[dramatic music]
- Here in The Forge, we put hundreds
of smiths to the test.
- It's hot in here.
- But only a select few have proven themselves
time and time again, remaining undefeated.
♪
Now three of our most decorated champions
will put their perfect records on the line
and go head-to-head against previous
"Forged in Fire" winners
in some of the most heated battles yet.
- This is a living nightmare.
- Everything's [bleep] [bleep] right now,
if you know what I'm saying.
- Will anyone have what it takes to finally...
[metal clanging] Oh!
Beat the Unbeaten?
♪
[dramatic music]
- My name is John Wigger, and I'm 33 years old.
I first competed in season 5,
and I was the champion of the bardiche.
♪
Everybody I went against last time,
it was their first time in The Forge.
Now, everybody I'm gonna be competing against this time
has done it, and they've been champions.
So no one's lost yet.
Someone's gotta lose,
and I know it's not gonna be me.
♪
- My name is Eric Finch.
I'm 22 years old.
I competed on season 9
and became a "Forged in Fire" champion
on the episode "Fastest Blade in the West,"
and I made the Vaquero machete.
During the last competition, I made a Western Bowie knife
that was complimented as the best replicated knife
they'd ever seen on the show.
So standards are set high.
I'm hopefully gonna come out here
and create something best they've ever seen again.
♪
- Well, bladesmiths, champions, gentlemen,
welcome back to The Forge.
Now, you guys know how this goes.
You're here to compete and show your skills
in an intense and unique bladesmithing competition.
Now, this time, it's gonna consist of two rounds,
the first of which will be
the two of you going head-to-head
in a straight five-hour round bladesmithing competition
where you're gonna build a weapon from start to finish.
Now, when that round is complete,
the judges are gonna step in, testing your blades
and ultimately deciding which one of you
has impressed them the most and would be
moving into the second round of competition.
Now, your second round competitor
will be one of our Titans of The Forge,
a bladesmith who has been unbeaten
in this competition with multiple wins.
All right, gentlemen, let's talk about the first round.
For this first round, we're doing a throwback
to one of our favorite challenges.
This is a challenge that we call Crazy Crates.
Now, the good news here is that you guys get to build
whatever blade you want.
The bad news is, when the clock starts,
you guys are gonna run up and choose
one of these crates, not knowing
what the challenge is inside.
There will be steel and the technique
that you must use to build your signature blade.
Now, if you choose a crate that you're not comfortable with,
you will have the option to come back up
and grab another crate.
But that's your backup steel,
and you're stuck with that method.
So I highly recommend you at least give
the first crate a shot.
- It's intimidating not knowing
what you're gonna have to make,
or especially what you're gonna have to make
out of a certain material.
I don't know what's in there.
I don't know what I'm gonna get,
so it's definitely very, very scary.
- Now, gentlemen, when the five hours is up,
like I said, the judges are gonna step in.
They're gonna test your blades,
first for strength and durability
in a copper tube chop, and then check
your edge retention in a playing card slice.
♪
Now, gentlemen, this is a very difficult challenge.
And you've only got five hours on the clock, so good luck,
because your time starts now.
[rock music]
Here we go, off to the races.
These guys have to come up,
pick one of these mystery crates,
and attempt to build a blade with what's inside.
- [laughs]
- I'm going with this guy.
Feeling lucky? - Yeah.
- "What's in the box?"
♪
- Oh, what'd he get, what'd he get, what'd he get?
- Twisted stack Damascus. - Ooh.
- Twisted stack.
- Eric got the twisted stack Damascus.
- Oh, man.
- That's the toughest one out there.
- Nickel Go Mai.
- Oh, yeah, easy peasy.
- So we got five different layers,
alternating and forge weld together.
- Ooh, you lucky dog.
- Hey, let's do it.
[laughter]
- John's got nickel Go Mai.
Eric's got the twisted stack Damascus.
As of right now, as it stands, you guys think
John's got the harder one, or Eric?
- I think Eric's definitely got the harder one
because Eric has to make Damascus, and then cut it,
twist it, restack it.
And then he can start making his blade.
And John has one forge weld, and Eric at least has two.
- I haven't ever really done nickel Go Mai.
But out of all the other things that it could have been,
I'm pretty comfortable with what I got.
I have worked with a little bit of nickel in the past.
But I kind of make what the people want at home,
and not a lot of people ask for nickel in their knives.
- The last time John was here, he did a cold forge outside,
no power tools, right? - Yeah.
Yeah, it was really, really hot.
Plus, they were trying to reduce
a huge piece of steel by hand. - Yeah.
