cyrogenic treatment

[MikeC]

Steve, there is new cryogenci treatment facility that has opened here in my City and is running heavy advertisment at all of the local outdoor and sporting goods store making some pretty outragoues claims about cryo treatmetn for your knives, tools, guns, fishing reels, etc.

I know a bunch of manufacturers and makers have experimented with cryo treating knives is their anything to this and these claims of being a wonder treatment for metal items or is this mostly hype?

Thanks in advance

Mike C.

 

[yoda4561]

Hype. Cryo has its applications, but it's not some magic wand like some folks want to sell it.

 

[STR]

The debate over this seems to never end Mike. I don't know how much benefit you can obtain from cryo treating a blade thats been out and used and already sold in the market so to speak. In my understanding its only best if its done in sequence with the rest of the steps when making, heat treating, then cryo treating the blade. There may be some benefit after all that to an older blade but again, its not as beneficial based on what I've been told.

Does it work? I believe it does. There are very long diatribes to the contrary and you will hear good arguments both ways but honestly, I have seen differences and could tell you blind which was the better of two identical blades. Don't believe me ok then try this. Go to Jantz supply and buy one of their blanks. Just pick one that Texas KnifeMaker supply also sells the same pattern in. Buy one of each. You'll note that the one from Jantz is not cryo treated but the one from TexasKMS is. You will see just as I did I'm sure that the one from TexasKMS not only keeps a better edge but its just the better blade period. This to me was the real tell and now regardless of what I read I always go back to that $20 test that convinced me.

You can read of other tests in two D2 blades, one an old Safari Skinner I believe by Swamp Rat knives. The other a Dozier. Don't get me wrong here I love my Dozier blades and there is certainly nothing wrong with them but the truth of the matter is they did not keep up with the Cryo treated Safar Skinner in the tests done. Is it bias? You decide. I don't know. I think when cryo is done in the making process as part of the normal steps to make the blade that it adds some stability and even hardness to some steels. Its quite possible there is benefits to doing cryo treatment later after the blade has been made and heat treated and out for a while and for all I know its just as beneficial but again, not being a scientist on metallurgy I really can't drift off in to that speculation and thats all it would be from me being the back yard user of knives that I am. I have seen differences though as described above when I made a set of knives for my sister. I bought one of each of a particular pattern and liked that one so I bought more later for myself. I don't have them anymore but I do feel that there was a noticed difference between the cryo treated one and the non cryo blade. To me it was not a matter of me just thinking there was a difference. I really saw it in use. The blade simply cut better for longer its that simple. Hope that helps.

STR

 

[MikeC]

Thanks, I knew I could count on you to provide me with some real insight and into laymens terms. Appreciate you taking the time share your knowledge and experience.

Thanks again

 

[Guyon]

I think when cryo is done in the making process as part of the normal steps to make the blade that it adds some stability and even hardness to some steels.

Just yesterday, I saw a really old post by Jerry Busse about this topic. Here's what he had to say about cryo and INFI. This is about as close to the proprietary Busse treatment as you're going to get, I suspect.

Busse has been doing cryo since the early 1980's. Back then it was a very primitive process involving an old cooler, dry ice and about a gallon of acetone. Process: pack the blades in dry ice, pour the acetone over the ice to speed the evaporation process, and hit somewhere around the -190 degree mark. Do a normalizing temper (approx. 350 - 450) and voila! Prehistoric Cryo!

In the late eighties we began the employment of a deep cryo treatment (-300/320 degrees) which was done in a dry, controlled, atmosphere. This process allows us to take our blades down to temp. over the course of 10 hours hold them at temp. (-300 degrees) for approx 50 hours, and then bring them back up to room temp. over the course of the next 10 hours at which point they receive 3 more, individualized, oven tempers. This is the same process that we employ to this day.

Some makers are out there just plunging their blades into liquid nitrogen which can shock the steel so dramatically that microscopic cracks and fissures can form that could cause massive blade failure in the field under heavy and/or light use. That is why it is crucial that the blades be cooled slowly and brought back to room temperature slowly and then normalized with a few oven tempers for stress relief.

Of course there are also some makers that I know of who claim to employ cryogenics because they stick their knives in the freezer over night. Scary! Alway ask the maker to give as much detail of his cryo process as possible.

Knowledge is power! Arm yourself!

Yours in Nuclear Cryogenics,

Jerry Busse

 

[STR]

Thanks Guyon for bringing that here. Its good info. :thumbup:
We'll have to remember this is here because something tells me that your post just now will be much easier to find here in my forum for reference in the future as opposed to trying to find it over at Jerry's place.

STR

 

[Guyon]

Thanks Guyon for bringing that here. Its good info. :thumbup:
We'll have to remember this is here because something tells me that your post just now will be much easier to find here in my forum for reference in the future as opposed to trying to find it over at Jerry's place.

STR

I was surprised to find as much detail in that post as I did. Most often, people speak of the Busse "proprietary process" in a hushed, veiled manner. I realize Jerry's not giving away the whole can of beans, and he knows the post is here at BFC. Still, that's quite a bit of info that you don't normally see brought back up. I've seen the "80 hours" mentioned quite a few times, but never unpacked in that much detail.

Jerry mentions the cryo process in one other thread (from 1999) that has since been locked. There, he states,

I started doing shallow cryo. with dry ice and acetone as an accelerator, in 1984. We have used deep cryogenics for the past several years. We cryo our blades in a dry, controlled atmosphere. This allows us to take them down to temp. at a very slow rate (10 hours) and hold them down there for a long period of time (48 hours) and then bring them back up slowly (10 hours). They are then normalized with a low temp. oven temper. All in all we do a little over 80 hours of heat treating and tempering. The dry atmosphere with long cycle times has really paid off for us in the performance department.

I imagine then that the Safari Skinner you mention above was subject to some kind of similar treatment. That knife BTW is a great hunting knife and one of my favorites.

 

[alejandrino]

Just my two cents !! Cryo does work well if done properly like mr. Busse says. There was an article a while back in one of the knife mags and it was proven to work well increasing overall edge holding. I think this is also done on other cases like gun barrels or metals to increase hardness.