
you just can't afford to make a bad mistake.
- I've made a couple daggers. Not great with the grind,
but, yeah, I can forge the shape.
- It looks like nathan is working
on the tip right now.
- When you talk about toothpick,
you think about poking and stabbing,
so we want to have a strong tip on this particular blade.
- The tilling the earth test seems like a pretty easy test,
just stabbing it in the ground, but one of our
previous competitions broke the first blade.
- Mark, we got a problem. - Pretty darn happy with that.
♪ ♪
- as I'm drawing out my blade, I can see it starting to split.
Mother[bleep].
All: Ooh!
- I don't know the way the chunks are on the edges.
Remember when trey did his first initial forge weld,
we were talking about how the can wasn't hot enough?
- Mm-hmm. - If you force it too much,
it can start splitting and separating.
- I still have a lot of forging to do,
and it's barely enough time to get that done.
I'm gonna have to use every bit of know how
I know to fix these issues.
I can't start over now.
Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. Damn it.
- Anything he could be doing at this point to fix that?
- I think just try to grind them out.
- I still have a lot of forging to do,
and I've got a lot of meat left in this billet.
I'm gonna mash it down and draw it out,
and then cut the cracks off.
- That is looking rough. - Yeah.
Trey is trying to forge weld it back together.
He might squish it down.
He might get it looking like it's closed,
but when he goes to grind it,
they're going to pop back up again.
- Ohh!
♪ ♪
- you know, I am pretty impressed
with isaac's blade at this point.
- So far, I'm really happy with my blade,
the profile particularly.
I checked the length, and I'm, like, two inches short.
The last thing I wanna do is go home
because I missed parameters.
- Isaac went straight to big blue
and now he's trying to draw it out further.
- Hopefully he can draw out that whole to 14 inches.
- I'm taking extra care to make sure
that my blade is right
where I need it to be to hit parameters.
- Bladesmiths, you have 1 hour remaining.
- Still pretty thick. The clock is ticking down,
and I need to hog off a bunch of steel before I quench it.
- We got paul on the grinder,
staring over his shoulder at the clock.
- It's very important for me to make it
to the testing round, so I'm going to spend time
and get this thing thinned out.
♪ ♪
- isaac's is in the quench.
♪ ♪
- whoo!
The blade is hard, and I'm ready
to do some final grinding on it.
- It might seem like a fairly simple blade,
but there's four separate bevels you got to work on.
- It's a lot of precise work.
- The difficulty here is maintaining symmetry
because if you grind one bevel a little bit more
than you did another one,
it's not gonna anything you want it to.
- You think he got all his delams out of the cracks?
- Damn it.
Those delams are still there.
I'll have to fix these issues
in round two if I make it.
Tim's winding down, and I need to quench.
♪ ♪
the blade's hard, and I'm happy.
Now, I have to grind that can off and grind in the bevel.
I've never made a dagger before.
I'm used to grinding two bevels, not four.
This is challenging for me.
- It's good he's not quitting,
20 minutes.
♪ ♪
- nate's is quenched.
♪ ♪
- everything went well. It stayed pretty straight,
so I'm just gonna be a happy camper and keep moving.
[bleep].
- Yowza. - As I'm grinding,
I realize I have a bit of a warp.
It's a pretty substantial warp,
I realize that it's too big for me to grind out.
So I get the rest of the blade as clean as possible
and hopefully get it to round two and deal with it then.
- Come on, baby.
At this point, I'm a little bit concerned
'cause the clock's ticking down.
Yeah. That's good.
- Paul's in the quench.
- I'm just praying that I have a hardened blade.
Whoo!
I don't wanna have to quench this again.
Whoo-hoo!
It's hard, and it's good.
♪ ♪
- five, four, three, two, one.
This round is over.
♪ ♪
- definitely a possibility that this warp will send me home,
but I hope that the judges can overlook it
and give me another chance to fix it.
- Well, gentlemen, you guys all rose to the occasion
of our civil war-themed competition.
You turned your grapeshot or your cannonballs
into arkansas toothpicks.
But as you guys know,
only three of you are moving forward
into round two of the competition.
