Egde hardening A2

J.Wade

J.Wade

Joined
Sep 3, 2004
Messages
775
Hi guys.

A2 is one of my favorite steels to work with. I have done full heat treat with it worked out perfect. Now I would like to try egde hardening A2 but I dont know how. should I try clay or is there some other trick.



Thanks a bunch
jimi
 
Why edge harden ? A2 is a very good steel and makes for a blade that holds an edge well and is fairly tough. Since it's air hardening I don't know how you could get hardened edge unhardened spine .You could differentially temper using a torch to temper back the spine.
 
Mete is (as always) right.As an air hardening steel you would be hard pressed to harden only part of the blade.If you want different hardness areas,try a differential temper.
 
Sean Perkins used to do a clay coating on the blade and quenched in brine water. He said he broke a lot of blades that way, but the ones that survived are tough mothers!
 
Since A-2 is air hardening I think that it would be possible to get an edge quench. If you used quench plates and only quenched half of the blade between them. You cold clay coat the spine and put your shop vac on exhaust and blow air over the exposed cutting edge hardening it while the clay insulates the spine keeping it soft. Or just turn on the shop vac and draw air over the blade hardening it.
Experiment and let us know how it works out?
Chuck
 
:confused: the problem you have with air hardening steel ...
plates, oil,or air it's going to harden if you take the whole blade over critical...
I'm not sure about A2 but say with 440c you can A/O it and edge quench,
the Other air steels up the line gets much harder to
differentially quench .
like Mete says you can differentially temper by protecting the edge
and draw the rest back

remember
differentially quenching (edge hardening)
differentially tempering (edge already hard)
are two different processes and terms.
 
Phill Hartsfield, as far as I know, has used A2 in all of his blades for decades. He heat treats so that the edge is harder than the back, but not by a lot. I don't know if he would tell you how he does it, but it may be worth a try.

Phill Hartsfield
PO Box 1637
Newport Beach, CA 92659-0637
949-722-9792 714-636-7633
 
If you look at the specs for A2, it peaks in toughness (impact strength) at HRC 60/61. What would the advantage be to differential treatment, other than cosmetic?
 
Thanks a bunch guys. I'll try some of your sugestions and let you know what happens. I know other steels are much better for what I want to do but I have a fair amount of A2 and was intrested when I saw Phill Hartsfield's swords out of edge hardened A2.

Guess I just want to try building a better mouse trap.


thanks
jimi
 
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