Advice for rolled bowie.

jobasha11 said:
So whats the consensus? Grind it back and sharpen it to test again or avoid the possible loss of even more width and grind the handle off to re-heat treat?
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I'd send it back to be ht again. It looks like it is way too soft and I wouldn't think there would be any improvement if you ground the edge back a bit.

When it gets back to the heat treater, maybe they can do a Rockwell test before they ht it again. This would answer some questions for you.
 
jobasha11 said:
So whats the consensus? Grind it back and sharpen it to test again or avoid the possible loss of even more width and grind the handle off to re-heat treat?
Click to expand...
Just got a zoomed look at those rolls-that needs to be re-heat treated. 52100 at 59-60 should have chipped when pushed that far IMO.
I have once or twice, as an experiment differential hardened blades using the torch (I differential harden almost everything) with the handles on (both Nepalese khukuris that I didn't want to pull the handles off of, but that i liked and were too soft. BIG heat sink clamped to the choil and working quickly-then torch tempering by eye. I would NEVER do that on anything that might get out of my hands but a) it worked, and b) you learn a lot about your steel and what can/can't be gotten away with. It's an option (though you don't have a lot of room for heat sinks between grips and edge, so you may well be stuck knocking the grips off anyway).
 
You have nothing to loose by grinding it back and putting a new, higher angle edge on( try 30-40 degrees included).

My concern is that the existing edge easily bends without breaking off metal. I would have expected chunks out of it by now.

If the edge still is soft and you don't want to tear it apart ( understandable), you can just clean it up, put a sharp edge on, DON'T chop with it...and make it a shelf queen.
 
I figured if I put an edge on it and it failed again, I would have to grind it back even more if I wanted to re heat treat as to avoid warping.

Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
If the edge still is soft and you don't want to tear it apart ( understandable), you can just clean it up, put a sharp edge on, DON'T chop with it...and make it a shelf queen.
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"Dont chop"... I can't understand these words together:confused:

I want to make it useable no matter what the results are. Even if that means destroying my handle:(
 
I was finally able to Rockwell test it.

Drum roll please,








Reading of 53 on the ricasso... damnit.

I wont bother putting an edge on it. I'll email Peters this thread and asking him to call me when when he reads it.
 
You'll get quicker results just calling them directly. Ask for Brad Stallsmith.
 
What I'm trying to say is he's not exactly johnny-on-the-spot when it comes to e-mails ;). If he doesn't know the pics are in his email, he's not going to call back...
 
I would have thought it'd chip before it should roll that badly. Did it look the same when you got it back as when you sent it? I wonder if they somehow missed the blade altogether.

The handle looks really nice. Bummer.

I'd try some cutting of corrugated cardboard. If it rolls at an unreasonable number of cuts (against a blade that you know is good) I'd call it a bad ht.
 
Edge was ground too thin
Looks like a flat grind taken to almost zero. Needs at least 17-20 deg primary edge for that kind of use.
Still should not have gotten those small divots from a knot. What Stacy said is correct.
 
Omega Leather Works said:
I would have thought it'd chip before it should roll that badly. Did it look the same when you got it back as when you sent it? I wonder if they somehow missed the blade altogether.

The handle looks really nice. Bummer.

I'd try some cutting of corrugated cardboard. If it rolls at an unreasonable number of cuts (against a blade that you know is good) I'd call it a bad ht.
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Yeah its a shame about the handle... well, the knife too.

There was scale and looked the same as the other blades in the batch. Im fairly certain now its a bad heat treat. The only other option is a bar got mixed up in my order from Aldo.

Hankins said:
Edge was ground too thin
Looks like a flat grind taken to almost zero. Needs at least 17-20 deg primary edge for that kind of use.
Still should not have gotten those small divots from a knot. What Stacy said is correct.
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It was at .015". While that was probably a bit thin in hindsight, it shouldn't have resulted in this.
 
Hankins said:
Edge was ground too thin...
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I strongly disagree. I've made plenty choppers/camp/combat/survival knives out of various alloys with edges that thin (.015" or less) at 58Rc, tested 'em pretty dang hard, and none of them just smooshed over like that. None of them chipped out or broke, either. FWIW, all of my blades to date have been HT'ed by Peters'.

In my experience, good steel with very keen geometry and pro-level HT will withstand a helluva lotta abuse. Much more than you might expect. There's something very wrong here...

Josh's pics and descriptions do not show "minor rolling", they exhibit major deformation. That just ain't right. I doubt very much that it was caused just by grinding too aggressively after HT, and I strongly suspect that grinding it back further ain't gonna "fix" it.

Josh has said he had the knife independently tested, and it came out to only 53Rc. That's WAY too soft for a camp knife, and goes a long way towards explaining why his knife just bent in that manner.

My guess is, unless the steel just isn't what his vendor said it was (it could happen), something's deeply wrong with the HT. That could happen, too. If it were my blade, I'd be making Brad's phone ring every hour on the hour until we figured out WTF is going on.

I have no dog in this "fight" but I do have full confidence that Brad will bend over backward to help Josh figure this out and make it right. :thumbup:
 
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Spalted said:
I have only sent one box to them so far, out of 120 knives only 6 were actually tested.
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That's not good. IIRC it says on their website that every knife is tested. I've used trugrit in the past and they test EVERY knife.

jobasha11 said:
I was finally able to Rockwell test it.

Drum roll please,








Reading of 53 on the ricasso... damnit.

I wont bother putting an edge on it. I'll email Peters this thread and asking him to call me when when he reads it.
Click to expand...

That's unacceptable. I was actually considering Peters for my next batch(because it would be cheaper than Trugrit for a larger batch), but after this I don't know.

Man that's gotta suck. Going to all the trouble of finishing the blade to the best of your ability and then having it be useless. All it would have taken was a minute or two to do the hardness test...
 
I have sent a fair number of batches of 15 to 20 blades ea to Peters for heat treatment. Every blade came back with a Rc test spot which was easy to see by the buffed off area and divot from the diamond. Jess
 
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