[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
[rock music]
- my name is kyle farace. I'm 34 years old.
I met my wife about a year and a half ago,
and she introduced me to bladesmithing.
We actually forged our own wedding rings.
♪ ♪
- my name is zach tarbell.
I'm 27 years old,
I'm from rochester, new york.
I'm a welding instructor and a part-time bladesmith.
I'm ready to go to work,
and I'm looking for a challenge.
- My name is ben allanson, and I'm 34 years old.
I've been bladesmithing about eight years now.
I have a ton of people rooting for me back home--
my wife and our four beautiful boys.
And I just want to say my four beautiful boys are dogs.
They're not people.
- My name is aj saracinello. I'm 31 years old.
I'm from totowa, new jersey, and I've been bladesmithing
as a hobby for about eight years.
When I tell people that I make knives,
some people find it pretty interesting,
and other people kind of look like,
"ah, maybe we're not gonna be friends with this dude."
[chuckles]
- bladesmiths, welcome to the forge.
You're about to take part in three rounds
of intense forging competition.
At the end of each round, you're gonna present your work
to our panel of specialists.
The judges for this competition are gonna be
two-time "forged in fire" champion
ben abbott,
historic-weapons re-creation specialist
dave baker,
and edged-weapon specialist
and kali martial artist
doug marcaida.
♪ ♪
now, remember, there's $10,000 and the title
of "forged in fire" champion on the line.
Today in the forge,
we feel like doing a little experimenting.
♪ ♪
in round one of the challenge,
we're gonna ask you to make blades
using canister damascus.
♪ ♪
but if you look around,
you notice there's no cannisters.
That's because we're gonna ask you to use these...
♪ ♪
round tubes.
♪ ♪
we're calling this challenge
tubular cannister.
♪ ♪
- I've made cannister a few times
but always with a square tube.
You don't make cannister with round tube.
- Now, we know this is far from a traditional technique,
so you're gonna have to figure out your workarounds
and make it work.
Now, let's talk steel.
♪ ♪
you each have a bucket of high-carbon steel
in front of you.
We want you to use every last ounce of it
in your two-inch tubular cannister.
Nothing can be wasted. - I knew it.
I knew there was gonna be some--
there's a ball bearing that's just a little bit too large
to fit down that pipe.
Man, how do I get it in there?
♪ ♪
- and your blades need to follow these parameters...
We want you to make your signature blade
in your signature style.
Your blades need to be set up for a through
or a hidden tang and between 14 and 16 inches
from tip to plunge grind.
Now, in round two of the competition,
you'll be adding handles to your blades,
making them fully functional weapons.
At that point, we'll be testing for strength and durability
in the steel wind chime chop
and for edge retention in a rubber tube slice.
Bladesmiths, you've got three hours to complete your work.
Good luck. Your time starts now.
[rock music]
- we are off to the races!
♪ ♪
- so a normal cannister damascus
is made with a 2-by-2 square cannister.
What makes this more difficult?
- The biggest challenge that they're running into
is that the large ball doesn't fit inside the cannister.
- None of the parts other than the small ball bearings fit in.
So they've all got to be either
cut down or crushed.
- I've never done a tube damascus before.
So I'm just trying to think in my head
how I'm gonna figure this out to get a good forge weld.
I immediately started thinking about my checklist
and starting step one.
Make my cannister, clean up all the material...
Oh, that's long.
So I don't get sidetracked.
It takes a while to cut a ball bearing.
So I'm thinking it would be quicker
to draw it out
and then just pretty much throw the whole thing in a cannister.
♪ wee-ooh ♪
- [humming]
my plan for the cannister
is to cut off six inches,
which is gonna be easier to manage
in and out of the forge and on the power hammer.
- You can do a volume calculation
figuring out how much tube you need.
I'd leave at least a 1/2 inch of materials
on either side of what I wanted
so I've got sacrificial material to get rid of.
♪ ♪
- at the chop saw, I realize
that it's probably a little bit too short,
but at this point, I'm gonna see what happens.
- It's always fun when you're more than 20 minutes in
and nobody's working on a knife yet.
- A round cannister is an unknown to me.
I don't know how it's gonna behave.
I'm used to square tube.
So I decide to start with something
that I'm familiar with.
- Zach squared up his pipe.
We always use squaring dies,
to try to apply force
equally on all four faces,
to compress to the center,
and we don't have any rounding dies.
♪ ♪
- I got all these materials in front of me.
