Heat treating at home?

Chiro75

Chiro75

Joined
Feb 4, 1999
Messages
5,786
I am going to be receiving some D-2 in 5/32" thickness and these will be my first knives. I will use files and a Dremel. Iy was recommended that I do my own heat treat at home by Sean Perkins and wanted some input from anyone who has done this or had similar experiences...
Sean recommended using a Bernzomatic to take the edge to orange color, then quench the knife in water. He said this may cause a little warp, but it usually can be ground out. Sean then recommended tempering in an oven at 400 degrees for one hour, then testing the hardness, and repeating the tempering in several cycles until I had the hardness I wanted. How well do you think this will work?
I like the idea of being able to grind a knife and heat treat it at home, both from a financial as well as time and control aspect! I guess Sean uses a similar process on his knives of A-2 and even ATS-34, so it should work just as well on D-2. Anyway, any input or hints would be appreciated. I'll keep people informed as to how it works when I try it out (I'll start small with a couple small knives, of course, in case the results are sucky! ;-)

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My Custom Kydex Sheath pagehttp://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/Lab/1298/knifehome.html
Palmer College of Chiropractic
On Two Wheels
 
Sounds good enough to start with. to get a good reading on the blade color, I would make sure you're in some pretty good shade. otherwise, you might over heat.

Also, does Sean know you're using D2? D2 is an air quenching steel and I'd be afraid of water being to fast of a quenching medium. You may double check with him on that. I'd hate to work out a blade and then have it shatter in my watertub.

Steels like W1 and 1095 make good water quenching steels and are supposedly pretty simple and easy to work with. Another option is O1. that's what i'm using and it's prety forgivable. You would do pretty much the same thing and then quench it in oil.

Another thing, when you quench, make sure you dip the blade in straight down. sometimes a vapor layer will form between the quenching medium and the blade so it might help to GENTLY move the blade back and forth, NOT side to side. if you go side to side, the blade will warp.

Boy, I sure seem to get long winded when i think I know something! :-)

Spencer

[This message has been edited by Spencer Stewart (edited 17 July 1999).]

[This message has been edited by Spencer Stewart (edited 17 July 1999).]
 
The following are the rantings of one who knows just enough to be dangerous.
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I heat treat my own knives in 5160 and O1. I use an oxy/acetelene torch and heat the area I want treated to orange and check it with a magnet often. When they`re orange and turn non magnetic I quench them in motor oil. Afterwards I triple temper them at 375 to 400 degrees for about an hour. I`ve tested them pretty hard and they take and hold an edge very well and I haven`t seen any evidence of the edge chipping or anything. The O1 almost seems to get too hard though and it`s a bear to sharpen. I`ve been playing with it trying to get it right. Hope this helps some. Marcus
 

Sorry Spencer but I don't agree with putting the blade straight down on the quench.

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KSwinamer
 
Yes, Sean knows I am using D-2! Just to give you an idea of how extreme he treats his blades, he said when he was using ATS-34, he heat-treated them the same way and quenched in ice water! Not only does the guy beat the hell out of his blades before they leave the shop, but he beats the hell out of the steel before it even becomes a finished product! I figured if these techniques work for Sean, then they should work okay for me, too. I'm making a couple very small test blades, so there won't be more than a couple hour's work there if anything gets trashed.

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My Custom Kydex Sheath pagehttp://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/Lab/1298/knifehome.html
Palmer College of Chiropractic
On Two Wheels
 
How about making one blade to put in water and one in oil? experiment a bit. I know
everybody is tired of seeing me say that but
how else can you find out what works best for you?
goshawk

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http://www.imt.net/~goshawk The race is not always to the swift, but he who hangs loose.
Don't walk in tradition just because it feels good!!!!!

 
That's a good idea, Goshawk, but I'm so inexperienced in this way that I probably wouldn't know the differences anyway! As far as I am concerned, if I can cut with the knife and not have to sharpen it more than once in a while, then I've achieved a LOT! :-)

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My Custom Kydex Sheath pagehttp://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/Lab/1298/knifehome.html
Palmer College of Chiropractic
On Two Wheels
 
Be careful of the color method for telling when to quench. Your eyes will see the color differently depending on lots of variables (humidity, time of day, how you feel, etc.). The magnet test is a better way to go (unless you spend the money for a digital controlled unit). Also, you will probably get better results if you edge quench instead of point quench (edge quench is when the blade is put into the quench medium egde first. Point quench is the point goes in first).
One way to tell for sure if your heat treating method is working is to test a blade to destruction. After the blade has been broken you can look at the grain structure. If it is very fine and looks frosted and kind of like ceramic then you know your heat treatment method is good. You will also know what kind of abuse it took to break it and that should give you a good idea of how well it will hold up. Quench one in water and one it oil, draw them both at the same temp and then test them. That way you will know which works best for you. Take good notes on the process you do so you can repeat it once you have it down.
Hope this helps,
Ravenclaw
 
How about ATS-34? I have a cutting torch outfit and access to good oil,only afraid of
messing up new blade i just ground. Anyone tried this? I was planning on sending it to the heat-treater.
DK
 
Could somebody be more specific about finding the right tempurature with the magnet test? I keep seeing this mentioned but haven't read how this process works.

