Original subtitles

- I'm Caleb Ledford, I'm 18 years old,

and I'm from Young Harris, Georgia.

I'm trying to prove that, as young as I am,

I can actually make a name for myself and show everybody

that small-town kid can do big things.

- My name is Zach Batanyan. I'm 19 years old.

I get a lot of emotional satisfaction

out of bladesmithing.

And it brings me a lot of joy

to struggle through and fight through,

and the end product is usually something functional,

yet beautiful.

- My name is Forrest Ketner.

I'm 58 years old.

Favorite part about bladesmithing

is just putting all the details together

and getting a finished product.

I'd like to really finish strong

and have a blade that looks like what the judges asked for.

- My name is Jimmy Poole.

I'm 68 years old.

I wanna do this competition

because I can brag about it forever,

and I can't wait to get on the--the floor.

And I'm gonna kick some butt out there.

- Bladesmiths. Welcome to the Forge.

You're here for three rounds

of timed edged-weapon making competition

that will reveal to us

which of you is our next "Forged in Fire" champion

that walks out of here with a check for $10,000.

All of your progress will be monitored

by our panel of expert judges,

and these are the guys that make that decision.

So I'll introduce you now.

Up first,

two-time "Forged in Fire" champion, Ben Abbott.

Next, historic weapons re-creation specialist,

David Baker.

And last, edged and impact weapons specialist,

Doug Marcaida.

All right, bladesmiths.

I don't know if you noticed or not,

but we've got a multi-generational crew

of smiths in here today.

We've got Gen Z versus the Baby Boomers.

We've got HDTV versus black-and-white TV.

And in today's competition, it's gonna be old-school...

Versus new school.

In our first round of competition today,

you guys will have to choose

whether or not you're gonna forge an old-school bowie

or a new=school bowie.

If you choose to forge an old-school bowie,

you must make it out of this bar of 1095 mono steel.

Sounds easy enough, right?

However, you cannot use Big Blu.

You cannot use the presses.

You just have to use elbow grease.

If you choose the new-style bowie,

you must make your blade

out of these stacks of 1095 and 15N20 steel.

It must be a 50-layer Damascus pattern.

However, you have full access

to all of the power equipment here in the Forge.

- If I got with this old-school approach, you know,

I don't have a power hammer, hydraulic press.

But I don't have that anyways,

so I'll just stick to the ole old power hammer...

Right here.

You'll have just three hours

in this first round of competition

in which to complete your work.

If you make it to the second round,

you'll have a chance to attach handles to those blades

so that we test them for strength and durability

in a horn chop

and for edge retention

in the dreaded apple slice.

Keep an eye on the clock. Pay attention to the details.

Failure to meet a single one of our parameters

is grounds for immediate dismissal from this forge.

Good luck, bladesmiths.

Your three hours starts now.

- Ooh, look at that. - Zach's going old-school.

- Old-school, old-school. - Three old-schools.

- And one new school.

- The old-school is just one piece of steel.

I'm also looking at the shape of the blade.

The new school has more curves to it.

It's got brass guards. It's flashier.

The old-schools? Eh, it's just a knife.

So I'm taking the simple way.

I'm gonna choose the old-school,

and then I don't have to worry

about forge welding or anything.

- Now, one's no harder than the other

when you take away the power tools, right?

- Right; I mean, the only thing is, do you have the endurance

to pound on a bar or a one-inch square?

- That's a big piece of steel,

but I'm feeling strong.

I can pound it all day long.

All right, baby. I'm ready to go.

- I might be young, but I guess I'm an old soul.

So I go straight for the old-school.

- The difference between an old-school bowie

and a new school bowie is perception.

New-school bowies tend to be perceived

as having recurved blades or pins

or aggressive points with multifaceted handles,

While the old-school bowies have a blade that cuts

and a handle you can hold on to.

And it still falls within that visual thing.

You look at it and you say, "Oh, that's a bowie."

- Yeah.

- Now we wait for it to get hot.

I'm the old-school guy.

I decided to go with the mono steel.

I've done canned Damascus and layered Damascus,

but I heard him say "50 layers."