I'm gonna break them down as small as I can
to fit them into that cannister.
I get the big ball bearing broken down into thirds,
but it's still not fitting.
[bleep].
So I've got to take more pieces off of it.
- It's hard enough thinking,
"how do I make a knife in three hours?"
now they have to think outside of the box
or, in this case, outside of the tube.
[laughter]
- the one time I tried cannister damascus,
it failed miserably,
and that was with square can.
♪ ♪
I cut my cannister down to about six inches
'cause I know I don't want to be dealing
with an extensive amount of steel
to try and forge this blade.
- Check out aj.
- Uh-oh.
- I'm using white out
because I want to make sure that the cannister can pop off
this steel pretty easily
so I know that I have hardenable steel.
- They don't have to peel the tube
off the billet.
- No, they don't have to, and I certainly wouldn't.
I would not put any white out anywhere near this cannister.
I'd use the cannister to keep everything together.
- I get all my materials in the can
and realize that I cut my pipe a little too short.
♪ ♪
so I have to redo the can.
- I'd say 80% of our competitions,
if you don't have sacrificial steel,
you're in trouble.
- This time I'm gonna try bringing it up to ten inches.
- Two hours, bladesmiths!
- I'm choosing not to use the white out
because I'm gonna grind off that tube
when I'm done anyways.
Welding!
I know I'll have good high-carbon steel on the edge.
I weld it up and throw it in the forge.
[groans]
I go back to my table.
Oh, my god.
I see ball bearings still on my table
you got to be [bleep] kidding me.
I have to put everything into this can
to meet parameters.
Son of a [bleep].
I decide I'm gonna cut the end off of it
and try to put the ball bearings back in.
What a [bleep]show.
- It's not all gonna fit.
So I'm trying to fit everything in the cannister.
It's just not fitting.
I dump everything out, try to redo it.
It's not gonna have room.
But my cannister's just too small.
Okay.
- See that zach is having trouble
fitting some of those larger chunks of metal
into his tube.
- Well, he's invested a bunch of time
in squaring up that tube.
So might as well stick with the investment.
♪ ♪
- so then it hits me--
why don't I just make the cannister bigger?
So I'm gonna make a new piece of square tube,
cut a little piece off of it,
and weld everything together.
This is a faster solution than starting over.
♪ ♪
- normally you'd use a square can,
so when you're putting it through the press
to forge-weld,
you got your dies set up
so you would get nice, even pressure.
Whereas, with a tube,
you're not gonna get nice, even pressure.
I'm gonna work it slow
like I'm packing a snowball.
You know, if you pack a snowball real slow,
you're gonna get it nice and hard.
My wife, kayla, is a bladesmith,
and she taught me how to forge.
I brought a picture of her and I working in the shop
so I can just try and have the feel
of just a normal day out in the shop with her.
And then I'm standing in front of the forge.
I feel something in my pocket,
and it's a note from my wife.
- It might not be his home forge,
but he's a bringing a little bit of his home with him
to make it more comfortable. - Absolutely.
- Regardless of what the outcome is,
you know, I still get to go home
and work alongside my best friend.
♪ ♪
- after I get my metal in the forge,
I'm waiting for it to heat up,
make sure it's hot all the way through.
I'm looking around at my competitors.
If my steel looks like their steel
then maybe I'm ready for a forge weld.
Drawing it out at the press,
it seems like it's going all right,
but it's not moving as quick as I want it.
So I decide I'm gonna take it to the power hammer
because that'll hit it a lot harder.
♪ ♪
and the sides blow out.
♪ ♪
[bleep]. - Oh, boy.
- I'm thinking I failed.
Nothing welded up. I just have a can.
- I kind of think that aj is not getting that can off.
- Nope.
- He has forged it beyond the point
where that can can be removed.
- I'm gonna cut it,
and everything's gonna spill out,
and I'll have to start again
with an hour left on the clock.
- I give his odds of success a 20%.
- Either way, he's got to make a decision now.
- This could send me home.
[bleep].
♪ ♪
- I'm thinking that this is a failure.
So I start to peel the can off.
♪ ♪
- you know what? I'm hearing hollow.
- So am I.
♪ ♪
- I see that the can's popping,
and not only is it popping,
I could see that there's usable steel under there.
♪ ♪
- ha, look at that! [laughs]
unbelievable.
That can fell off of there. - [laughs]
wow.
- I truly don't believe that.
- I'm thinking I should go buy a lottery ticket,
because not only did the metal weld,
the can popped off.