Thanks,
jj
 
That`s pretty much how I do it. The steel will have to pass red and dark orange then just about the time it hits a nice glowing orange it will become non magnetic quite suddenly. I believe it occurs at around 1450 degrees with 5160,I`m not sure about other carbon steels. Marcus
 
The way I was taught to use the magnet is like this: bring the blade up to a red color slowly and evenly (very important). Check the blade at the tip, middle, and at the tang (riccoso). When all 3 areas become non-magnetic you have reached critical temp. This holds true for all steels though the temps may vary depending on the type of steel being heated. Once all areas are non-magnetic it is time to quench. Something else I would suggest you do before you do the heat treatment is to normalize the blade 3 times. To do this you need to bring the blade slowly and evenly up to critical (non-magnetic) then let it air cool in a room with no air movement until it is under 800F (this is one of the areas where there are lots of oppinions as to the lower temp) then do it 2 more times. Depending on the type of steel used the last time you anneal the blade. I don't anneal my 1084 blades as it is not necessary (most high carbon steel does not need this done either). Someone else will have to interject on what they do for other types of steel for annealing. This will grow very small crystals if done right and make a better blade.
Ravenclaw
 
Ravenclaw, Thanks for the reply...I understand the process now. But you raise another question for me, perhaps this points to my weak understanding of heat treating. Would you "normalize" an air-quenched steel also? If so, then how does the process of normalizing differ from heat-treat for air-quenched steels? [I've never heard of normalization of steel but what you say does make sense, the repeated heating and cooling should cause alignment of molecules into more rigid (crystalline) structures.]

Chiro, I would greatly appreciate you posting your results, if you would. If the process turns out to be relatively straight forward, I'll take notes and try with my first blades. Thanks.

jj

[This message has been edited by jeffj (edited 18 July 1999).]
 

Hello everybody,
I would like to apologise for my response earlier, I'm afraid it came off a little snarky, I was just trying to respond while I was in a rush to take the wife out and I really didn't look at my response then, but I did when I came back and realized, to my horror, that my response seemed a little rude, but it honestly wasnt intended that way. Anyhow I apologise again and especially to Spencer, and hope you all have a good day(or night or morning, depends on when you read this I guess
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)

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KSwinamer
 
Jeffj,
Sorry I can't help on the air hardening steels for normalizing. I started out with them when I was doing stock removal and sent them away to be heat treated, but when I made my forge I quit using them and if I have my way, which I do for now, I will not go back to them. Maybe someone out here who uses air hardening steels will be helpful and respond to your questions.
Ravenclaw
 
No offense was taken from kisu. I've been around guys that are much less tactful in saying what they want to say and I understand that often the tone does not represent any hard feelings. As a matter of fact, my father-in-law is like this.

After an email from kisu, I think we were talking about two different things.

Spencer
 
I've never used ats 34 and don't how it would react to water quench but I have a friend that oil quenches it and then immediatly tempers it with the torch he heated it with by burning off the oil until
a certain flame color. It's an old method
of hardening and tempering that I don't think
is used much any more.
As to normalizing and annealing on carbon steels that I've done. Normalizing is more
of a process to releive stress after forging.
Annealing is a process to soften steel so it
can be worked but it also works on the grain
of the steel.
1084, 1095 and 5160 are spring steels and they will air harden even though they are not considered real air hardening steels.
Normalizing is usually only done once after
forging is completed. Then annealing is done
wich is different in that the steel is cooled
very slow under some what controled conditions rather than relitively fast by air cooling. 1084 will definalely be aided
by annealing. practicly all the carbon steels preform better when annealed.
The process of hardening with a torch and oil quenching whether edge or the whole blade can be done rather simple with the use
of a magnet as mentioned before but the color of the blade is so decieving that even
the most experienced person will be fooled
because of the available light source. the process takes checking the magnet OFTEN or
more. A rule of thumb is spring steel will
demag around 1550 52100 demags around 1440.
Annealing temps are not necessarily the best
up at critical.
My plans are to give more info on some of the experimenting i've done with spring steels and ball bearing steel (52100) with pics after the first of the month. I've have
a show coming up or I would do it sooner.
This doesn't answer the original D2 question
necessarily but I think that you (chiro) could use some cardboard to cut up to see if
there were a diffenence - it would probably
tell you where the hot spots were on the handle if nothing else. Don't depend on EF Hutton on what they have to say find out yourself.
goshawk

[This message has been edited by goshawk (edited 19 July 1999).]
 
Back on the D2 issue. For myself if I were doing it, I would experiment with normalizing it as you really never know what you are getting as far as consistancy in the steel (unless it is certified). Then I would make 3 small blades and quench one in water, one in oil, and air quench the last one. Then I would draw them all at the same temp. Then I would sharpen each one and pound it edge down into some hardend steel to see what the edge would do and then see what it took to break each one recording each step I did along the way. By doing this simple test, I would know just exactly what each type of quench gave me and how good of a blade it would make. But this is just how I would do it.

As for annealing carbon steels like 1084, I don't and won't. My testing has not showed any bennefit by doing this step (and some of the bladesmiths I have talked to and helped me learn my method of heat treating told me annealing these types of steel are not needed as the gain from doing it is too small). I normalize it 3 times and that is it. Also, normalizing does relieve some stresses caused by forging but not all and it is a good idea to normalize any carbon steel whether forging it or doing stock removal unless you have a certificate stating that what you have is really what you think you have.
Just to let everyone know, the above statements are my opinions (and I am very opinionated) and are not meant to step on anyones toes. If I have, I am truely sorry. This is the way I do things and how I believe are the best ways to do them and that is all.
Ravenclaw
 
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