- My biggest concern with this technique
is I'm not 100% sure what's gonna happen
when I forge weld this together.
- Now, with the Go Mai, it's a good idea
to do an anatmospheric weld to close everything off
so you don't have any runoff of that nickel
when you're heating it up.
- I don't think he is.
Now, what can happen if he doesn't
weld all the way around?
- You might get delaminations.
- Yeah, I've seen it kind of pop out
when on Big Blu when someone starts their weld.
- Last time I was at the forge,
I was the young guy going against the old guys,
and now I'm the old guy going against the young guy.
So let's see if I can come out the winner again.
Luckily, I brought my own power hammer.
- For some reason, I feel like I know John intimately.
- [laughs]
- You bardiche will KEAL.
Oh, it will KEAL!
[laughter]
- You know him very intimately.
- 95.
I've never done stacked twist Damascus before.
Making any type of Damascus is difficult.
You're always running the risk of getting delams
or, you know, a piece falling off.
Twisted Damascus, because of how many steps go into it,
and twisting it, then having to re-forge weld it
and bring it all back together, it's just multiplying
your chances for error.
- It is a very large difference
between the amount of steel these guys have.
- Yep.
- Using all the metal I was given
would have made way too big of a billet at once.
So I'm deciding to take it in half
and do two separate billets, and then combine them
later down the road.
- So Eric decided to make two separate stacks.
So he's gonna be working two billets at the same time.
- That's smart because you can draw one out,
draw the other one out.
And you know, it doesn't cost you any more time.
- All right, here we go.
Both our smiths have their billets in the fire.
♪
- As my billet's heating, I'm looking for handle material
'cause you only have a certain amount of time
to spend on each object.
- John's already mixing up some glue.
Is he doing his own slab?
- Yeah, he had a couple little slabs of G-10 in his hand.
- That's good.
So he's also working on his handle material.
- I ended up choosing Micarta because the last time
I was on the show, I tried to use some wood.
Oh, no!
It cracked.
And every time I put it in the drill press, it just broke.
Micarta is super strong and durable,
and I don't want to deal with any of those
problems this time.
♪
- Eric, with that massive pile of steel he cleaned up,
first out of the fire.
He's using the press like a power hammer.
- Oh, I do it all the time. - [laughs] So awesome.
- Yeah, yeah.
- So I have to forge out a billet of Damascus,
cut in half, then twist each one and then take them
and stack them on top of each other
to forge my blade out of.
I gotta be really careful here because if I screw this up,
I'm gonna have to go get another crate.
- All right, Eric with the second billet, same deal,
real quick, gentle presses, parallel to the dies.
- I'm taking a big risk with doing this.
And if this fails, I have to go get another crate,
and I have no idea what's gonna be in it.
But it's "Forged in Fire."
♪
- While my billet's heating,
I'm gonna start designing my blade
and figure out the steps I'm gonna take to finish that.
I end up choosing not to double up my CRV core.
I was worried that the center may be too thick,
and you wouldn't get a good contrast in the nickel
and the other metals.
I'm a little worried because I'm not
gonna have very much material at the end of this.
♪
- What the hell is dribbling?
- It's gotta be in the nickel. - I know.
- He's cooked that nickel.
He left it in there so long it just dropped out.
- It seems like that anatmospheric weld
would probably have been a very good idea.
- He's gonna have big voids.
- I don't even think he noticed it.
- Start forging out the billet, and I'm getting
a little worried that I may not have enough material.
If I don't have enough material,
what I'll probably have to do is squeeze down
on the sides of the blade and draw it out.
But I'm worried about doing that also,
because that's what causes delam.
So I'm just going to forge it out as far as I can
and keep a good thickness that
I'm comfortable with to profile later.
♪
- All right, champs, you guys are an hour in.
You've got four hours left.
- Now that my final two pieces of twisted Damascus
are drawn together and drawn out,
I have to twist each one.
♪
Going into a twist, you risk having
your end layers start pulling apart.
So I'm making sure to clamp down in the vise
my end layers, and I twist it slowly.
- When you're twisting, you want to keep
a nice, even pressure on it
because those shocks often find the weakest link
and then tear it.
- This is definitely tougher than
I thought it was gonna be.
- That's a very thick billet to be twisting.
- Yeah, he's gonna be exhausted here in a second
trying to twist this.
♪
- Hey, use the-- use the press to squeeze it,
and then you can spin it.
- We'll give it a try.
You know what? We'll give it a try.
♪
The press is so heavy that it allows me
to twist it with no problem.
- John just talked to Eric,
and I think he was telling him, hey, buddy,
we got a press right there, use that.