Now I can start forging my blade.
- Bladesmiths, you got one hour remaining!
- I feel pretty content.
My billet, it's big enough to make a sword out of it,
but I'm just happy that I know I have enough steel,
and from here, I can just chop off the end of it.
♪ ♪
- what an interesting hammer stroke.
It never comes above his chin really.
- But his chin is eight feet off the ground.
- [laughing] there's that.
- I'm just finishing up making my full tang.
Everything's smooth.
- Whoa, whoa, whoa! - What happened? What happened?
- Kyle's making a full-tang knife.
He needs to make a through tang or a hidden tang.
♪ ♪
- I look over, see kyle hammering out
what looks like the profile of a full-tang knife.
♪ ♪
it's a competition, there's a lot of money on the line,
but I don't want to win on account of somebody
getting knocked out for a parameter.
- It looks like zach wants to say something.
- Yeah.
- Yep, wait. Hold on.
- You doing a hidden tang? - No.
- I think we have to. - Something's being said.
- Really? - Yeah.
- Maybe check, but I'm pretty sure.
The instructor in me just wouldn't let it go,
because we teach our students
to keep an eye out for everyone
and everything around them,
and that's what I intend to do here.
- Our smiths,
they can ask the challenge department
for a clarification.
- And here they go.
- Here they go. - Bingo.
- Oh, okay.
- I would want them to say something to me
just like I did to kyle.
- That's what I love about this competition.
- Absolutely.
- The community of bladesmiths
are always helping each other.
- I'm grateful for zach.
If I had gone any further,
there would've been really no fixing it after that.
I would've totally missed parameters.
- You got 30 minutes remaining!
- I'm grinding the blade,
and I notice down at the edge, there's some--
it looks like cracks along the edge.
And that's just the worst.
I don't want to play with it too much
just because I'd rather have the thickness
to correct something than make it really thin
and a little vulnerable in the strength test.
♪ ♪
- ah!
He's got the kill it quench!
- Lo and behold, no warps at all.
♪ ♪
I just need to grind some more
to get down to that good high-carbon steel.
♪ ♪
- bladesmiths, you got ten minutes remaining!
- There we go. - Okay, kyle just quenched!
- Nice.
- I take it out of the quench,
and it's like I'm looking at a banana.
So I try and straighten it out
by applying some pressure on it.
- With all that mild steel
jacketing that blade,
he actually can bend it quite a bit.
♪ ♪
- aj quenched.
- I notice it's got a bit of a warp to it.
So I'm gonna go for a second quench.
♪ ♪
still got a bit of a warp,
but I left enough thickness
that I can grind it out.
- Bladesmiths, you got five minutes remaining!
- Little more.
♪ ♪
- nice. Good quench.
♪ ♪
- it looks good, it feels good,
but I haven't measured my blade in a while.
♪ ♪
[bleep].
My blade is about 3/4 inch shy of that 14-inch mark.
[bleep].
They're measuring my blade from tip to plunge.
So I make the decision
to cut a new plunge grind
behind where I really wanted it to be.
This is gonna, in effect, make the blade longer.
- Five, four,
three, two, one!
Bladesmiths, your time is up!
Turn off your machines, put down your work!
This round is over!
- [laughs] - [bleep].
- Good job. - [laughs]
[dramatic music]
- overall, except for that plunge grind,
I'm pretty happy with the blade.
It's pretty straight,
it's pretty even,
but likelihood that I'm gonna move on to round two,
I'm gonna call it a 50/50.
♪ ♪
- all right, guys, congratulations.
You made it through round one.
You had 3 hours to come out with a knife
between 14 and 16 inches.
Now the judges have some critiques to give.
Kyle, you're up first.
Please present your work.
♪ ♪
- all right, kyle, your welds look really solid,
which I like.
Major concerns I have
are the transition here to the tang.
It just kind of goes into
a pretty lean tang right away.
So anything you can do to work on that transition
would probably be a good idea. - Thank you.
- All right, ben, you ready?
Come on up and present your work to your judges.
♪ ♪
- so, ben, first off, there's a heck of a lot of metal here.
Would love to see you refine these grinds.
I can see the hardened steel along the edge.
That's good.
Altogether, looks like a solid, sturdy blade.
- Thank you. - All right, aj.
Please present your work to the judges.
♪ ♪
- all right, aj, peeling the can off is the right way to go,
but it does take away a relatively significant
amount of steel.
