"English Two Rod"

"It's usually very difficult to count the layers of metal as you cannot distinguish the welds between the individual ropes and the welds at the edge of the ribband. Each rope (or 'iron') produces the left side of one whorl (or scroll) and the right side of another. You cannot see and identify with certainty the boundry of the riband and count the number of ropes in the ribband which is by definition the number of 'irons' in the pattern." "The size of the swirl pattern on Crolle Damascus can be helpful: the swirls run about 1/2 inch width on two-iron and about 1/8 inch width on 6-iron."