Hamons and grinding after heat treat

FullyTorque

FullyTorque

Joined
Jun 3, 2013
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407
I'm thinking of making a santoku from 1095 and I'd like to clay quench for a hamon. However, I'm using thin 0.070" stock and single bevel, which (if done before heat treat) is a recipe for warpage as I discovered making the prototype in 15n20 (full quench, no clay). Luckily, I was able to act quickly enough to get it 80-90% straight before the blade fully cooled and then got it near perfect during tempering.

If I grind the bevel in after heat treat will it ruin the hamon?
Could I end up with a nice clean hamon on the flat side and an inconsistent mess on the other?
I'm not expecting some wild whispy hamon, just something simple and clean.

Oh here's how the prototype turned out
 

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The answer varies with your methods, experience, and the exact steel makeup. Most likely you will be good with your idea.

Take a bar or your steel and do a test quench with a 4" piece. Grind a bevel on it and stick it in FC...that will tell you what you want to know.
 
You should be OK. Just grind holding the blade in bare hands, and if it gets too hot to hold, cool it FAST. I've never found reasonable grinding post-HT to mess up hamons much.
 
The best thing to do, of course, is to rig a simple setup to run the belt wet (search this forum to find neat examples)... that would preserve both your hamon and your edge, avoiding overheating concerns.
You want a simple hamon shouldn't have problems grinding post-ht, on the contrary when searching for wispy activity is better not to grind too much below the very surface, where the most of the interesting stuff belong.
Regarding the flat side, be aware to eliminate all the decarburation layer (UNDER the scale), otherwise the knife won't take a proper edge.
I hate straightening single bevel kitchen knives, so i'm in your same boat ;)

Cheers

Stefano
 
Wet grind or by hand if you want goog detail in hamon.

Stefano I [Robert C on HypefreeBlades ] asked for your email to send the information to you .What happened ??
 
Thanks guys. I was kinda thinking that it would take away from the whispy activity that some hamons have, but that's ok.
I've been considering rigging up a gravity fed water system similar to what grizzled gizzard posted a while back. I like to keep my fingers on the backside of the blade when grinding so I dip the blade often. I also have a couple of Zirconium belts from my last abrassives order in anticipation of doing some post HT grinding.
 
It is not mandatory that you'll lose all the activity together with the bulk of the bevel, but for a knife that actually sees kitchen works, any cosmetic feature will soon be lost on food and stones ;)
 
stezann said:
It is not mandatory that you'll lose all the activity together with the bulk of the bevel, but for a knife that actually sees kitchen works, any cosmetic feature will soon be lost on food and stones ;)
Click to expand...

Exactly why I won't do hamons on kitchen knives unless absolutely requested. They don't look near as good after some use.
 
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