But the one thing here that gives me the most pause
is there's a delamination right here on the spine,
and there's another one a little bit further up
just right here.
But the rest of the blade did weld up.
Nice job. - Thank you.
- All right, zach, that leaves us with you.
Please present your work to the judges.
♪ ♪
- all right, zach, let's talk about your blade here.
It's not perfectly straight, but it's not warped either.
What I have a question with is...
What exactly is going on here?
- Right at the end,
realized I came up a little bit short on that length.
So I made the decision to push that plunge grind back,
try to make that 14-inch minimum.
- Got ya.
Because normally you would think with a design like this
from tip to plunge grind
goes right there, and that would've been 12 1/2,
but you marked it further back.
You're at 14 inches.
If you move forward,
there might be some reprofiling there,
but otherwise, sir, it's a solid piece of work.
- Thank you.
- All right, bladesmiths.
You all came through with workable blades.
Unfortunately, the judges have made their final decision,
and the bladesmith not moving forward
is gonna be...
Aj.
Ben's gonna tell you why.
- Well, aj, coming out of round one,
of the four blades, yours is the only one
that has structural problems in the steel,
and that's why we're sending you home.
- I understand.
- All right, aj, at this point,
I'm gonna have to ask you to surrender your weapon
and please leave the forge floor.
- I'm pretty happy with what I ended up with,
considering it was a tube cannister damascus,
which they've never done on this competition before.
- Good work. - Well fought, brother.
- Good luck.
Going home, I'll probably only ever see
a tube cannister in my nightmares.
I would call this challenge, like,
the quiche of damascus, 'cause it was just disgusting.
It was--it was-- it was hard.
♪ ♪
- all right, guys, congratulations.
The three of you will be moving forward
into round two of the competition.
In this round, I want you guys to add handles to your blades.
You'll see on your work stations,
you each have six pieces of round stock.
I want to use those
to make spiraled fluted handles.
You guys will only have two hours
to complete this next round of the competition,
after which we will be testing your strength and durability
in the steel wind chime chop
and checking for sharpness in a rubber tube slice.
Good luck, bladesmiths. Your time starts now.
[rock music]
oh, right.
- So I got a question for you guys.
What is a good rule for fluting on the handle?
- You want to make a comfortable handle
before you start doing any fluting.
♪ ♪
- coming out of round one, I got some feedback
from the judges regarding the straightness of my blade.
So I do plan on using the grinder,
try straighten out some of that wobble that I've got.
♪ ♪
little concerned about that clock.
Two hours is pretty short
to make a hidden tang with a flute.
♪ ♪
- dave mentioned that he was a little worried
about the integrity of my tang.
So, going into the second round,
I'm going to beef up my tang
where dave had said his main concern was.
♪ ♪
I have no idea what's going on around me.
I just want to focus on my own work
and make sure that I can turn in a finished blade.
♪ ♪
- 90 minutes remaining on the clock!
You've got 90 minutes left!
♪ ♪
- so my plan is to tackle the handle first.
♪ ♪
- ben's doing the "throw it at the floor" test.
- There you go.
- Is he checking the strength of them?
- Yeah. - Yeah.
- Some of the stuff can be really brittle.
- If anything blatantly shatters,
I shouldn't use that if it does.
♪ yeah ♪
♪ ♪
- kyle's looking for one with brass.
- I know I want to use brass to make a guard and a pommel
to add a little bit of counterweight
for such a large blade.
♪ ♪
but it's not cooperating with me.
- It's the wrong tool.
Brass, when you heat it up
with one of those cutoff wheels,
gets sticky and starts coating the blade,
and then they stop working and just make things hot.
♪ ♪
- I'm not making any progress whatsoever
trying to get through that piece of brass.
[bleep].
♪ ♪
you know, I've got two hours to try and make it work.
Every mistake is a big mistake,
and it could set me back quite a bit.
- There is a lot to be done here.
This is not an easy handle.
- 45 minutes remaining on the clock!
- [bleep].
A job with the wrong tool,
you're just gonna waste your time.
- I take it over to the bandsaw,
where I should've started,
and no issues getting through it.
♪ ♪
- ben's the first one on the grinder putting his flutes in.
- [laughs] oh, it's horrible.
The flutes that I just put in are not gonna work.
It just doesn't feel good in my hand.
It's way too big.
- He put the fluting in before he started shaping his handle,
so isn't he just gonna lose the fluting?
- Yeah. - Yeah.