And if something doesn't stick,

it could really create problems down the road.

But mono steel, I'm gonna have to beat it out.

So I think I'll test my arm today.

- We've got three smiths

who really chose the tough route here, physically,

and then we got Caleb.

Even after he gets his 50-plus layers,

he's gotta create a pattern into that blade,

draw that out again, and make his shape.

- When I see all the competitors go

for the mono steel and the old-school technique,

at first, I was a little worried,

maybe second-guessing myself,

thinking that maybe I went for the wrong challenge.

But then I realized that I have all of the power tools

for myself.

But still, there's also a setback

because I have several more steps

that need to be completed.

It takes a lot of time with the Damascus

compared to where they are right now

with the rest of their steels.

Um, I feel a little bit behind,

but by the time I get everything going,

I feel like I can get back ahead.

- The 1095 is pretty chunky,

and I figure, with a square piece of metal,

if I beat it down on the square side,

it's gonna be a whole lot harder to move

than to beat it down diagonally

where I'm just beating on the corners.

- What I do love about what Forrest is doing:

he's hitting the diamond down.

- Okay.

- Which will get you to that two inches wide

that you're looking for really rapidly.

- First couple of strikes,

I notice the 1095 is kind of hard to move.

It started reminding me

that I'm not as young as I used to be.

What are you doing over there?

You're using the big hammer, huh?

- Yeah, yep.

- That'd wear me out after about four blows.

- Hey, look at Zach.

That is the exuberance and energy of youth, right there.

- It'd be nice to be young again, wouldn't it?

- Yeah, it would be.

- It's pretty repetitive,

just heating, hammering, heating, hammering,

drawing this massive steel out.

But that's my favorite part.

My hammer technique is pretty simple.

I'm just going to the rhythm

of the music that's playing in my head.

Right now, I'm uh, hammering this to some Wu-Tang Clan.

- ♪ Yeah

- But you know, later,

later I'll be hammering to some Slayer.

- ♪ Yeah

- Whatever in the mood is, yeah.

- That's a big dude who moved a lot of steel

very, very quickly and very effectively.

- Yep.

- Once I get the metal into critical welding temperature,

I give it a couple of light taps just to set the weld.

And then after that,

I can really just lengthen the metal all the way out.

- Bladesmiths!

90 minutes has elapsed.

That is half the time in the round!

- I started off with 12 layers of the steel.

I need to just cut it into five different pieces.

- So Caleb's got a five stack.

If he can get this weld to stick,

he will have made 50-plus layers.

- Yeah. - At this point,

60 layers, actually.

- Yep.

- Oh, every time Big Blu turns on I get mad.

I'm heating this steel,

and I'm pounding the hell out of it.

I heat, hit, heat, hit, heat, hit, heat, hit.

And I'm starting to get cramps,

and the steel just ain't moving very good.

- Jimmy and Forrest both are hurting right now.

- Yeah. - Yeah, but you can see

a difference, though.

With Forrest, he's moving the metal.

And Jimmy, I mean, he's hammering,

but it's not effective strikes.

Stop moving the metal.

- Maybe when he's not looking, I'll take his steel.

Swap with him.

- Yeah, there you go.

- I'm trying to cut my tang in,

because I know I don't have the energy

to beat that in.

And I already have the length I need for the knife.

- Is Forrest cutting in a tang right now?

- Yeah. - You know what?

If you're getting tired,

why hit something you can just cut away?

- Exactly. - It makes a lot of sense.

- Bladesmiths! 60 minutes!

- I'm feeling pretty good.

My blade is starting to take shape.

- Zach's hammered that down to a pretty nice bowie profile.

- I'm makinghe bowie that I make all the time at home.

Steep clip point, big belly,

and, uh, I'm making it to be able to survive a horn chop

and at the same time still be able to slice cleanly

through some apples.

- Twisting wrench.

- He's going for a twisted pattern.

- Ah.

- I'm hoping so much that while I twist it

I don't see any delaminations in the steel

and it starts to come apart,

because that means all this hard work

that I've put into the metal is just for nothing.

I'm gonna have to restart.

