asking your advice: 5160 Katana

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DaQo'tah Forge

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I seek advice on the use of 5160 spring steel when making a Japanese katana.

Now I have tried and tried to use the suggested 1050 steel with a water-quench, but I have had nothing but trouble with the resulting cracks.

I wanted to use 1050 steel because that steel gives me a cool Hamon line that I had at the top of my list of things I wanted to have on the Katana.

However after 4 cracked blades, I have bumped "Good Hamon" down on the list.
Right now I think "Good Hamon" appears on the list underneath "Smells good",,,(In other words I just want to not have cracks and I don't care about other things)

Does anyone have any advice on how to quench a long sword like a Katana in oil ?...
what do I do?
how much oil?
what temp is the oil?
how different is the clay-coating on the spine?
 
I don't know about the 5160, but on the 1050 you might try a thin oil quench to avoid cracks. Something like vegitable oil with your normal clay coating and still get the good hammon and curve.

Hopefully someone with sword experiance will chime in.

Good luck
 
Last weekend at Harley's, Howard Clark and Randall Graham did some demos and one or the other stated they had a 20% failure rate. Both are accomplished sword makers.
 
what you might try is some oil on top of the water in your quench tank, just squirt some on there before the quench. ive tried it, and it works pretty good. this oil keeps the blade from getting a really bad shock from the cold water. maybe try boiling water, or really hot water for the quench? its worth a try, test it on some tantos,or scrap blades first as ive never done a clay coated blade before, i just diff. temper, it gives a stronger blade.
 
elvenbladesmith07 said:
what you might try is some oil on top of the water in your quench tank,
Click to expand...

ok, BUT,,,,BUT I read some place, perhaps in a post from one of them real big brains like METE of someone like that who knows everything about sttel, that an oil/water quench does not work...

I think I remember reading that you dont get the best of both worlds, you actually get the wrost of both worlds....

However,,,I must admit,,,I am tempted to try it....I was thinking that about one inch of oil sitting on top of 6-8 inches of hot water might be worth a try,,
My thoughts are that as the hot blade passes into and out of the oil that a thin film of oil would cover the clay and add to the slowing down of the quench there,,,almost like a bit of waterproofing?

But,,,like I said, I think I remember being warned that 'It dont work like that"/...LOL
 
Why couldn't you use 1095? It is very shallow hardening so the clay coating should be more effective. With 1095 if you don't drop from autenizing temp down to below about 1000° in 1/2 of a second, you won't get good martensite transformation. It will be harder than you want for a sword (around 62 or higher as quenched) but you can temper her back to around 51 and have a spring temper on the blade.

Just a thought.


Editied to add: I always quench in 130° oil, not water.
 
I have made several swords and quinch in 140 deg water.Leave in for the count of 5 ,the take it out for the3 count and place back in and let cool. Robert
 
the biggest problem with the oil/water quench is that the water and oil will mix and start to bubble. the foamy stuff wont let the blade harden right. so if you queching a 6inch blade put 1" of oil, and like 10" or more water, and dip the blade all the way to the botoom of the bucket, to protect it from the foamyness. also use a wide bucket for the quench to help keep the oil/water cool. a 5 gallon bucket with an " of oil on the top should work for knives, but for a katana you going to need like a 55 gallon drum. a 55 gallon drum is overkill, but its the the only thing i can think of that would be long enough for a sword, and wide enough to keep cool. a plastic drum wouldnt be bad, because the blade will be nowhere near the walls of the drum. its just takes some expirementation, youll get it!
 
in response to 5160, it makes exelent katanas, 1050 through 1095 are also really good. 1050 isnt that great, its just somewhat historically accurate. the best blades are problly 1095, with a diff.tempering, not a diff. hardening. i personally dont like the clay coat method, its so unpredictable, and it doesnt produce as quality a blade as diff. tempering. but to each his own, and you probably want it to look like a traditional katana.
so in a nut shell, the best proforming, but not historical sword; 1095 with diff. tempering
best looking, but still really funtional sword; 1050 with diff. hardening.
it all depends on what you want.
 