- I need to take more material
off of this handle first.
- He's gonna have to go back and do it again.
- Yep. [laughs]
- he just took 30 minutes and chucked them out the window.
- I need to stop doing this
because it's sucking up too much time.
I want to just get the handle shaped,
and then I'll take the dremel
and put flutes in smaller by hand.
♪ ♪
- ten minutes remaining on the clock!
♪ ♪
- has zach fluted anything? - No.
♪ ♪
- right now I'm feeling confident
in the time that I have
and the amount that I have to get done on this knife.
The last thing that I want
is to go home on account of an uncomfortable handle.
- Now would be a good payback for kyle.
"hey, zach, you're about to miss parameters."
- I want to spend the last five minutes
working on my edge.
I know that this is cutting it close,
but I'm pretty sure that I can do it.
- Five minutes remaining!
- You can throw flutes on a blade in a minute,
if you've done it before.
♪ ♪
- I decide to put my handle on first,
remove a ton of material,
get the basic shape of my handle done.
♪ ♪
I'm holding on to this thing,
and I'm thinking about what my wife told me--
"make sure you make it so it fits everybody else's hand
and not just yours."
and then I look over at ben abbott, and I'm like,
"this guy's got tiny, little hands.
I hope this thing fits in his hand."
- 20 seconds remaining!
♪ ♪
five, four,
three, two, one!
Bladesmiths, this round is over.
Put down your blades.
Stop what you're doing.
[dramatic music]
- I'm pleased with what I have in front of me.
I can't believe that I've pulled off that handle
in two hours,
and then I take a look
at the blade to my left and my right.
My heart sinks.
I've forgotten to put those flutes on the handle.
[sighs]
♪ ♪
- all right, gentlemen, I think you know what time it is.
It's time for the strength test.
To test the strength and overall durability
of your blades,
I'll chopping into these steel wind chimes.
Now, this is not about what your blades do
to those wind chimes.
It's about what those wind chimes do
to the edge of your blade.
Ben, you're up first. You ready for this?
- Yes, sir.
I'm a little concerned about my edge.
I just hope that the chimes aren't too big of a deal
and my knife doesn't snap or something like that.
♪ ♪
- ben, a lot of the weight's still in this blade
from when we evaluated it-- it didn't get much lighter.
As a matter of fact,
adding that guard probably added more weight,
and there's not a lot of counterbalance.
As far as hitting the pipes go,
you can see that there are some rolled-over sections,
packed-out sections,
and certainly sections where you've lost your edge,
but it's solid, one piece-- good job.
- Cool. Thanks.
- All right, kyle, you're up next.
You ready? - Hell, yeah.
- Good.
- I'm a little bit nervous about my edge.
I designed it more for the sharpness test
as opposed to the strength test.
I hope when dave's done hitting these wind chimes,
my blade is in one piece.
♪ ♪
- okay, kyle, first off, hold up your hand.
Yeah, I figured. [laughs]
you got some big mitts, man. That's a big handle.
- [laughs]
I don't know. I don't think they're that big.
- As far as how your blade did,
you've got plenty of edge still left on this blade,
but you can see here where you've got a lot of rolling.
But there's still a lot of edge on this knife.
So good job.
- Awesome. Thanks, dave.
- You bet. All right, zach.
You ready? - Yes, sir.
- Okay.
♪ ♪
- I don't know what the judges are gonna say.
If not for that one parameter,
I believe that my knife would do well
through the strength and sharpness test.
Hopefully they're gonna decide to test it.
♪ ♪
osed to the strength test.
I hope when dave's done hitting these wind chimes,
my blade is in one piece.
♪ ♪
- okay, kyle, first off, hold up your hand.
Yeah, I figured. [laughs]
you got some big mitts, man. That's a big handle.
- [laughs]
I don't know. I don't think they're that big.
- As far as how your blade did,
you've got plenty of edge still left on this blade,
but you can see here where you've got a lot of rolling.
But there's still a lot of edge on this knife.
So good job.
- Awesome. Thanks, dave.
- You bet. All right, zach.
You ready? - Yes, sir.
- Okay.
♪ ♪
- I don't know what the judges are gonna say.
If not for that one parameter,
I believe that my knife would do well
through the strength and sharpness test.
Hopefully they're gonna decide to test it.
♪ ♪
- right now I'm really hoping that my blade will get tested.
♪ ♪
- [whispering] hey, guys.
- I know in the back of my head,
I don't have those flutes.