- So now that I have my two pieces of twisted Damascus,
clean, tack up the ends,
and get it right back in the forge.
♪
- John's already profiling a blade.
I can see the tang and the shape of the blade.
- I noticed when I'm forging this billet,
when I'm trying to forge on the corners of it,
it's wanting to split apart a little bit.
- I think he's got a giant delam.
- [bleep].
So I'm a little worried.
- At this point, if John has to start over,
he better hope that one of those boxes is monosteel.
- There's no time for this.
I have to make this blade work.
Oh, man.
- So we're 90 minutes in.
Right now, John's almost got a billet
that is the length of the blade he needs.
He still needs the tang.
He still needs the tip.
- I think he's got a giant delam.
- Oh, man.
So I'm a little worried.
But my other side of my billet looks good.
I think I'm gonna make that the top of my knife
and get a new edge.
The welds look pretty good, and I think
I'm gonna be okay with that.
- All right, so John's got this delamination,
but it's kind of isolated on one side of the billet.
And it seems like he's come up with a plan to get past that.
He's just flipping it around
and utilizing that as his tang.
- There you go.
- I'm able to move my delam to the tang.
But then I look down the spine and I see a few more delams.
[bleep]. - Oh, no.
He's got a delamination that looks like a crack
all the way down the spine of his blade.
- I do not have time to start this all over.
So I have to work with what I got.
I look at my blade edge, and there is no delams.
I'm just gonna run a bead of weld
all the way down the spine of it
in any spot there's a delam.
And then I know I can grind that off.
- All right, gentlemen, you guys have three hours left.
- Now that my twisted pieces are back up to temperature,
I gotta get them welded up.
If this weld fails, there's a chance
I might have to restart my billet.
- He needs to take his time
and be patient with this forge weld.
- Yep. Nice.
I'm liking what I see.
- Tiny, couple touches.
- Nice. - Done.
- Yep.
- Dude, he is doing it by the book.
- I love it.
I love what I'm seeing.
- I have a solid billet, and now I'm ready
to start drawing this out.
♪
- I would like to see these blades quenched.
2 1/2 hours left.
- Yep.
- I get the delams worked out.
I get my profile worked in.
And everything's to parameters, thank God.
I'm just praying this quench goes well.
♪
- Whoa.
- All right, he's quenching.
- Oh, a little hot.
- All right.
- It wasn't screaming hot. It was just hot.
- No. - Whoo!
She's hard.
It's skating like Nancy Kerrigan.
[laughs]
Whoo, whoo! Pretty sweet.
- For any blade, going into the quench
is definitely the most make or break moment.
You risk cracking, twisting, warping,
especially after doing a multi-stack twist
Damascus billet.
- All right, now Eric is in the oil.
This is absolutely insane.
After all that effort, Eric is now caught up with John.
- It's straight.
I don't see any cracks.
I see no warping.
And man, it feels good because I think
I'm gonna get this blade done.
[sighing] Oh.
- All right, guys, you got 90 minutes left
to finish your work.
- I'm feeling really good right now.
I'm grinding the profile,
and everything looks pretty tight.
So now I'm gonna work on making the handle feel good.
Because I've seen people go home just because
of the handle, if it's got hot spots in it,
if it slides up and down their hand.
So I'm gonna try to make it kind of tight in my hands
so I know it's good for everybody.
Eric's got his blade.
It looks great.
So I'm a little worried about that at the moment.
♪
- Now that my blade is quenched,
it feels a little heavier than what I'd like.
So I'm gonna add a big fuller on the front half,
removing some of that weight to help
bring it back a little bit.
For one, it's gonna lighten up the blade.
But it's also gonna hopefully give me an advantage
in the card slice.
Because instead of the cards having to go the whole way up
to a thick edge, they only go up halfway,
enter into the fuller, and hopefully make it
a lot better of a slicer.
- You know, Eric's blade is looking beautiful.
- It really is. - It's got a nice fuller to it.
- He's just kind of got it running almost down
the middle, which is neat because
it should expose more of the pattern.
- John, Eric, guys, 30 minutes left.
- With not much time left, I need to grind down now
so you're able to see the nickel
and the different kinds of metal.
- Looking at John's blade, you can see the nickel
very close to the edge.
Is there a way to bring that up in the grind?
- Yeah, you just need a very, very acute grind,
and it'll come up.
- Yeah, which has its own problems
in the test that we're doing.
As I'm grinding, I see there's another delam.
[bleep].
It's away from the edge.
I know it's the nickel.
It's too late in the competition
to try to do anything to the delam.