Great posts!

Lots of new things for me to think about...

Im right in the middle of cutting out and forgeing the 5160 steel right now...so thats what this sword will be made of.....

I need to build a thingy to hold 5 foot long/1 foot deep of oil......any ideas?
 
could always weld one out of some cheap mild steel, or get som really big angle iron, and put to halves toghether, and save some time, money, and work.
 
check out www.kukrihouse.com click on "the makeing"
these guys have been water quenching spring steel for years.
I haven't tried it on a Katana but it works for big knives.

Are you useing an interrupted quench when you water quench? In for 2 secs. out for 2 secs. etc,etc,etc...
How thick is your edge at the time of quench? It needs to be a dime thick at least.

I busted a 1050 hawk head clean in two cause I dropped it in the slack tub when I was quenching it.

www.swordforum.com/forge/diff-temp-broadswords.html
 
well.....me and the water quench,,,,,it's a LONG story....

I do use the interupted water quench,,,,But,,,,,,4 blades went "Ting!"

I was useing 1050 steel in the water quench,,this blade will be oil quench with 5160 steel

Im going to use a clay coating to try to get the katana to bend correctly to that spine...

Im not sure I need to do an interupted oil quench yet or not....I will read your advice on that...
 
You might ask Don Fogg but I believe that if you quench in oil your sword is going to bend down instead of up.
 
Bill is correct, a clay hardened blade done in oil can take a set downward. If you get it right on the first or second try, it shouldn't be too noticable. But if you have to re-harden to get the results you want, after a couple tries it will definitely take a downward set.

This is even in a 7" blade. In a sword it can be quite noticable.

The clay set-up can be the same. You can quench from a higher heat and still get the blade hard without cracking (oil vs. water).

Almost all oils, except those that state directly not to... can give you an improved quench by preheating it to the 120-140 degree level. The is a generalization, but one that holds pretty true in my shop for most things.

You'll need a LOT of oil to quench a sword. I recommend a tank that will give you at least a few inches of oil on each side of the sword blade, and is quite deep. Deep enough in fact that you can pass the blade through it as though you're actually cutting the oil downward.

Agitation like this will GREATLY improve hardening results as you're constantly moving "fresh" oil past the steel.

Just some suggestions.

Good luck! :)
-Nick-
 
Im still not sure I understand how to do my quench to get a curve going the correct way?????

The steel Im useing is 5160....
I will use clay,,(however I have not yet decided how to use the clay)

But what shall I use for the quench?

I have the ability to pre-heat both oil or water...

If you guys are telling me that there is just 'no way" to avoid the curve going the wrong way,,,then Im stuck,,,and I cant even start grinding on the rough blade in the morning,,,,

I really need some advice.....I dont know what to do now.
...
 
No, you can do it DaQo'tah...

Just put the sori in it before you harden it. There have been a lot of makers over the years that have done it this way.

You should put just a little more upward curve in it than you want, so that if/when it does take a slight downward set, it will be right where you want it.

5160 water quenched makes a really whicked steel... but I'd HIGHLY recommend you oil quench it. A 1050 water quench is a walk in the park compared to a deeper hardening steel with more alloying elements like 5160.

Just my opinion! :)
-Nick-
 
darn!......

I just think that if I heat and bend the curve into the blade before the heat quench that Im just making a 'fake" blade....

It woule be a fake curve and every time I look at it , it will seem fake to me....

darn,,,this is not going the way I wanted at all....
 
How thick are your edges? I got to playing around with my forge the other day and tried some satanite clay on the back of a rough ground 1050 knife just to see what would happen with a water quench. Yup, cracked it. Course I did it in my cold slack tub, and had a thin edge and no clay on the edge.

Leave the edge thick, put a thin wash of clay on the edge and real thick on the spine and heat the water to nearly boiling and try that.

Go ahead with the 5160, if the smiths of old had had it they would definatly used it! They would just have put a little more bend in it than they wanted and quenched. It's not faking, it's new steel.

Good luck
 
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