♪ ♪
- you guys all agree?
♪ ♪
zach, we asked you guys to give us a fluted handle,
but your knife does not have that.
It was a pleasure watching you in round one.
You helped kyle out with his parameter issues.
Unfortunately, your knife does not meet parameters.
So, for that reason,
I've got to ask you to leave the forge floor.
Thanks for coming out, man. - Thank you.
♪ ♪
I agree with the judges. It's the right call.
I missed a parameter. The other guys didn't.
This time around,
I realize I may not have brought my "a" game.
If I get a second chance, I'm bringing it.
♪ ♪
- kyle and ben, congratulations.
You guys are moving forward into round three.
Only the man next to you
stands between you,
the title of "forged in fire" champion,
and that coveted check for $10,000.
In round three, we're gonna send you guys back home
to re-create an iconic weapon from history.
That weapon is...
♪ ♪
the vajra-mushti. - Wow.
- Originating in india,
the vajra-mushti is an edged knuckle-duster.
The unique design features sharpened blades
on every side of the handle,
making it a specialty weapon
only wielded by well-trained indian warriors.
The sharp edges on all sides
provided the user with a wide range of lethal attacks,
from deadly stabs and slashes
to devastating punches.
A traditional indian martial art
where the weapon is tied to the fist of wrestlers
has lineage dating back to the middle ages
and is still practiced today
by professional wrestlers in india
using nonlethal knuckledusters.
- There's a lot going on here.
I need you to follow these parameters.
Now, you've got two blades on the ends.
They both need to be double-sided
and flamelike or wavy.
The blade on the top
needs to be between 7 and 8 inches.
The blade on the bottom
needs to be between 4 and 5 inches.
Now, your push blade
needs to be between 4 and 5 inches,
with a height of between 1 and 2 inches.
- [sighs]
I don't even know what to say.
The closest thing I've seen to that
is probably a pair of brass knuckles.
- We're gonna send you guys home for four days,
and when you guys come back, I want to see two blades
worth at least $10,000 apiece.
So do your absolute best work.
And good luck. We'll see you in four days.
- Awesome. Good luck, man.
- Good luck. [chuckles]
[rock music]
- day one, I'm about to build a vajra-mushti.
I can't wait to get started with this.
I'm making a at least 70-layer damascus billet.
As long as the forge weld goes good,
I'll be able to draw it out quickly.
I'm about to put my billet in the forge.
I'm feeling marvelous.
Everything's going smooth.
In she goes.
So far, so good with my damascus.
It looks strong, solid.
I still have a long way to go.
It looks like it's gonna forge-weld nicely.
♪ ♪
- I feel good to be back home
here in bellows falls, vermont,
and we're going to make the vajra-mushti.
I've never made a vajra-mushti or anything close to it.
So I decided to use 1084 carbon steel
because it's something I'm more familiar with.
I think the most difficult part to the challenge
will be making the handle.
It's something that I'm definitely gonna have
to pay a lot of attention to.
♪ ♪
the two smaller blades are basically the same.
One's a little longer than the other,
you know, and then the other blade's just a big rectangle.
♪ ♪
five hours into it, I feel pretty good.
♪ ♪
one more soak in the forge,
and then I'll quench them.
♪ ♪
I got all the forging out of the way,
so I'm feeling good.
End of day one, and I'm really glad I got the heat treat done.
Looks good.
[dogs barking]
♪ ♪
- day two, I'm a little tired this morning.
But I feel great, ready to get this show on the road.
My plan for today
is to get as far into this build
as humanly possible.
I got my pattern set out for my knuckle blade,
and I'm just gonna start cutting out the pattern,
and hopefully soon we'll get it welded on.
♪ ♪
I got this thing joined up. It's looking good.
I'm not too stressed
that I haven't gotten to the quench yet.
It's been a long time since I used a torch.
♪ ♪
I decided that I'm gonna go with a torch heat treatment
because the handle doesn't need to be hard.
I just need the blades hard and the knuckle blade hard.
♪ ♪
so I did one, and...
I'm scared I'm gonna crack it in half,
because right after the quench, it is brittle.
So any little shock or hit
could cause catastrophic cracking.
I have to get the next one done.
♪ ♪
oh, my god.
If one of these blades has a crack,
I'm honestly not sure what I would do.
You got to be [bleep] kidding me.
Lls out of my vise grips.
And, of course, I have wood floors,
and it falls floor, and it's catching on fire,
and I'm trying to pick it back up.
