Forge D2

B

Billyboyr6

Joined
Feb 21, 2011
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I am new at Bladesmithing, but not at forging and heat treating. Just need advice on what process works best for these small pieces of material.

I have read and read on and on about how hard it is to forge and am full aware of the characteristic's of the material. I work full time in a Foundry and use steam hammers to forge even the most difficult materials. I have a furnace at my disposal for use and and an on site machine shop.

My questions are:
What temp do I forge the smaller pieces of d2 at?
Est. 16lbs each( going to draw out to aprox. 1/4" x 2" flat bars)

And what works best for a heat treating process.

I have information on forging and heat treating d2 but just curious if the process is the same for 16lb parts as it would be for 100 lb parts. Thanks
 
A better question would be WHY forge D2, when there's so many other forgeable steels?
 
I think you'll find that few if any of the folks on here have ever forged down 16lbs of D2.

It's my understanding that pretty much all high-heat forging steels are going to require basically the same heat regardless of size. Especially when you're talking about "small" pieces being 16lbs. To most knifemakers a small piece of steel could weigh less than an ounce.

If you can't find what you need online or in your materials books, then I'd go with the forging process you have listed for larger parts.
 
HT guide says to preheat to 1200-1300f then heat and forge starting between 1850-2000f and stop at 1700f Always cool slowly. To Anneal in a inert atmosphere (or I suppose foil) heat uniformly to 1600-1650, hold for 1 1/2 hr then cool at a rate no faster than 40f per hr.

As I understand it the problems with forging D2 are carbide formation and keeping them down to an acceptable size and repeated high heats can cause profound grain growth. The anneal would probably reset the grain growth, but, I am not sure about the carbide sizes and their tendency to setup in the grain boundaries

Good luck
 
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Danbo said:
A better question would be WHY forge D2, when there's so many other forgeable steels?
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Mostly because it's the best of what material I have to choose from and It's free material, so why not. And it is not difficult to forge d2 when you work in an industrial forge shop. We forge alot more difficult stuff then that. Titanium, inconel, waspaloy ect. Not to be rude but I didn't ask for opinions, just wanted to get some facts from experienced black or (blade) smith's with d2.
 
ib2v4u said:
Forging inconel must be interesting. How hot and how hard do you have to hit it?
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We do mostly aerospace work and that's where all the exotic metals are needed. For I-718 inconel, I think we forge it around 2300 deg. And we use a 3500# steam hammer. 3500 PPI of hammer pressure. And it still moves very slowly.
 
I've forged lot's of D2. I treat it pretty much like any steel, you just have to be careful not to hit it when it's too cool.
 
Phillip, I have been nervous about forging it because I am not sure what to do with it afterwards as far as normalization. What works for you?
 
My books at work say only: forge @ 2000-2050, and furnace cool. Then to anneal @ 1600-1625 for one hr. Per in. (from center out at it's thickest point). And furnace or lime cool But if I forge down to 1/4" in thickness then annealing for only 15 min. once uniformly up to temp. dosent make sence.

Sounds like I will have to do a try out piece and take a BHN reading and see where it ends up.
 
Billyboyr6,

I have never forged D2, here is a link to a book I have that details the forging of knives from tool steel, I haven't looked at it in a very long time.

http://www.amazon.com/Hand-Forged-K...=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1299854849&sr=8-5

I think he details forging all the tool steels including the highspeed ones: A,D, M, O, S & T. I don't think you would use a different temp to forge a 4" x 4" x 4" block vs 1/4" x 2" x 128" bar other than as you get thinner it will gain and lose heat faster due to the increase in surface area.

Steve Seib
 
ib2v4u said:
Phillip, I have been nervous about forging it because I am not sure what to do with it afterwards as far as normalization. What works for you?
Click to expand...

Normalizing doesn't do anything for high alloy steels, except maybe relieve stress. The high alloy content keeps the carbon tied up as carbides, and prevents grain growth. I always break the cutoffs to check the grain size, and so far, it's always been fine.

I just let the forging air cool, then anneal it.
 
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