Metallurgical Study of a Japanese Sword by Using Neutrons and Muons

Abstract

Japanese swords are an interesting research object from the metallurgical point of view since characteristics and making process have not been fully elucidated. To a Muromachi era sword, we applied, as nondestructive methods, a neutron Bragg edge transmission method to obtain space dependent crystallographic information, and a muon decay method to obtain carbon content. Crystallographic characteristics were inhomogeneous and carbon content was low. The results suggest existence of two types of iron, low carbon iron in body and higher carbon at the edge.