You got to be [bleep] kidding me.
I'm feeling a lot of anxiety and stress right now.
If one of these blades has a crack,
I'm kind of screwed.
♪ ♪
luckily, I don't see any cracks.
So I think the quench went well.
That's gonna have to do.
♪ ♪
- it's the beginning of day two,
and I can't wait to get started.
For the handle, I'm gonna go with copper.
It's moving a lot better than I thought it was going to.
I want to pay really close attention to detail.
I want to make a $10,000 knife.
Today I'm able to remove 3 pounds
off a 5-pound chunk of copper
and knocked out a nice workable piece.
Tomorrow I'd like to get the handle all finished up
and the blades fitted on.
That's basically it.
♪ ♪
- it's day four. Ready to get this thing done.
So I just got done
doing the profiling on my vajra-mushti.
Feels pretty good.
I'm gonna start doing fit up on the handle.
♪ ♪
I'm feeling great.
At the end day, I used every minute that I had.
There's definitely some finishing touches
that I didn't get to that I wish I had--
mainly the handle.
I'm hoping that there's not, you know,
major hot spots around the knuckles or anything like that.
It can look like crap,
but as long as it feels comfortable in your hand,
you know, that's fine.
I feel good.
I mean, I definitely did the best that I could.
♪ ♪
- final day, day four.
I can't wait to get this thing all finished up
and get it out the door.
Start the day out fitting all the blades,
gluing everything up.
This thing's sweet,
and it feels nice, too.
The handle's coming out awesome.
Exactly how I pictured it in my head.
Now I just got to put the finishing touches on it.
Having my wife pop in now and then
is definitely motivation.
- Hey, babe.
- Hey. - I got the diamonds.
- Sweet. - [chuckles]
- I thought it would really make the handle pop
if I could set these four diamonds in it.
Day four in the books.
It's been a lot of fun
and can't wait to see this thing go through the testing,
and hopefully I come out on top.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- guys, welcome back to the forge.
You have had four days
to work on your renditions of the vajra-mushti.
Kyle, tell us about your work.
- The blades are 1084 carbon steel
with an acid etch.
Handle's solid copper.
I put forced patina on it
and inlaid four certified diamonds into the handle.
Do we get to keep them afterward?
[laughter]
very nice. Ben, how about yours?
- The top and the bottom blade
are 84 layers of 15n20
and 1095.
And then my knuckle blade is w1.
My handle construction is all brass.
- Well, only one of you guys will be leaving here
as the champion of "forged in fire"
with a check for $10,000,
and we've got figure that out through a couple tests.
We've got a sharpness test, a strength test,
but up first, the infamous keal test
with doug marcaida.
♪ ♪
bladesmiths, welcome to the keal test.
To find out what kind of lethal damage your weapon will do,
I will take your weapon and deliver multiple lethal blows
on this ballistics dummy.
Kyle, you're up first. You ready?
- Oh, yeah.
When I first saw the weapon,
I was a little intimidated by it,
but I kind of have the ability
to, like, picture something in my head
and make it come to life-- that's exactly what I did.
The only fears that I have coming into it
are the judges not liking the design
that I put on the handle.
[rock music]
♪ ♪
- wow. - [sighs]
- all right, kyle, let's talk about your weapon here.
I was worried about the finger welds
that you had there, that they would be an issue,
especially when I'm punching.
No issues there.
I like the fact that as it gets slippery,
it gave me a very good grip.
Overall, it is a beautiful piece,
and your weapon will keal.
- Oh, yeah.
- All right, ben, your turn, sir.
Are you ready? - I'm ready.
- Let's do this.
♪ ♪
all right, ben, let's talk about your weapon here.
The edges are very sharp,
but there some sharp edges
that you have in here.
Every movement started to give me a little bruise
and cut off some skin right there.
But in terms of
what this weapon will do,
it will keal...
- Thanks, doug. - My hand.
- [laughs]
- all right, bladesmiths, welcome to the strength test.
To test the strength and durability
of your vajra-mushtis, as well as their overall construction,
I'll be stabbing and punching
into this sheet metal and chain.
Kyle, you're up first. You ready for this?
- Yep.
♪ ♪
[dramatic music]
- all right, kyle, in this strength test,
your two long blades held up great.
The center blade here took some chipping on that chain.
I'm looking at the grain in there,
and it's pretty big.
I would've liked to have seen that refined.
But in general, these two blades held up well.