If I do that, I'm gonna ruin my heat treat,
my temper, and all that.
So there's really no reason to risk
messing up my blade edge,
'cause that's what's most important.
So I'm gonna try to hide it.
- John put nail polish on his blade.
He followed the nickel with nail polish
and made, like, a secondary shiny bit.
- Camouflage.
♪
- So I want my handle on my blade to be
pretty thick and comfortable.
These judges are upping the game
for this champions competition.
I know they're expecting a lot out of us.
I think the judges are gonna be really impressed with
what I got done.
- That's a sweet-looking blade.
- I'm really relieved to see a really cool-looking pattern
and no signs of any delams or cracking
or any welds in my blade.
All that's left to do is sharpen.
♪
- 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
Bladesmiths, put down your tools.
This round is over.
- It was a stressful five hours,
but I got everything done.
I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.
[dramatic music]
- All right, gentlemen,
it's time for our strength test,
the copper pipe chop.
John, your nickel Go Mai is up first.
You ready for this? - Do what you gotta do.
No turning back now.
- All right.
♪
- I know going into this pipe chop,
I can't really afford to take any damage
because I don't know if Eric's gonna be taking any damage.
And I think that could be the decision of who wins.
♪
- [grunts]
[rock music]
[grunting]
♪
- That'll be enough of that.
- Yeah, that was brutal.
[dramatic music]
- All right, John, in your billet,
there are some delaminations.
I think you dealt with them really well.
For competition, you got that sealed up in the back.
Didn't open up, didn't change at all,
so good for you on that.
Handle for me is just a hair small.
It would have been nice to have a little more handle
with this much blade doing impact testing like this.
But the main thing, your edge--
that thing is just as sharp as when I started.
Nicely done.
- Thank you, sir.
- All right, Eric, you ready to go?
- Let's do it. - Okay.
♪
- It's very intimidating looking at these pipes, man.
Copper is softer than steel, but it's still a metal.
It's not something a blade should naturally
get put up against.
♪
I'm just hoping that it survives it.
♪
- Copper is not something a blade should
naturally get put up against.
I'm just hoping that it survives it.
♪
[rock music]
♪
- [grunting]
♪
[grunts]
- Oy.
- [laughs]
- [sighs]
- All right, Eric, right off, that is a beautiful knife.
It's honestly one of the best-looking
five-hour knives I have ever seen,
so good on you for that.
Your handle construction, that bird's head
back here gives it a lot of retention.
As far as the edge of your blade goes,
sharp as it can be.
A beautiful knife, it's got a great shape
and a wonderful feel.
Well done. - Thank you.
[dramatic music]
- All right, champions, this is the sharpness test,
the playing card slice.
John, you're up first. You ready for this?
- Do what you do. - All right, let's do this.
♪
All right, John, let's talk about your blade.
As I was cutting, I could definitely feel
that it's a very sharp blade, except some of the edges
over here weren't as sharp as the others,
because you could see, it just tore the cards
instead of cutting cleanly.
Around here, there's a little indentation in that.
It might have been the reason why
it didn't cut through some of the cards.
But overall, it will cut.
- Thank you.
- All right, Eric, your turn, so are you ready?
- Do what you gotta do.
- Let's do this.
♪
- Holy smokes.
- Oh, my God.
- All right, Eric, let's talk about
your store-bought knife right here.
- [laughs]
- It is just exquisitely made.
Good job on that.
Now, your edge, I guess you were all in,
'cause as you can see, it cut all the way through.
Overall, your knife, it will cut.
- Thank you.
♪
- Gentlemen, before we get to the hard part,
I gotta commend both of you.
That was an extremely difficult challenge,
and you both brought us great blades.
But as you know, in this competition,
only one of you can join us in the second round
to go against our Titan.
The bladesmith leaving The Forge is...
♪
John.
Sorry, man, but you missed out
by just this much.
And Dave's gonna tell you why.
- Hey, John, you fought a great fight.
But what this came down to is your edge geometry.
It was great for a strength test,
but not quite as good for that card cut.
Well, those are the reasons we're letting you go.
- So are you telling me
that I did this for nothing?
[laughter]
- That's the sweetest thing anybody's ever done for me.
[laughter]
Well, John, before you step off The Forge floor,
I would love a hug.
[laughter]
- Love you, man.
- Great job. - Good job, John.
- Thank you.
I knew it could come down to the fit and finish,
and it did.
I still feel comfortable with the knife
I made in the time given.
Since Eric's beat me now,
I'm absolutely rooting for him
in this next round.