- Caleb's got another full twist.

- Tight.

- The more you twist,

the better that pattern's gonna be

all the way to the end of the blade.

- Right now, I just twisted my billet of Damascus,

and I'm getting ready to flatten it out

and then grind off some of the rest of the outside.

I'll really be able to power through

and get my knife forged out and shaped fairly quickly.

So I'm thinking I made the right choice

with the power hammer.

- This metal's tough, and it's taking a while to cut.

I'm worried about not finishing.

We have to beat the clock, and it is running down very fast.

On the grinder, I'm trying to

get the bevel right on the blade

and get a sharp edge on it

before I go through the quenches.

My blade's plenty heavy,

but hopefully I'll have more time to work on that later.

- You know Jimmy's fading fast.

Exhaustion has really taken its toll.

- I'm pounding like hell, and ain't nothing happening.

I need a little more.

Every time I raise this hammer, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts.

My arm is dead,

but I still gotta get another half inch

on the end of this blade.

I don't think I'm gonna make it.

I can tell my arm's not gonna make it.

So all I gotta d is just pound away

and go to the grinder as soon as I can

so I can get the bowie shape ground down

versus hammering it down.

- 30 minutes, bladesmiths!

- Okay, I've got it, baby.

The grinder is gonna save my ass.

That's for sure.

- Does it move faster

under the hammer or under the grinder?

That's the question. - Hammer.

- The hammer? - Yeah, always.

- Okay.

- I'm thinking if Will will just turn around

and talk to those other judges,

I'm'na sneak over and pound a couple on Big Blu.

If I'm caught, I think they'll take pity on the old guy.

I hope, anyway.

- Looks like he might have two inches of height

and the length that we're looking for.

- Yes. - Really?

- Yeah, but it looks dangerously lean to me.

- Right now, I'm just working on the profile of my blade.

I've already got a rough forge on it,

so now I'm getting a rough grind.

And then I'm gonna go from there and get it heat-treated.

- Man, that looks like a hot blade.

- I could have the prettiest blade on the planet

but if the heat treat's not good,

it could break on first impact hitting that horn.

It's hard, it's straight,

it's exactly where I want it to be.

- It's Zach's race to lose at this point.

He's got a nice shape. - Killing it!

- I only have time for one good quench.

- It's a, uh, thick blade.

- It's straight, and I'm happy.

I feel confident that it looks like a bowie,

but I know it's quite heavy.

- I'm getting ready to quench my blade,

and I'm constantly checking it

and making sure I have the correct color.

- All right, so Caleb just quenched.

- It looks good. That made me very, very happy.

So right now I'm just looking

toget a little bit better of a grind on it

and get it cleaned up so that I can get a nice edge on it.

- I think I've got probably the best chance

of having an easy quench than anybody.

It's not gonna warp. It's way too thick to warp.

I've just gotta make sure it doesn't get too hot and crack.

Come on, baby.

It looks pretty good.

I think that's skating.

Thick as hell, but I've got a hard blade.

Hock it off, baby. Come on, come on, come on.

- Five, four,

three, two, one.

Bladesmiths, shut down your machines.

Drop your tools.

This first round of competition is over.

- Whoo.

- That was fun. - Yee-haw, baby!

- Whoo-hoo.

- Weighs as much as my anvil. Hah!

I'm turning in a thick blade,

but it's got my heart in it,

and I want the judges to at least see

what the potential is to this blade.

- All right, all right, bladesmiths.

The time has elapsed in our first round of competition.

We asked you guys to make

10- to 12-inch old-school or new-school bowies.

You got to choose which type of bowie you made.

Caleb, you're the only smith

who chose to go with the new-school method.

Please present your blade to the judges.

- Well, Caleb, this is a light blade.

It's got a nice profile to it.

I really applaud the fact

that you didn't just do half a twist and call it twisted.

And it's evident in the pattern.

The pattern that you ended up with is beautiful.

All in all, well done. - Thank you.

- All right, Zach, you're up.

Please present your blade to the judges.

- The weight of this is nice. It's nice and light.

But the big question I have

is how you're going to set up for that guard and handle.

Right now...