So it's time for the judges
to take a closer look at your blades.
Trey, you're up first. Please present your blade.
♪ ♪
- all right. So, trey, you went with the grapeshot,
which is great, and your blade actually
wound up with a nice pattern.
Right now though, your blade is a little asymmetrical.
You've got kind of a straight side and then a bowed side.
But what gives me pause is right at the tang junction.
I see delaminations on both sides of the blade.
If you do move forward, you've got a grind to correct,
and you've also got these delaminations to take care of.
- All right. Nathan, you ready? - Yes, sir.
- Please present your work.
♪ ♪
- all right, nathan, your grinds look good.
I don't see any seams or delaminations anywhere.
But there's one thing that you really need to fix
is the warp on the blade.
But otherwise, good job. - Thank you.
- Isaac, you ready? - Yes.
- Please present your work.
♪ ♪
- all right. Isaac, let's talk about your blade here.
First up, it is the dagger shape that we're looking for.
You have a base that tapers straight into the point,
and your steel looks solid.
Good job. - Thank you.
- All right, paul, are you ready?
- Yes, sir. - Please present your work.
♪ ♪
- all right. Paul, you went with the cannonball
and there's still a lot of weight to it.
A good idea would be to mark a centerline
and bring these edges to it.
That'll help you thin out some material, more so.
But otherwise, it looks solid
and you still got a lot to work with.
Good job. - Thank you.
♪ ♪
- well, gentlemen, I've gotta say you've all presented
a viable arkansas toothpick for the judges to critique.
But unfortunately, somebody does have to go home today.
The bladesmith leaving the forge is...
Trey.
Your blade didn't make the cut,
and doug's gonna to tell you why.
- Trey, for one who has never made a dagger before,
you came so close.
But the asymmetrical shape of your blade
coupled with the visible delaminations
brings into question
the structural integrity of your blade.
For those reasons we're sending you home.
- I understand. - Well, trey,
you should be very proud of yourself.
But unfortunately, I'm gonna have to ask you, to please
surrender your work and step off the forge floor.
♪ ♪
- I'm leaving here sad because I wanted to make it
all the way through.
But being my first time making something like this,
I'm very happy with it.
Good luck, y'all. - Well done.
- I hope my daughters see if you put your heart and soul
into something and try your best,
the outcome will still be something you can be proud of.
♪ ♪
- gentlemen, congratulations. The three of you guys
are moving forward into round two of the competition,
where you're going to add handles to your blades,
turning them into fully functioning daggers.
In this round you're going to have to add
a coffin-shaped handle and a guard,
and you're gonna need to use a frame handle technique.
At the end of this round, the guys are going
to put them to the test,
checking for strength and durability
in our "tilling the earth" and log chop,
and we're going to check the edge retention
in a leather canteen slice.
Gentlemen, you only have two hours in round two
of the competition, so good luck.
Your time starts now.
♪ ♪
- jay, a framed handle
is something I haven't seen before.
Can you explain to me what that all entails?
- So you make a hidden tang.
You slide the guard up into place, set that,
and you're going to make a frame
that goes around it in that coffin shape.
- All right. There are so many things to do in this round.
Creating a frame handle,
something I've never done before.
Fitting a guard, affixing a handle
and it's a very short amount of time.
I focused first on getting my guard fit up,
then having my frame and welding it together
so that I can treat it
like a regular full-tang construction knife.
- I'm concerned nathan has a considerable warp.
- I start trying to straighten out my blade a little bit.
I try to soften the middle of my blade enough
that I can bend it without snapping it.
- You've got to be very,
very careful heating that center ridgeline
and not having that heat travel up to the edges
and lose your hardness.
- Are you kidding me? It hasn't really changed a whole lot.
I've spent too much time on it already,
so I'm just going to move on and hope for the best.
[bleep].
- So paul is getting straight into his brain.
- At home, I never rush a handle,
but I have to crack this thing out as fast as I can.
♪ ♪
I realize that I didn't leave myself enough
for a good size handle.
That's just not acceptable.
- Oh, shoot.
- Paul had to restart on his frame.
- Having a bad handle would be a problem during testing.
