Art of the Ninja!

So I have always been a bit of a scholar when it comes to ancient martial arts and weaponry. I have developed an idea and would like any feedback. OK so wrap your brains around this. In the ancient art of sword smithing in ancient China and Japan, the smith would use many folds to build structure and strength into their swords well know fact right. They also did one other thing a little less known about.. They would take a mix of clay, charcoal, oil, and water and make a salve. They would take this salve and run the mixture in a thin coat all the way down the forward part of the blade. Then they would also make small lines going away from this edge that can best be explained as they looked. It looked as if the smith was trying to mimic the way ore would grow in veins in a rock. (World known for some very very strong rocks) then they would reheat the sword then stike a slicing blow into a trough of water. This created hardened steel on the leading edge and veins of strength running from that, while still allowing a sword to flex as it should without snapping itself but still having a low maintenance blade. So The point I get at now is what can be the process for adding invisible structural designs in hardened steal to a bike frame by heating and applying this type of salve? Anyone have much experience with hardening steel?

yeah - this is called 'case hardening'

1 plunge your piece of red-hot lower-carbon-content steel into the case-hardening compound

2 reheat the bizzo back to red-hot

3 clean the cooled work

4 harden the piece 'right out' with a red-hot plunge into cold water or brine

5 temper to desired hardness -

nah... a bike frame is a bit big, and the tubing, if heat treated already (likely) will have its strength/springyness changed, most likely for the worse...

restapukin
X
his mark

i should have said that it's the carbon penetration that is important - the ideal carbon content for tool steel is 4% - that's what you aim for - a good deep layer of carbon steel; pure 'mild' steel is not heat-treatable - 4% carbon steel is very versatile in the way it can be hardened to taste with relative simplicity in the average workshop or kitchen even.

stainless and alloy steels need all kinds of kilns and thermometers and oil baths to heat-treat

I'm talking about doing it like the Ninja and doing only thin lines of structural significance using a salve or mixture of clay, carbon, and oil. Only harden "veins" in the steel for maximum strength without entirely hardenening the frame....Yin, and Yang!