That's about...

as short as I'd want a handle to be,

And there's no guard on here yet.

- All right, Forrest. You're up.

Please present your blade to the judges.

- All right, Forrest. I just see a lot of metal.

Maybe there's a bowie somewhere in here,

which you'd get to grind it all out.

But it does have the characteristics.

You've got a drop-seal point,

you've got your curve there, it's got an edge,

but right now, as it is,

that's just a very thick piece of metal.

Moving forward, you're just gonna have to

spend a lot of time on the grinder

and get it to the weight-- what a normal knife would be

when you're swinging or cutting with it.

- Jimmy, you're up next.

Please present your blade to the judges.

- All right, Jimmy.

First off, there is a lot of weight here.

This is a beast.

There's not a lot of this that screams bowie knife to me.

The tip is kind of coming up

instead of having a clip coming down.

If you move forward from here, there's a lot of meat

that's gotta come off of here.

I do commend you for all the work you've put in,

but this is a very, very thick and narrow blade

in this dimension as well.

- All right, gentlemen,

the judges have made their decision.

It's time for one of you smiths to leave the Forge.

The bladesmith leaving the Forge is...

Jimmy.

Your blade didn't make the cut.

David Baker's gonna tell you why.

- Jimmy, you know, I love watching a bladesmith work

who enjoys what they're doing.

But your blade's far enough away from the shape

we're looking for, that without a forge,

it's just going to move further away from that shape.

And that's why we're letting you go.

- Got it. - All right, Jimmy.

Please surrender your blade.

- My knife had more beef on it than a thousand-pound steer.

So it'd've probably taken me six hours

just to grind enough of it off.

- Thank you. - Loved every minute.

Thank you.

I would've loved to have taken home $10,000,

but I just didn't have what it took to pound the steel out.

Hang in there, guys.

Don't let these punks take you down.

- I'll try not to.

- But in terms of what I did, I have no regrets.

I was just blessed to be here.

- Congratulations, bladesmiths.

You've made it the second round of this competition,

and now it's time to take those tempered blades

and make them fully functional

old-school and new school bowies.

Now, two of you chose the old-school bowie style.

Which means that your handle construction

must be as follows:

You must have a framed coffin handle,

with at least six-pin construction

and a straight guard.

On your new-school bowie,

you must have an S-shaped guard, a secondary guard,

and an acid etch on your blade.

You have just two hours

in which to complete all this work.

At the end of that time,

we'll be testing your weapon's strength and durability

in a horn chop and for edge retention in an apple slice.

Based on the construction of your blades

and how they perform in those challenges,

the judges will select one of you to surrender your blade

and leave the Forge.

Good luck, bladesmiths.

Your two hours starts now.

They're getting their blades ready

for a horn chop and an apple slice.

These blades gotta have the right dimensions

and the right parameters

for the style of blade that they're doing.

We've got one new-school blade out there,

and we've got two old-school.

- First thing I have to do is get the tang

down to a decent size

and getting my brass guard on.

I need to do the hidden tang

with metal on both sides to look like a coffin.

And then two slabs of handle material on top of that.

- This handle construction is no joke.

To do a framed tang handle, it takes time.

- Additionally, he has to take a blade

that's as fat as some handles we've seen

and get that ground down to a blade size.

- I'm not worried about not finishing.

It's just gonna be a heavier blade

if I don't have enough time to grind on it.

- Caleb has to do an S-shaped guard and a secondary guard.

- The handle needs two guards,

so I have to make sure that they fit up properly

with the rest of the handle.

- We've never done a secondary guard on a blade.

What's that gonna be like?

- Secondary guard, it's flat with the back,

and it has a little finger well.

It's a really nice retention device.

It's very comfortable when done right.

- I wanna make sure that at least

my main guard is pretty thick

so that I can grind into it and make the S shape.

And in the secondary guard, I just want a good, uh,

flat but also thick

so that I can make a nice little finger twirl

for the back of it so your fingers fit in comfortably.

- Have to change my full tang over to a hidden tang.

I need a hidden tang in order to make a framed handle.