Ehh.
- Bladesmiths, you guys have an hour and 30 minutes
remaining in round two,
- and nathan's got some steel for his frame.
- My plan is to cut the shape of my tang out of a piece
of mild steel, slap it together and make sure everything holds.
Welding.
♪ ♪
feeling pretty good so far.
- Nathan's got his frame welded up.
Now he's back over the band saw
cutting out the profile of his coffin.
- Not as clean as I can make it, but it'll have to do.
- Gentlemen, you have 1 hour remaining.
- At this point, I notice that my guard is loose.
[bleep].
My heart drops.
- I don't think isaac is quite happy
with the fitment of his guard.
- I don't want to go home
because a little piece of brass wiggled loose.
I know that I need to figure something out.
- A guard that's loose will eventually per use
is going to start damaging the handle material.
- As a jeweler, I set stones into precious metals
using a chisel.
You hammer down all the way around the perimeter
and it pushes that metal down
and it grabs on to whatever is inside.
- That brass being soft,
that will compress it down and close up that gap.
- It works like a charm.
I'm really happy with it.
There we go.
- It's time to work on my scales.
I'm looking to see if I can find oak or a nice hard wood.
I see some scales that look nice,
and I think "well, let's give these a try."
crap, did I just break this stupid thing?
The handle material cracked.
Oh, come on.
- He's using reconstituted stone, it's very brittle.
It's not really good for an entire handle.
- This is pointless.
I'm already behind schedule from where I was hoping to be.
♪ ♪
- this is where you start freaking out.
- As I'm looking at the clock, I'm thinking,
"there is no way I'm going to be able to present
a finished blade to the judges."
I am trying to think of something
to make this thing happen.
[grunts]
I need to start over again on this.
- I'm worried about paul. There's still a lot of fit
and finish that needs to be done.
- This is pointless. As I'm looking through everything,
I find some beautiful acrylic.
Let's give these a try.
I have no idea if I'm gonna be able to present
a finished blade or not, but I never quit.
- Bladesmiths, time is running out.
You have 30 minutes remaining.
- Now that I have my scales glued on
and waiting for that set,
I'm gonna focus on getting it sharp.
I decided to do an appleseed edge
so that it can survive being stabbed into rocks
and chopped into a log.
It's gonna be tough.
♪ ♪
- now he's got paper towels taped up on his blade,
so you know he's got an edge right now.
- So everything is looking great.
I know it's sharp and I know it's ready to go,
I still need to shape my coffin handle.
- I mean, that looks like a steak knife handle.
- So as I'm grinding, I realize
I may have removed too much material
and I'm really hoping the judges
are able to hold on tight.
- Gentlemen, you've got three minutes remaining.
- Okay. Okay.
Right now the handle is where it's at.
I can finally start to get an edge on this thing.
So as the clock is ticking down,
I'll be lucky if I can get this thing done
and get an edge on it in time.
- Oh man, he's going at a very aggressive angle.
- There's a lot of steel to be removed.
I mean, the edges were as thick as the border.
- I think my blade will do good in the strength test.
I purposely left a very beefy edge on it.
- He might be thinking if he has more meat on the blade
the stronger that it'll be.
- If you trust your heat treatment,
you don't need the math.
- Meaty but good.
♪ ♪
- five, four, three, two, one.
Gentlemen, turn off your machines.
Put down your tools. This round is over.
- Ahh!
I can't believe I have a nice finished blade.
I never thought I was going to be able
to finish it in time, but I did.
- Bladesmiths, welcome to our strength test.
Our dual strength test is going to be
"tilling the earth"
and then chopping on the log above it.
This is going to test the edge holding ability
and the overall construction of the arkansas toothpick.
Nathan, you're lucky enough to be first.
- Pitter, patter. Let's get at her.
- I like that.
♪ ♪
- I'm definitely worried about the warp of my blade.
If the point of my knife catches a rock the wrong way,
it's going to bend my blade even more,
if not completely snap off.
It could definitely send me home.
I'm on the edge of my seat.
It's just not something you should do
to a knife that you care about.
♪ ♪
- [grunting]
♪ ♪
hey, nathan. It survived. Good job.