Nice job. - Awesome, thanks, ben.
- All right, ben, you're up. You ready for this?
- Sure am.
I'm definitely feeling like kyle's ahead.
I know that my handle
is causing some pain on the judges' hands,
and that's just weighing on my mind.
I know that's big for them,
and it could potentially send me home.
I'm super nervous
because I totally don't know what's gonna happen.
♪ ♪
[rock music]
♪ ♪
- all right, ben, well,
the first thing I feel when I pick this weapon up
is its sheer mass.
I mean, it's a heavy, heavy weapon.
That did you some justice in the strength test.
The only thing I could see
is a little bit of glinting on the lower blade.
But the middle blade,
it took a pretty major deflection right here.
It kind of cracked.
One more little hit here, and that would just come off.
The main thing working against you on this blade
is the rough inner surface.
I couldn't really find a real comfortable way
of getting this finger out of harm's way.
But after the strength test, it's all in one piece.
Nice job. - Thank you.
♪ ♪
- all right, bladesmiths, we know your weapons can keal,
and we know they are strong.
Now it's time to find out just how sharp they are.
To find out, I'll take your weapons
and deliver some stabs and slices
on these spice bags.
Kyle, you're up first. You ready for this?
- Yep. - Let's do this.
♪ ♪
all right, kyle, let's talk about your weapon.
It is comfortable. It's a good fit on my hand.
It's got a pointy-enough tip over there,
but with that one piece where you're missing some edges,
it was more of a jagged cut.
When it came to stabbing and slashing
on both weapons on each end, it will cut.
Good job. - Thank you, doug.
- Ben, your turn, sir. You ready?
- Ready, let's go. - Let's do it.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
all right, ben, let's talk about your weapon.
The weight that you have here
back up the cut because you have very sharp edges,
and the cuts are very deep,
but my hand, when I'm making impacts,
still rubs on the inside of your handle.
But other than that, sir, your beast, it will cut.
- Thanks, doug.
♪ ♪
- all right, guys,
you guys both came through with unbelievable pieces of work
verging on art,
and they performed almost equally on all the tests,
but we do have to make a decision.
The judges are gonna have to confer
and go over those fine details.
While they do that,
I'm gonna ask you to step off the forge floor.
♪ ♪
- after seeing ben's weapon,
I felt like we were pretty evenly matched,
but this is "forged in fire,"
and you never know what way it's gonna go.
- All right, guys. What do you think?
It seems pretty close to me.
- Looking at the two weapons,
I think kyle's blade is strong.
It took some chipping in the strength test,
but then if you look at ben's blade,
it also took some chipping in the strength test.
- Both blades definitely can keal,
and both blades are definitely sharp,
but one weapon is a lot more comfortable
to wield and control.
A weapon should only hurt the enemy,
not the end user.
- Okay, so you guys are in agreement?
All: Yeah. - We'll call them back in.
♪ ♪
all right, guys. It was very, very close.
You guys both did a phenomenal job.
Unfortunately, we can only send one of you guys home
with the title of "forged in fire" champion
and a check for $10,000,
and our champion today is...
♪ ♪
kyle. Congratulations.
Ben, unfortunately,
you're not walking home the champion today.
Doug's gonna tell you why.
- Ben, I commend you on building a very unique weapon,
but only your handle
affected both of us when we were testing it,
and for that reason, we're sending you home.
- Okay. Totally understand.
- All right, ben, you obviously showed you had what it takes
to be in the forge and to compete with some of the best,
but, unfortunately, the time has come.
I'm gonna have to ask you to leave the forge floor.
- All right. Thank you, guys.
This was awesome, for sure.
- Good job. - Kyle, amazing job.
Honestly, I feel great.
I mean, it was an amazing experience.
I'm super happy for kyle.
I had a feeling that handle was gonna get me,
but I busted my butt,
and honestly did the best that I could,
so I don't have any regrets.
- Well, kyle, congratulations.
You'll be leaving here with the title
"forged in fire" champion and a check for $10,000.
Congratulations. - Thank you.
[applause]
my wife's gonna be super pumped
when I tell her that I'm the next "forged in fire" champion.
- What are you gonna do with that cash, man?
- My wife and I are probably gonna use it
for a down payment on a house.
- That's absolutely fantastic. - Nice, nice.
- Cool.
- 18 months ago,
I would've never imagined being here today.
Hell, yeah. I'm "forged in fire" champion.
[laughs]
♪ ♪