- Zach has set a coffin handle shape down from the spine,

which is not the right place for a coffin handle.

- Okay. - But it's the right place

for a hidden tang. - Okay.

- Just grind it a little further down

on either side.

Now you can do your frame around that hidden tang.

- I just take my blade over to the grinder

and just start moving some material.

Son of a bitch.

- Whoo!

- I'm holding my blade in one hand

and holding my tang in the other,

and they're not connected, and this sucks.

- Something very, very catastrophic

has happened to Zach's blade.

He was on the grinder, he was grinding on his tang,

and all of a sudden, pew, no more tang anymore.

- The tang breaking off

shows me that my heat treat wasn't good.

I don't have enough time to chase these problems.

I have to fix it quickly and move on.

- This is not one of those fix-its

where you're just gonna, ah, weld this back on.

This is serious.

That junction's where a lot of the stress

of what the strength test is gonna, is gonna test.

- Like, it's a nice deep penetration with the weld.

I'm feeling a little bit discouraged.

I just hope it holds.

- Bladesmiths! One hour has elapsed!

- I have to get the guard on, and I have to put some, uh,

mild steel on the side of the tang

and then put the handle on,

and then I'm gonna work on thinning my blade.

- Forrest is putting a bead

around the frame on his tang.

So he's basically welding up that frame tang.

- My preference on the handle material

is just looking for the right thickness.

I think it's, like, resin with some, uh, color mixed into it.

I think it's the best material to use.

It should do.

- I've spent quite a bit of time on this first guard.

This is a pretty good stopping point

and I really need to get to work

on the first piece of wood in the handle.

- I think the dimensions are off.

I think it's a little small.

- Yeah, it's a very small guard--it's a lowercase S.

- My time is very limited.

I need to finish up what I'm doing

so I can move on to my secondary guard.

- The break happens. I could spend a ton of time

trying to go get this stronger,

but I just gotta move on,

because I still got a lot of work to do in round two.

- Well, it looks like Zach has drawn a little outline

of the handle shape that he wants to cut out of there.

- The plan for my first-ever frame handle

is to cut this piece brass to the shape of a coffin,

so when I put my scales on,

I already have a rough shape

that I can use to form the handle out of.

- 20 minutes, bladesmiths!

- I'm trying to hammer the second handle scale on.

Nuts.

- Forrest's handle is falling apart.

As he's trying to get it all fit together,

it's crumbling.

- I don't have time to start up again.

- So I just saw him put epoxy everywhere

and he's putting bits and pieces back in there.

- I'm just gonna use as much time as I have here at the end

to, uh, sand it smooth so it doesn't hurt the judges' hands

and give it an edge on the blade.

Hoping it stays together to the end.

- That secondary guard,

it's so prominent on the example here.

It is such a defining feature of this modern bowie,

and it's not on Caleb's blade.

- I realize that I grinded the guard too far.

My guard is honestly no longer a guard anymore.

It's more or less turning into just a brass spacer.

I have no more time,

so I just do my best to clean it up nicely.

I just want something that's presentable to the judges.

- Five minutes, bladesmiths!

- I got all three pieces of my handle glued up,

and I need to get my handle onto my tang.

Aw, son of a bitch.

It won't seat all the way down.

- Zach glued his handle scales to his frame and let it dry,

then tried to insert his tang

into a hole that he had now squeezed glue into.

- I'm super frustrated.

And I got half an inch of tang exposed.

My handle is just floating

with a little bit of glue holding it in place.

I make the executive decision,

my handle's not gonna get seated

up any further than it is.

- Pop it off. Grab a drill.

Make it bigger. Stick it on.

- I'm just gonna keep working till the last second,

try to get this thing as sharp as I can.

- Five, four, three,

two, one.

Bladesmiths, shut down your machines!

Stop what you're doing.

The second round of competition is over.

- I'm just looking at my blade.

I'm not pleased with the way it turned out.

I only had two hours

and this was the best I could come up with.

But in my mind I know I could've done so much better.

I'm just hoping that, um,

something just goes well for me at this point.

- Bladesmiths, welcome to the strength test.

