1084 HT questions

[John Hoe Handle]

I have only worked with 1084. About every knife I make comes out very slightly warped.

I HT with a 4" pipe in coal forge. I start with the handle side first, then turn, and then take it to critical by watching for the recalesence pt. And let it cool to black. I do this two time or so since I am forging. I take back to critical, check again the recol pt. put back in for 20 sec or so, and quench in Parks 50. I then sand down a section and put in toaster oven at 400F for an hour.

I do look for the warp out of parks after 10 secs in the oil. I generally don't see a warp. But its hard to tell with smoke and all. I used to put my blade on the anvil to cool, but figured that was giving my warp. So last time I put in my vise handle side vised.

I am wondering if my tempering process is causing this warp due to blade sitting flat in the oven on top a burner. Wonder if I should make a jig to hold the blade not flat? Or try to temper with a mapp torch.

I usually find the warp when grinding the flats on the platen.

 

[john april]

in my experience warp usually comes from uneven grinding. once i started checking to see that my bevels were the same distance from the spine on each side with calipers, and my edge went right to the centerlines, most of my warp problems went away. i made an M shaped strip of thin sheet metal to put on the tray in the toaster oven so the blade stays straight up and down, and does not lay on one side, which would heat it unevenly.

 

[skillgannon]

I have been using the convection setting on our oven since we got it and it seems to work well

 

[bill may]

Try a different oil. Parks is for my understanding is made for a quick hardening 1084 does not require this, canola oil works well with 1084

 

[Ian Fifelski]

Try a different oil. Parks is for my understanding is made for a quick hardening 1084 does not require this, canola oil works well with 1084

parks is reccomended for all 10xx steels. You will get much better results with 1084 in parks.

 

[Willie71]

parks is reccomended for all 10xx steels. You will get much better results with 1084 in parks.

Correct. 1084 doesn’t need to quench as fast as W2, but it’s still a water quenching steel.

 

[Don Hanson III]

Quench for 5-8 seconds, then wipe the smoking oil off the blade and straighten with your hands, gloves and or a rag is recommended. You will have close to one minute to get er done.

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

What Don said!

Also, once you straighten the warp, clamp in your quench plates. Even clamping between two flat plates of steel will help keep it straight as the structure transforms at 400F down to 200F.

 

[John Hoe Handle]

I visibly do not see the warps after quench. Only reason I know I had warps was my makers mark started disappearing when I was grinding the sides flat.