Steel Bars, Rods, and Blanks

Knifemakers buy their material from us. Alongside finished blades, we forge and sell Damascus steel bars, rods, and blanks, so other makers can start with a billet that's already pattern-welded and ready to shape.

That's the useful part of buying from a forge rather than a supplier. We work this steel every day into knives, axes, and rings, so what we sell as stock is the same material we put our own name on.

Every listing gives the dimensions, the pattern, and the condition the piece arrives in, whether that's a rough forged bar or a profiled blank ready for grinding.

Shop Steel Stock and Blanks

Choose the stock that matches your workflow, whether you're forging from raw material, grinding a pre-profiled blade, or fitting an axe head to a haft. Compare the listed dimensions, pattern, material condition, and other specifications before ordering.

• Damascus steel bars: Flat stock for makers who want to forge, shape, and grind their own blades or other projects.
• Damascus steel rods: Round stock suited to pins, fittings, guards, jewellery, and other projects that start with a round section.
• Knife blade blanks: Pre-profiled blade stock for makers who want to focus on grinding, handles, finishing, and other later stages of knife making.

• Axe head blanks: Forged axe heads with formed eyes, ready for fitting and finishing with a suitable haft.

Damascus Steel Bars

A Damascus bar is a billet of pattern-welded steel, forged from layers and ready to be drawn out, shaped, and ground into a blade. The pattern is already in the steel, so what you do with the bar determines how that pattern appears in the finished piece.

Our steel bars are sold by dimension, and each listing states the thickness, width, and length, along with the pattern. Check thickness first: a bar thinner than your intended blade spine leaves nothing to work with, while an overly thick bar means more forging and more material lost to the grinder.

When you're comparing steel bars for sale, ask what the bar has been through. A bar that's already been forged, straightened, and normalised is easier to work than one straight from the weld. We state the condition on each listing.

Damascus Steel Rods

Damascus steel rods are round rather than flat, and they suit different work. Makers use them for pins, bolsters, guards, handle fittings, pen bodies, and jewellery, where a round section is the starting point.

A solid steel bar in round section can also be forged flat if you want the pattern to move in a particular direction, since forging a round bar down changes how the layers present on the surface. Both steel round bars and flat stock start from the same billet; the section just determines what's easiest to make from them.

Round steel bars are listed by diameter and length.

Knife Blade Blanks

A blank is a blade that's been profiled but not finished. Damascus knife blanks arrive cut to shape, usually with the bevels ground or partially ground, leaving you the final grinding, heat treatment if it hasn't been done, handle fitting, and sharpening.

Blanks suit makers who want to focus on handles and finishing rather than forging, and anyone building knives without a forge of their own. They're also a practical way to learn: you can put a handle on a blank and have a working knife without ever lighting a fire.

Each listing for our knife blade blanks gives the overall length, cutting edge length, thickness, tang shape, and whether the blank is heat-treated and to what hardness. Check the tang type before ordering, since a full tang, hidden tang, and stick tang each need a different handle approach.

Axe Head Blanks

Axe head blanks are forged heads with the eye formed, ready for a handle. They save the hardest part of axe making, which is drifting the eye accurately while keeping the head sound.

Listings state the head weight, eye dimensions, and bit length, so you can match a haft before ordering. Eye dimensions matter more than anything else here, because a haft that doesn't fit the eye means reshaping the haft or the eye, and neither is quick.

Working With Damascus Stock

Damascus behaves differently from mono-steel in a few ways worth knowing before you start.

Etching reveals the pattern

The layers are invisible on a ground surface until you etch. Finish your grinding and hand-sanding first, then etch; grinding afterwards removes the etch you just created.

Grind before heat treatment where you can

Working hardened Damascus is slower and burns through belts, and overheating a hardened blade at the edge ruins the temper.

Sand thoroughly

Deep scratches show up sharply once the steel is etched, so finish to a consistent grit across the whole surface before the acid goes near it.

Expect carbon steel behaviour

Damascus made from high-carbon steels rusts. Keep stock oiled in storage, and oil the finished piece too.

Choosing What to Order

If you forge, start with bars. They give you the most control over the final shape and let you move the pattern where you want it.

If you grind but don't forge, start with steel blanks. You skip the forge work and go straight to profiling, grinding, and handles.

If you're fitting hafts, axe head blanks let you concentrate on the handle and the hang.

If you're making fittings or jewellery, rods give you the round section those pieces start from.

To see what the material looks like finished, browse our Damascus steel knives.

Bulk and Trade Orders

We supply makers ordering in quantity as well as one-off buyers. If you need a specific dimension, pattern, or quantity that isn't listed, contact the forge and tell us what you're making. We'll tell you what's possible before you commit.