Photos Broken section of steel - grain too coarse?

M

MinusFortyForge

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Jan 26, 2025
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I want to show you folks some pictures of a chunk of 1095 i heated and quenched - i think the grain may be a bit coarse but i'm not sure if this is around what to expect or not.
thickness is a bit less than 2mm, width of the bar is about 1.75"
Quench medium was water
 
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I cant click on the pictures to make them bigger but I don't think it's ever a good idea to quench in water. You should definitely get some Parks 50 to get the best quench.
Also the temperature at the quench matters a lot. Are you doing your heating in a forge or HT oven?
Linus
 
Unfortunately, when I click on the first photo I get a "oops..." message.

The second photo when clicked on shows very large grain. Looks like coarse salt or sand. Ideally it should just be a smooth grey surface.
 
The coarse grain makes me think it was greatly overheated. If done at 1475-1500°F and quenched in water it should have very fine grain.
 
Thank you folks! I was gauging by colour and it was an orange colour that makes me think about 1600-1700F, was aiming for 1500.
Forge, charcoal heat. Always seems to look a lot less hot than it really is!
 
Be careful with your picture links. The third one has ads that are definitely NSFW.
 
Hi,

The steel has been overheated. It should appear as very fine, white-gray after breaking, without shiny spots. For carbon steels the color should be somewhere between low to medium red before quench. Orange is too much. You can put a long peace one end if the fire, so that one end is heated to yellow, another end remains dark. Then quench it and break into many small pieces right after. In this way, you can see how the steel responds to different temperatures for quenching, from the same peace of material.

Regards
 
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