Your edge held up pretty well, but a couple issues.
It lost a little bit of the very tip on there.
Nathan, you started with a warp and it's still there.
But overall, you survived. Good job.
- Thank you.
- All right, isaac, are you ready?
- As ready as I will ever be.
- Well, I'm ready now. So let's go.
♪ ♪
- I can't feel anything but my knees shaking.
In that box there's rocks and dirt
and all sorts of abrasive materials
that can wear down an edge, and that terrifies me.
♪ ♪
- [grunting]
♪ ♪
- it made it, isaac. Good job.
I wished the handle was just a little bit bigger,
a little on the spindly side,
but you got the shape of the coffin good.
You can see -- and I can actually do that with my thumb.
So you've lost the edge. It's not a razor anymore.
But overall, not bad at all. Good job.
- Thank you.
- Ready, paul? - Yes, sir.
- All right. Let's do it.
♪ ♪
- after watching the other two weapons be tested,
I know that my blade has to hold up
and pretty much remain almost perfect for me to make it.
♪ ♪
- [grunting]
♪ ♪
- it survived, paul. - [exhales]
- doing this log strike,
you could hear how much heavier this was striking a log,
and instead of a thwack it was more like
an ax hitting something.
But all in all, you survived. Good job.
- Thank you. - Yeah. Sir.
- Bladesmiths, this is the sharpest test,
the water canteen stab and slice.
I'm gonna take your weapon, stab,
and try to slice through these leather water canteens.
Nathan, you're up first. Are you ready for this?
- Yes, sir. - All right. Let's do it.
♪ ♪
[intense music]
♪ ♪
all right, nathan, let's talk about
your arkansas toothpick here.
First up, your tip.
It took damage during the strength test and it's rounded,
and it's pushing the bag all over the place.
So overall, sir, it kinda cuts.
All right. Isaac, it's your turn, sir. Are you ready?
- I'm ready. - All right. Let's do this.
♪ ♪
all right, isaac.
First up, the angle you have, right here, is acute enough
to be able to push through these water canteens.
The edge did take some dulling, but still enough to cut.
Overall, sir, your toothpick will cut.
- Thank you. - All right, paul,
your turn, sir. Are you ready?
- Oh, yeah. - All right. Let's do this.
♪ ♪
- good job.
- All right, paul, let's talk about your arkansas toothpick.
It pierced nicely through both canteens.
But, because your blade is very thick,
the edge holding capability of this is almost lost
because I tried to cut on the way out.
Overall, sir, it will cut.
- [exhales]
- well, gentlemen, all three of your blades
made it through our strength and our sharpness test,
but as you know only two of you are moving forward
into the third round of this competition.
The bladesmith leaving the forge is...
♪ ♪
nathan.
Unfortunately, your blade just didn't make the cut,
and dave baker is going to tell you why.
- Nathan, I appreciate the work you put in on that.
I think your grinds looked great.
But the problem was you had a warp
that you just couldn't get out, as well as the fact
that you lost the tip in that strength test.
Those two things combined just made a weapon
that was ineffective.
That's why we're letting you go.
- I understand. - Well, nathan,
you fought really hard
in the first two rounds of competition,
but unfortunately I'm going to have to ask you
to please step off the forge floor.
♪ ♪
- [sighs]
I'm not gonna pretend that I'm not disappointed,
but I'm definitely leaving here a better bladesmith
than when I arrived,
and when I get home I'm going to make a couple more canister
damascus arkansas toothpicks.
- Well, paul, isaac, congratulations.
You are both moving forward to round three of our competition.
Now, you guys are heading back to your home forges to work
on yet another iconic weapon from the civil war era,
and that weapon is...
Ulysses grant's donelson sword.
- The donelson sword is a commemorative blade
ordered to general ulysses s. Grant
for his victory at fort donelson in February of 1862.
One of the first major union victories of the civil war.
The weapon features a highly ornate handle
and an engraved blade
based on the popular 1860's officer's sword.
After general grant's death, his wife donated the sword
to the smithsonian institute in 1886,
and it remains under their care to this day.
