Editing Pattern welding (section)

===Modern decorative use===
Pattern welding is still popular with contemporary bladesmiths both for visual effect and for recreating historic patterns and swords.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023-01-19 |title=Pattern Welding Explained |url=https://www.provos.org/p/pattern-welding-explained/ |access-date=2023-05-19 |website=Niels Provos |language=en-us}}</ref> Modern steels and methods allow for patterns with much higher number of visible layers compared to historical artifacts. Large numbers of layers can either be produced by folding similar to historical processes or by forge welding a small number of layers together, then cutting the billet in pieces to stack and forge-weld it again. This can be repeated until the desired number of layers have been achieved. A blade ground from such a blank can show a pattern similar to wood grain with small random variations in pattern.  Some manufactured objects can be re-purposed into pattern welded blanks.  "Cable Damascus", forged from high carbon multi-strand cable, is a popular item for bladesmiths to produce, producing a finely grained, twisted pattern, while [[chainsaw]] chains produce a pattern of randomly positioned blobs of color.{{sfn|Goddard|2000| pages=107–120}}<ref name=caffery1>{{cite web |url=http://www.caffreyknives.net/damas.htm |title=Damascus Pictorial |first1=Ed |last1=Caffery |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110723034406/http://www.caffreyknives.net/damas.htm |archive-date=2011-07-23 }}</ref><ref name=caffery2>{{cite web |url=http://www.caffreyknives.net/bsteel.htm |title=Bits of Steel |first1=Ed |last1=Caffery |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051215152635/http://www.caffreyknives.net/bsteel.htm |archive-date=2005-12-15 |via=[[Internet archive]]}}</ref>

Some modern bladesmiths have taken pattern welding to new heights, with elaborate applications of traditional pattern welding techniques, as well as with new technology.  A layered billet of steel rods with the blade blank cut perpendicular to the layers can also produce some spectacular patterns, including [[mosaic]]s or even writing. [[Powder metallurgy]] allows alloys that would not normally be compatible to be combined into solid bars.  Different treatments of the steel after it is ground and polished, such as [[bluing (steel)|bluing]], etching, or various other chemical surface treatments that react differently to the different metals used can create bright, high-contrast finishes on the steel. Some master smiths go as far as to use techniques such as [[electrical discharge machining]] to cut interlocking patterns out of different steels, fit them together, then weld the resulting assembly into a solid block of steel.<ref name=caffery2 />

Blacksmiths will sometimes apply [[Wite-Out]], [[Liquid Paper]], or other types of correction fluid to metal that they do not want to weld together, as the [[titanium dioxide]] in the correction fluid forms a barrier between the metal it is applied-to and any other pieces of metal. For example, when creating pattern-welded steel by filling a steel canister with pieces of metal and powdered steel and forging it together into a single mass ("[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/canister%20damascus canister damascus steel],") smiths frequently coat the inside of the canister with correction fluid and let it dry before adding their materials. Thus, when the canister is [[forge welding|heated and compressed using a hammer or pneumatic press]], the material on the inside of the correction fluid is forged together, but it does not forge to the canister, allowing the pattern created by forging the different materials together to be seen in the finished piece because it is not covered by the homologous steel of the canister. {{Citation Needed|date=October 2023}}