♪
- Well, Eric, congratulations, man,
and welcome to the final round
of this Beat the Unbeaten competition.
Now, it's about to get a whole lot harder.
Because in order to take home your second champion title
and a check for $10,000,
you're going to have to go up against a Titan,
somebody with one of the highest winning records
we've ever seen in this competition.
It'll either be Gladiator of The Forge Jesse Hu,
Super Champ Collin Sage,
or our very own judge, Ben Abbott.
You ready to find out who you're going against?
- Bring it on. - All right, Eric.
You are gonna have to fight against this guy.
[dramatic music]
♪
Gladiator of The Forge Jesse Hu.
- [laughs]
- Jesse, welcome back.
- My name is Jesse Hu.
I had to run the gauntlet
in the Gladiators of The Forge competition,
where I had to face eight smiths.
♪
- Jesse, you are unstoppable.
- Honestly, to this day, I still don't know
how I managed to get through all eight.
And so I'm back in The Forge
because if I have the title of unbeaten,
and it's never tested,
that title is meaningless.
♪
- So gentlemen, here's how this second round is gonna go.
In just a moment, Eric, you've got two choices to make.
I'm gonna open up the "Forged in Fire" vault,
give you access to all the weapons
that were built by previous champions,
and select one that you want to build against Jesse.
And not only that, you get to choose the technique as well.
♪
So without further ado, Eric,
are you ready to pick your weapon?
- Let's do it. - All right.
Let's get this vault open.
♪
Eric, come choose your weapon.
- You know, I want to choose something that's gonna
be a challenge for both of us.
But I don't want it to be something
that I'm gonna end up biting off more than I can chew
and screw myself over in the end.
So I think I'm gonna look for something that is
more of a one-edge knife.
- Ooh.
What do we have here?
♪
All right, Eric, you chose the Kachin dao.
♪
The Kachin dao was the weapon of choice
for one of the most feared headhunting tribes
in the world, the Kachin of Myanmar.
Known for their deadly fighting skills,
these fearsome warriors wielded
this single-edged broadsword
with a widened square tip to chop,
slice, and decapitate anyone unlucky enough
to cross their path.
This deadly weapon has also taken down
smiths in the "Forged in Fire" arena,
where, back in season 4, one smith's loose handle
put that smith on the chopping block.
Gentlemen, in order to have your weapons tested,
you will have to follow some very specific parameters.
So listen closely.
Your single-edged straight blade will
have to measure between 20 and 22 inches.
Now, that blade will have to have a spatulated tip.
Moving down into the hilt,
it needs to have a swelled pommel.
♪
- I've never seen the Kachin dao in my life.
I didn't know it existed.
It looks like a mix between
a pirate's cutlass and a competition chopper.
But I could be severely underestimating
what I have to make.
♪
- Now, there is another decision to make.
Eric, because you came out on top of round one,
you get to choose whatever technique you want.
So what are you thinking?
- He can obviously pick something
that could be detrimental to me.
I have no say in anything.
And he knows my work.
And that is the terrifying part.
- How about we go with some...
♪
- Eric, because you came out on top of round one,
you get to choose whatever technique you want.
So what are you thinking?
♪
- How about we go with some...
♪
Damascus San Mai.
- Damascus San Mai, that's a great choice.
Jesse, how do you feel about that?
- [laughs] - Little iffy?
It sounds like you made an excellent choice, Eric.
- [laughs] - All right, gentlemen,
this challenge will only consist of eight hours.
So without further ado, gentlemen, good luck,
because your eight hours starts now.
♪
- Whoo! - All right, here we go.
We've got Damascus San Mai
with a fairly straightforward weapon.
It looks like a machete.
- That's basically what these are.
So it needs to be a light, fast weapon.
- I've known Jesse for a few years now.
I've seen his work. I know what he can do.
It's extremely impressive.
I know he's gonna do the best he can.
But I gotta stay focused on what I'm working on.
♪
Similar to the last challenge,
I decided to go with two stacks.
Doing two stacks allows me to work on two different billets
at the same time, so I'm not wasting time
waiting for the one to heat up.
I'll take those two stacks, forge weld them together.
I'm gonna turn that into my core,
jacket 80CrV2 around it,
and I'll forge my blade from that.
- You know, this is gonna be exciting,
only because we just saw Eric submit a beautiful blade,
one that is worthy of going up against Jesse,
who's won eight times already. - Yep.
♪
- Winning "Forged in Fire,"
it changed my life a pretty drastic amount.
People on the internet are like,
how'd you get such a nice job at such a young age?
Is it Daddy's money?
I'm just like, no, I just--
I won "Forged in Fire."