To test of strength and durability of your edge

as well as the overall construction of your blades,

I'll be chopping into these horns.

Caleb, you're up first. You ready?

- Yes, sir.

I'm extremely nervous.

Being the first, I'm really kinda the guinea pig

of this test.

I know that this could cause my blade

to just snap in half.

If my blade can do well, then hopefully that means

me continuing on in this competition.

- Well, Caleb, first things first.

Your edge is just as sharp as when I started.

Really nice job,

but the whole handle itself is small.

I mean you could've gone another quarter,

half an inch tall on this guard

and it would've made it easier to grip.

And the other defining feature of this knife

is this secondary guard, and this is almost a spacer.

I would've loved to see this be more proud and better shaped

and closer together.

But your blade held up really well in the strength test.

Very well done. - Thank you.

- All right, Zach, you're up next.

How you feeling?

- A little nervous, but go for it.

- All right, will do.

- I'm feeling a little grim.

Didn't really get my handle where I wanted to.

There's quite a bit of the tang exposed,

and it is the part I welded.

So it's just a weak point.

I'm ready to see it just get destroyed or make it through.

Damn.

- Well, Zach. Got an issue here, huh?

- Yeah.

- I was expecting the tang to break

'cause you've got about a half an inch proud right there

where you welded across.

Where it did break, there is a dark spot in the center,

and that happens when there's a crack there.

These cracks probably happened during quench.

They're from an elevated temperature.

So, uh, no denying that issue.

- Well, Zach, your blade suffered a catastrophic failure

on the very first strike in our strength test,

and you cannot move forward in this competition

unless something goes wrong with Forrest's blade.

Your fate, and your fate, Forrest,

lie in the strength of your blade.

Are you ready for this?

- My handle's not real pretty.

It has a few cracks in it.

There's a lot of epoxy holding it together.

I'm just hoping the knife doesn't break.

- All right, Zach.

You're blade just didn't hold up.

It snapped on the first strike in the weapons test,

suffering a catastrophic failure.

We cannot continue testing with your blade.

You cannot move forward in this competition.

Come on, my friend.

Good job. - I'm disappointed,

but I learned a lot, and I had a lot of fun.

I was full on expecting it to crack right at the tang.

It ended up breaking at some random crack that formed.

I'm just gonna go back home and keep forging.

- Caleb, Forrest, congratulations.

You guys have made it into the final round

of this competition.

Now we're sending you back to your home forges

to recreate this iconic weapon from history.

The Sword of Goujian.

The Sword of Goujian

is an exquisitely crafted jian sword

wielded by King Goujian, ruler of China's Kingdom of Yue.

After brutal battles between the Yue and the Wu,

King Goujian was forced into slavery

in exchange for sparing his people.

After three years of servitude,

King Goujian rebuilt his empire,

conquered the dwindling Kingdom of Wu,

and was bestowed this sword.

Featuring a sharp lethal tip, inch grip,

blue crystal, and turquoise guard,

the sword was just as ornate as it was deadly.

More than 2,500 years later,

the sword was discovered by archeologists

in a remarkable condition.

Still with a razor-sharp edge,

it has been called

one of the most intact artifacts ever found.

Bladesmiths, your final challenge

is to forge a new-school version

of this old-school Goujian.

This one's made out of brass.

Yours should be made out of high carbon steel.

And that your blades fall within

the following parameters:

The length of the blade must be between 21 and 23 inches.

It must be at least 1 3/4 inches wide

as measured at the base,

with a three-inch wide guard

and a disc pommel.

- I like this blade because it's not a dainty, thin one.

It does have some meat on it.

I'm just gonna try making a nice-looking sword,

and make sureit's .

- You'll have just four days at your home forges

in which to complete this work.

At the end of that time, you will return

and present your blades to our panel of expert judges,

and after they've thoroughly tested them,

they'll declare one of you guys the "Forged in Fire" champion

who walks out of here with a check for $10,000.

Good luck, bladesmiths.

We will see you in four days.

- Good luck. - Congratulations.

- We're gonna take on the Sword of Goujian today.

We gotta start at the tip, work back to the tang.