- As you can see this is a very intricate and detailed blade,
and when you come back with your swords
I want to see as much detail as this one here.
Your blade length needs to measure
between 29 and 31 inches.
Your blades need to be double edged.
You need to have an upswept rear quillon clamshell
guard that faces toward the tip, a knuckle-bow,
and top it all off with a urn-shaped pommel.
- I'm really excited to recreate
one of history's greatest weapons.
I've never made anything quite like this before
with all the intricate details and parts.
I'm really intimidated by what could be in store
for me in this final round.
- You have four days to work on your swords.
Good luck. See you then. - [exhales]
♪ ♪
- today I need to get started on forging and hopefully heat
treating general grant's donelson sword.
That is one skinny sword.
A build like this is pretty far out of my comfort zone.
I've made a grand total of two swords in my life
and I know that I'm going
to have to push myself to the brink.
It's getting there. It's time to quench it.
♪ ♪
[grunts] see, it's only going to be hard to right there.
That space between the tang and the blade is not hardened.
See the difference in tone? My quench tank was too short.
So I'm going to requench my blade
using a deeper quench tank
so that I could quench it all the way down.
If those judges decide to do a bend test on my sword,
that soft area could take a bend
and not spring back to true, and that's a big issue.
[grunts]
hopefully it came out hard this time.
That's hard. That's hard. Oh, I feel so much better.
♪ ♪
- we're here back in lebanon, new jersey,
to make this amazing weapon.
All right. Here we go. This is the real mccoy now.
So now that I'm back at my home forge,
I don't have any presses, I don't have a power hammer.
The only thing I have is my hand
and now it's just time to hammer, hammer, hammer.
My arm feels like jelly, but there ain't no quitting.
I've got to keep going.
My right power hammer is exhausted.
Time to switch to my left power hammer.
I'm not nearly as far along as I was hoping to be,
but I'm actually happy the way the steel is coming out.
I guess that's about it for today.
♪ ♪
- so today I'm feeling really good
about the point that I got to.
Yeah. That's got a nice spring to it.
Today I hope to be able to have the basic structure
of my handle completed.
I need the rear-facing quillon and the two clamshell guards
and the knuckle-bow.
It's going to be something like that.
So now that I have the components complete,
I can move on to welding them together.
I'm really happy with how it's looking.
That's so cool.
♪ ♪
- day three, I got my puppy for support,
can't wait to get started.
Yesterday, got the blade just where I wanted it
and I forged that thing out right to specs.
Boo ya! So we're getting close to quench time.
It's a little tricky for me
because I've never done a blade this thin before.
I'm nervous as hell-- two whole days
hammering this sword out.
If something goes wrong with the quench,
there is no time to do that again.
Here we go.
♪ ♪
don't feel any tings or pings or anything.
I pull it out and I'm so happy.
It looks straight. It looks perfect.
♪ ♪
- so yesterday I was able to get
all of my handle components assembled.
It turned out really well.
And now I need to beautify it.
It's really ornate and complex.
I cut in the channels for my turquoise and amber inlay,
and finally I moved on
to masking the entire blade with nail polish
so that I can acid etch those designs into the blade.
There we go. Cool beans.
I've worked really hard up to this point
and now I'm so happy with my general grant's donelson sword.
- Day four, I'm absolutely exhausted.
So now I'm going to do a little bit of work on the clamshell,
try to make it look as pretty as I can as quick as I can,
and then it's going to be shaping the handle
into a comfortable handle.
Almost. So I finally got all the pieces
to fit on the tang.
All right.
This entire experience has been more fun
than I ever imagined it would be.
The blade is a little bit chunky, but "it will keal."
- isaac, paul, welcome back to the forge.
You guys had four days to work on your versions
of the general grant donelson sword.
But, before we get to the testing,
I want to hear about your build.
Paul, how did it go for you?
♪ ♪
- I took a piece of 5160 and spent two days hammering it
into the exact shape that it is now,
and all the components were filed by hand.
- It looks great. Isaac, how did it go for you?
♪ ♪
- I also used 5160.
I have some decorative acid etching on the blade
and some turquoise and amber inlay into the hilt.