Winning again would confirm
that those eight wins weren't a fluke.
- So Jesse's got 24 layers
of 1095 and 15N20 back at the welder.
- Good. - Awesome.
- I'm excited.
Jesse has shown us some very intricate designs
in some of the past Gladiator competitions.
- My blade looks menacing.
It looks terrifyingly sharp.
The grind lines are pretty much perfect.
- The look of this is sweet.
The scale is right on.
Nicely done.
- This weapon looks fairly unassuming,
so I have to find a way to make mine pop.
So I'm gonna do a twist Damascus San Mai.
I went for one singular bar, which I could twist in one go,
cut it in half, and then just slap it onto an 80CrV2 core.
♪
Whoo-hoo.
♪
- Eric's on the press with his first billet.
So fast.
That was three seconds on the press.
- On my first heat, I want to make sure
I do nice, gentle taps, just making sure
to set those welds and not overdoing it
where it's gonna pull the billet apart.
- Is there some kind of logic
behind Eric doing such quick passes through the press?
- It does two things. First, you're not cooling
your billet as much for each push.
And second, you're not squeezing as much in each push
and risking delamination.
- Gotta get those welds set.
It's now time to start drawing these billets out.
♪
- Jesse right behind him
with a much larger piece of Damascus,
setting his weld for the first time.
- I make sure my temperatures are screaming hot.
And I do fairly light presses.
And I think it set together pretty well.
So I start drawing it out.
♪
- Now, we've seen Jesse compete before.
He's quick. But he hasn't seen Eric,
and Eric's moves at just as fast a pace.
- Perfect.
- Champs, one hour has elapsed.
You've got seven hours remaining.
- So now that my 12-layer billets are drawn out,
I'm gonna take them over to the chop saw,
cut them in half,
giving me four pieces of 12 layers
that I'm gonna clean up, restack,
and forge weld into a 48-layer billet.
This is gonna become my core piece of steel
for my Damascus San Mai.
♪
- Eric is taking that second billet onto the press now.
It's forge welded together.
Again, going with those really small, easy taps.
- Everything looks good so I think
I'm gonna get this blade done.
♪
- I get my billet drawn out to around an inch by an inch.
And then I immediately go straight to my twist.
One of the reasons I chose twist Damascus
was because I did it in the past,
but I did it very poorly.
♪
Oh, wow.
Okay.
I want to prove to myself and the world
that I can do it better.
And it'll look cool.
[grunts]
- Jesse's decided to go with twisted Damascus.
He took that billet and did about ten full rotations.
- Jesse is going above and beyond.
- Perfect.
It's golden.
Like, I feel good about it.
- What's going on over there, buddy?
- You're way ahead.
- Me?
I see you're getting twisty over there.
♪
So I make sure to draw out my 48-layer billet
as wide as the 80CrV2.
That way, all I have to do is clean up my Damascus,
and I can clad the 80CrV2 on the outside.
♪
- Not a fan.
With the hardcore stuff that we throw these swords against,
I would have that 80CrV2 as a core no matter what.
- 100%. - No question.
- It's always gonna be a tougher steel.
- Of all the forge welds I've done,
this is the most important one
because this is what makes it San Mai.
And if it fails, I don't have Damascus San Mai.
♪
I have a solid billet, and now I'm ready to start
drawing this out into my Kachin dao.
All right.
- Guys, we're halfway through.
You got four hours left.
♪
- Now that my Damascus San Mai, it's all fit together,
I can start working on the shape.
The example blade has a much more gradual curve.
So I take it to the anvil, and I begin
drawing out the material on the spine
and beveling it a little bit to give it that nice curve.
- So based on Jesse's swings right now,
I think he's getting ready to quench.
- Once I get the blade to shape,
it's time for the heat treat.
♪
- Whoa!
Jesse's got his blade quenched.
- Oh, [bleep].
Perfect, a warp.
I notice the warp.
And it's actually pretty bad.
- Uh-oh.
- It's kicking to the right quite a bit.
- Jesse, right now, has a couple of seconds
to try to get a little bit of that warp out of the blade.
And that's exactly what he's doing.
♪
We've seen plenty of smiths break their blades
in jigs like this.
- Better be careful.
♪
- Oh! - Oh!
Somebody snapped a tang!
♪
Oh!
Robert just snapped his blade.
If this thing were to fall apart now,
that might as well be me handing in my unbeaten title.
♪
- So we're halfway through our Beat the Unbeaten competition.
We've got our two smiths, Eric going up against
our unbeaten champ, Gladiator Jesse Hu.
Jesse over here has got a warp to the right.