I'm keeping the blade rather thick

because I just don't wanna mess with

any twisting and bending once it quenches.

I am surprised how fast this is coming along.

So far so good.

Now I'm having to get the blade hot so I can quench it.

I'm happy.

I think we have a little quirk in it here and here,

but nothing the, uh, grinder won't take care of.

- Today I have to get started on my sword.

I'm bringing new-school vibes

to this really old-school weapon.

Instead of bronze,

I'm bringing Damascus to the table.

Hopefully, this is just gonna be,

a really, really cool contrast with the pattern

whenever I'm done with it.

All the welds are set good.

I'm getting the metal drawn out.

Good, nice square bar.

From there, I'm trying to go for a twist pattern.

I want quite a few good twists in there.

Pretty tight pattern.

All right, that'll do.

The end of day one,

it's still not a weapon, but it's getting there.

- Today I'm hoping to have my guard fitted on.

Maybe even the handle.

For my guard I'm gonna use a piece of angle iron.

The guard's rounded over.

Now I'm just gonna put a hole through the bottom

to go over the tang.

The guard actually split.

Cracked. All that fun for nothing.

So I have to, uh, start over.

I have a pile of railroad spikes.

That would be putting the, uh, new school

into the bronze metal, old-school sword.

Fits on the tang really nice,

but there's more work to be done.

- The plan for today is to get to work

on actually forging out the sword.

My goal for the end of the day

is definitely to get it quenched.

This thing's getting long.

Just trying to keep it where it's not too thin,

so that when I quench it, everything goes well.

We're about ready.

I'm really just hoping that nothing goes wrong here.

This is the most important step of the entire process.

It's pretty straight.

Excited with the quench. Went well.

- Morning of day three, and I'm tired.

First thing today, I'm gonna make my blade lighter.

Right now the balance

is about five inches in front of the guard.

I would like it to be--

within an inch or two would make me happy.

It's starting to feel lighter.

But I have a lot more grinding to go.

- Okay.

My belt sander just quits.

It's just not coming back on.

There's a lot of meat left on this blade.

I have to take it off.

I'm not sure what I'm gonna do.

I've decided to go grab two extension cords

and uh, run power from the house to the shop.

We got--we got power somewhere else we can use.

Plugged the belt sander into the house power.

And it works.

Hopefully now I can get the edge on the blade.

My blade's looking, uh, fine, and uh--

just needs a little more sharpening and polishing.

- Finally starting to see

that light at the end of the tunnel now.

First thing, I'm gonna start on my disc pommel.

I'm just gonna take this piece of just normal, mild steel,

chop it off,

and kinda try to forge it into a bit of a disc shape.

I'm kind of at a square right now,

and I'm looking more or less for a circle.

I'm just gonna kinda grind and polish off the top

and make it into a truer circle.

Time's running out. I need to sharpen my blade.

And then finally finish and put together the sword.

It's a little twisted.

The handle on the blade is centered,

and it looks centered,

but on the inside as you can see right here,

it's not perfectly centered.

But of course, with a pin and epoxy

and a disc and scroll on the back,

it's gonna be very, very strong.

Forrest really better bring it,

'cause if not, I'm gonna chop him down.

- Caleb, Forrest, welcome back to the Forge.

You guys have had four days at your home forges

to work on your Goujian swords.

Caleb, tell us about your blade.

- The two steels I used was 1095 high carbon

and 15N20 for the blade.

On the handle, a block of ebony,

and then for the disc on the back,

it's just mild steel.

- All right, all right. Forrest, how did it go for you?

- Well, I went 1084 on the blade.

And the guard is actually made out of a railroad spike

with walnut handles and a 2-inch round pommel.

- All right.

Well, we do have an old-school, new-school theme

in this competition.

So we're gonna find out which one of you guys

is our "Forged in Fire" champion.

We're now going to put your weapons through three tests.

There will be a strength test, a sharpness test, and up first,

Doug's KEAL test.

- Bladesmiths, welcome to the KEAL test.

To find out what kind of lethal damage

your weapon will do according to its historic design,

I will take your weapon, deliver some killing thrusts

and blows on this ballistics dummy.