- You did a phenomenal job. Gentlemen,
this is not only about beauty, this is about strength.
It's about sharpness. It's about durability.
One of you guys are going to be leaving here the champion
and we only know one way to find that out.
Up first, the keal. Doug?
♪ ♪
- bladesmiths, welcome to the keal test.
The sword was made to be a dueling-type of weapon,
so I'm going to try to deliver the same light slashes
and thrusts for this ballistics dummy.
Paul, are you ready for this?
- Oh, yes, sir. - All right. Let's do this.
♪ ♪
- I hope my blade survives because it is has been my dream
to hear doug say, "it will keal."
[intense music]
♪ ♪
- all right, paul, let's talk about your version
of general grant's donelson sword.
The weight on this blade is not that of a dueling sword
because it requires a little bit more
than just wrist movement,
but it is a great cutting sword.
Your edges are sharp.
Even with the harassing cuts you can see there,
it cut deeply.
And more importantly, sir, it will keal.
Isaac, your turn, sir. Are you ready for this?
- I guess. - Okay. [laughs]
- I'm feeling really nervous about the strength of my blade.
I know it's really thin and it's really flexible
and it's really light and fast,
but is it strong enough?
Any number of things could go wrong.
[intense music]
♪ ♪
- all right. Isaac, let's talk about your weapon here.
What I like about it is the time you took
to put these details
that we were asking for on your sword.
Everything cut was deep and not a lot of power is required
when you're swinging something so light.
But on probably hitting the bone your blade
did take a slight bend.
But overall, sir, your weapon will keal.
- Thank you.
♪ ♪
- paul, isaac,
you know what time it is. Time for the strength test,
a fan favorite, the cringeworthy flex test.
And we're going to flex those blades to 35 degrees
in either direction. If you're still holding true,
we're going to go to 45 degrees in either direction.
Paul, are you ready for this?
- Not really. But go ahead and bend away.
- I'm going to.
♪ ♪
- so the bend test really scares me.
I've never made a blade so thin
and delicate that needed to bend in each direction.
My greatest fear is that it will actually snap.
♪ ♪
- oh, my--
♪ ♪
- [exhales]
♪ ♪
- [grunting]
- ohh!
♪ ♪
- so, paul, as far
as the construction of your blade goes,
the handle is comfortable.
We saw how well the sword cuts.
You did a good job, but if you look in to that blade,
you can actually see a dark spot
on both sides of the blade,
and whether that's a flaw that you picked up
in the forging process or a flaw in the steel,
I have no way of really telling right now.
The grain structure on this looks fine.
But having shattered, having it pop like that,
that's a big issue. - Mm-hmm.
♪ ♪
- well, paul, we absolutely hate to see that.
You put a lot of work into your blade.
You made it past the 35 on both sides,
but you did break on the way to 45.
But you're not out of the fight yet.
Isaac, you've got to survive both of the 35-degree turns,
as well as the official ruling of 40 degrees
towards the south. - [sighs]
my heart is in my throat.
This is literally make or break.
[tense music]
♪ ♪
[exhales]
- congratulations, man. - Thanks.
♪ ♪
- paul, I want to say thank you for your hard work.
You have what it takes to fight in this forge.
Unfortunately, I'm going to have to ask you
to please step off the forge floor.
- Thank you, gentlemen. It was an honor.
- Great job.
- Of course, I'm disappointed that I didn't win,
but I am very proud of the blade that I made,
and I had the best time.
This was such a good experience,
and it was an honor to compete against such a good competitor.
♪ ♪
- isaac, we asked you to build general grant's donelson sword.
You performed phenomenally and built us something
that is not only functional,
but absolutely beautiful and stunning to look at.
You are the "forged in fire" champion,
and you just earned yourself a check for $10,000.
Congratulations.
- I'm the "forged in fire" champion, baby! Whoo!
[applause]
- how do you feel? - Cloud nine.
I'm feeling so good.
- That's a remarkable piece of work,
and you should be incredibly proud of it.
- Thank you.
There's just too many feelings going through my head
and my heart to really process what's all happening right now.
I can't believe it. I'm feeling so good.
♪ ♪