If this thing were to fall apart now,
that might as well be me handing in my unbeaten title.
♪
No matter how much each turn of the vise scares me,
I have to get this warp out.
♪
It's workable now.
I get it most of the way out,
but it's still not perfectly straight.
But I have enough meat on my blade
to where I can grind it straight.
I'm fine with it.
♪
- Now that I've got my blade roughly forged out,
it's time to get over to the grinder and start grinding it.
♪
[bleep]. I got a little surface delam up there.
- Seems like Eric does have a little bit of a delam
toward the tip of his blade.
- He's gotta be very careful with that.
- I'm gonna weld it just in case.
I don't know how deep this delam runs,
so I'm gonna take it over to the welder
and weld over it just to secure it
and make sure it doesn't become an issue.
The last thing I need is that delamination
opening up any more.
Let's go. Let's go.
♪
- Jesse's going for an integral bolster.
- That's cool, some extra embellishment,
a little harder process. - Yeah.
- The example blade doesn't have an integral bolster.
But they're cool and hard to execute.
I think it would add a lot to the piece.
♪
- So this is the part right now,
it's difficult to do in this kind of competition,
is make that nice, flat transition
from handle to bolster.
- I'm gonna put a brass spacer there
because I think it'll look cool.
And I managed to get
the back of the bolster fit up to that brass
pretty much perfectly.
And now that that's all fit together,
I can start working on the wood and the pommel.
♪
- It's time to get my blade into the quench.
- Look at that. Look at that middle.
- Wow, that is hot. - Look at that middle.
♪
- Oh, my God.
- That was all over the place.
- I did not expect a quench color like that from Eric.
- Pretty good.
It's straight, and I am so relieved.
- Eric's really happy with how his blade came out,
but he's not questioning that quench at all.
That kind of heat, the chance of the blade being brittle,
maybe taking some serious damage
during the strength test, are probably pretty high.
♪
- At this point, I'm at a crossroads.
It's the time where I have to determine
what my final mechanical connection
is gonna be for my handle.
The choices are either peen it or weld it.
And I feel like by peening it, it would take long enough
to where the heat can travel through the tang.
But if I were to weld it, I would make a smaller
pool of heat, and I can just immediately cool it
because that weld bead is all mild steel.
Welding!
- Is Jesse gonna weld his butt cap on?
- Yep.
- I'd do it.
I don't think it's a terrible idea.
- There's a very applicable Bruce Lee quote here.
"Be like water.
If there's a cup, the water becomes the cup."
If you pour water into anything,
it becomes that thing.
So you have to adapt.
That will work.
- Jesse's blade is pretty much formed.
He just needs to start etching that and sharpening the blade.
♪
- Gentlemen, you got 60 minutes left.
♪
- It's go time, and I gotta get this blade done.
♪
One of the requirements for this blade
is to have a mechanical connection.
And the way I constructed my handle
is a through tang, so my tang goes through
every piece of handle material.
It comes out the end, where I'm gonna peen it over
and secure it all together.
There we go.
- Eric's about to peen it over.
- We should see the flames
from the epoxy in just a second here.
- There. - Yeah, there it is.
- And now he's just heating that butt cap
and burning away material in the connection point.
That's not good.
♪
- One of the downsides of using the torch to heat the tang
is it heats up all the metal and melts my epoxy.
So to make sure I have an extra strong connection,
I'm gonna drill a hole through my handle
and throw a pin in as well.
- Smart move.
- All that's left to do is sharpen.
I'm not gonna worry about what he's doing over there.
I think he should be worried about what I'm doing.
[laughs]
♪
- I don't know what tests they're gonna do with this,
so I choose an appleseed edge as my edge geometry,
because it's strong enough to survive anything,
and I can make it sharp enough to cut through anything.
♪
Now that my blade's all finished, all oiled,
all looking pretty, I feel quite confident in it.
♪
Ooh. - Oh!
- Oh, no. - Jesse just cut himself.
- At least it's sharp.
This blade has drawn blood before any of the tests.
So now it's enchanted.
I'll take it.
- 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
Gentlemen, turn off your machines.
Put down your tools.
This round is over.
- Good job, man. That was a tough one.
- Yeah.
♪
- I'm looking at my sword,
and there's a couple things
I might go back, if I could, and change.
But you know, time's up, I made this weapon,
and I'm proud of what I'm presenting.
♪
- Champions, welcome to the dynamic KEAL test.
♪
I'm gonna find out what kind of lethal damage
your weapons can do, how sharp they are,
and how they wield in my hands--
not a Kachin dao, a Kachin now.