Forrest, are you up for this? - Yes, sir.

- Let's do this.

- I know my blade's heavy.

Hopefully, he doesn't have any rolling, and can control it.

And we'll see what the test ends up like.

- All right, Forrest, let's talk about your weapon here.

It's very forward heavy.

What makes it hard to handle

is you have a very skinny handle right here.

A lot of these movements, your blade went up on contact,

was spinning in my hand.

I had to adjust several times

to make sure that I stay on the edge over here.

Now, the edge is sharp.

Once it makes contact and you slash, it digs deep.

Overall, sir, it will KEAL.

All right, Caleb, you're up. You ready?

- Let's see it.

- I'm pretty excited

because I know this is a really cool test

to see what your blade can do to the dummy,

and I wanna see Doug really go in there

and tear this thing up.

- All right, Caleb.

First up, the blade, in itself, balance-wise,

I think you nailed it.

Now your handle construction:

It's ovoid. It's actually comfortable.

Because of the balance and a very sharp edge,

all the cuts are very, very deep.

Overall, sir, it'll KEAL.

- Bladesmiths, welcome to the strength test:

the gong chop.

To test the strength and durability of your edges

as well as your overall construction

of your Swords of Goujian,

I'm gonna be chopping them into these gongs.

Forrest, you're up first. You ready?

- Yes, sir.

At this point I feel like I'm behind.

Caleb's sword cut a lot better and swifter,

and he could get it to move better than mine

because of the weight,

and I'm just not sure where we're gonna go from here.

- Well, Forrest,

your sword did take some damage on the edge.

There's some rolls sort of crushed in right here.

Your handle is really small.

A bigger handle would've helped me control this really well.

But all that being said,

that much damage in a big strength test like this,

well done. - Thank you.

- All right, Caleb, you're up. You ready?

- Heck yeah, man.

- Well, Caleb, you did a great job with the Damascus.

I love to see this kind of stuff.

It's beautiful.

You're blade is still straight, true.

And the weight on this is phenomenal.

There is one big issue though.

Your handle.

It's loose now.

Your handle is coming apart. I can move it.

And your pommel is also loose.

If these were right and tight and held in place,

then it tends to help

everything else stay where it is,

but just a little bit of play in this guard

can send shockwaves right down the handle.

But, uh, I gotta say that's one heck of a blade.

- Thank you, thank you. - It's just--

you know, this handle that's really causing the issue now.

- Yes, sir.

- So we've got a pretty mobile opening.

Then it has a corresponding split

on the back side of the handle.

- Not only is it loose,

but the material that's loose has sharp edges.

- Okay. - Yeah.

I mean, this would require either taping that up

or wearing a glove.

Now, we're not testing the same as the other one.

- Okay. Ben?

- Uh-huh. Dave, final? - It kills me. Uh, yeah.

Can't. - Doug?

- I agree.

- All right.

Now, we've continued with blades

that had loose parts before...

We've continued with blades

that had split handles before...

- Your handle has cracked.

However, the combination of the two things

has made your blade unsafe to continue with any testing.

And therefore you cannot be our "Forged in Fire" champion.

I'd like to invite you to shake our hands,

shake your competitor's hand,

and then I have to ask you to please leave the Forge.

- I can't blame the judges' decision.

It's definitely unsafe to use at this point,

but that's a good call.

If I could've done it differently,

probably would've put a pin or two in my handle.

It might not have looked as good,

but the use is more important than the looks.

- Thank you so much, Forrest. - It was fun, thanks.

- I appreciate it.

I may not be the "Forged in Fire" champion,

but man, I'm walking out of here with my head held high.

I'm proud.

- Forrest, congratulations.

You are the "Forged in Fire" champion,

and that is a title

that comes with a check for $10,000, my friend.

Good job. Come on forward.

- I'm thrilled that I'm the champion.

Hasn't even soaked in yet,

and next day or two, I'll really realize what's happened.

Being a "Forged in Fire" champion

means I succeeded in the goal that I wanted to reach.

This is for everyone at home,

and I'm coming home a "Forged in Fire" champion.

Yee-haw!