Eric, are you ready? - Let's do it.
♪
This KEAL test, it's a little scary.
You know, that's a big pig.
It's a massive target to try to go through.
There's a lot of bones in there.
You know, it's a hard challenge.
I'm just hoping that it survives it.
♪
- You know, this KEAL test, it's a little scary.
You know, that's a big pig.
And it's-- it's a massive target
to try to go through.
There's a lot of bones in there.
I'm just hoping that it survives it.
♪
[rock music]
♪
- Ugh.
- [laughs]
All right, Eric, let's talk about your Kachin dao.
Your edge is sharp.
Even though it didn't cut on some of these vines
that may have just collapsed when I'm cutting through it,
look how deep the chops are on this pig carcass.
So in all fronts, I think it's a very sharp blade.
The wieldability and comfort in my hands works.
And overall, it will KEAL.
- Good to hear.
- All right, Jesse, your turn, so are you ready?
- Sure. - All right.
[dramatic music]
- Going into the final test,
there's a couple things I'm scared of.
It might not have the sharpness
necessary to get through those vines
because I don't know what they're made of.
There's a chance that it doesn't get through those
and he can't even swing into the pig.
♪
[rock music]
♪
- Damn, dude. That was sick, dude.
- That last vine though. - I know.
[laughs]
[dramatic music]
- All right, Jesse, let's talk about your Kachin dao here.
Looking at your Damascus pattern,
I can really appreciate the layers of your twist Damascus.
Now your edge-- your edge is sharp.
It cuts the pig carcass, and it cut most of the vines.
It is wieldable.
And overall, it will KEAL.
- Thank you.
♪
- Bladesmiths, welcome to the dynamic strength test.
♪
I'll be chopping into multiple targets in this arena,
testing the edge, the strength, and the overall construction
of your Kachin daos.
Eric, you're up first. You ready?
- Let's do it.
- All right.
[rock music]
♪
- [buzzes lips]
♪
- Oh! - [groans]
- [bleep].
- [whistles]
[tense music]
- Wow.
- Well, Eric--
- Little bit of an issue.
- Yeah, I mean it was a catastrophic failure...
- Yeah. - Unfortunately.
The grain size in here is not terrible,
but it's not the best I've ever seen.
It's still-- it's still looking like
400-grit sandpaper instead of, like, velvet, you know?
I don't see any weld flaws or anything like that.
It just--just came apart.
- Yep, it happens.
♪
- Oh, I hate this.
- [chuckles] You're telling me.
[laughter]
- Well, Eric, your blade blasted through the pig.
But unfortunately, the moose antler got
the best of your blade, and it broke in two pieces.
This is considered a catastrophic failure.
We cannot continue testing it safely.
But you're not out of the fight yet.
Now, Jesse, you will have to survive five strikes
in this dynamic strength test.
Are you ready?
- Let's do it.
- All right, let's do it.
♪
- I'm excited, but also, like, a teeny bit nervous.
I want to win super bad.
If I lose, I lose the title of unbeaten.
Forget about money at this point.
It's my honor on the line,
and my title.
[rock music]
♪
My heart. - [laughs]
- [exhales deeply]
♪
- Well, Jesse, you can breathe now, man.
You made it through all five strikes
on that grueling test.
Congratulations.
Now, unfortunately for you, Eric,
that means your time here in this competition has ended.
You fought hard. You gave us two great blades.
But before you step off The Forge floor,
I think we'd all like to shake your hand.
- I appreciate it. - Thanks, buddy.
- This was a good time, seriously.
- Good to see you.
- Obviously, the blade broke.
I still made the best blade I could.
It would have been pretty cool to take him down.
But you know, you gotta be happy for him.
I think this came down to just
a little error within the steel.
So maybe next time I'll be
a little more careful with my heat treat.
Jesse, glad to be your friend,
and I'm glad to be able to continue watching you succeed.
You know, unfortunately, I had to be one of those people
that, you know, rose you up even higher.
But you know, it's kind of cool to say that.
♪
- Well, Jesse, you put your streak on the line.
But you brought your talent.
You gave us a blade that made it through the test.
Congratulations.
You, again, are a "Forged in Fire" champion
with an unbeaten record.
That makes number nine. Congratulations.
[applause] Get over here, man.
- Winning again feels great
because it validates everything
that I've been thinking about since I last competed.
Because I won again, I've really proven to myself
that those eight times weren't a fluke.
I'm still unbeaten,
I'm ready to come back and defend my title,
and I could not be happier.
Ben, I'm 9 and 0,
so I'm coming for you.
♪
[metal clangs]