Heat treating stainless...who to use?

[LARRYZ10]

I make one of a kind sporting knives from 440C, Ats 34, 154 CM, and CPM 154 stainless steels. I am unhappy with Texas Knife Supply for my heat treating and now wish to ship my blades To the Paul Bos heat treat section of Buck knives or to Tru Grit's heat treating unit run by Jeff Mutz. I usually send out seven or eight blades at a time and of all the same steel. Does anyone with experience have a preference between these two companies heat treat services. I just want my blades heat treated and tempered to a target of 59 Rockwell. Any advice would be appreciated soon because I have eight blades ready for heat treat. Thanks, Larry Lehman

 

[Salolan]

I've never used him, but I've heard good things about Jeff. Nothing against Jeff but don't forget to consider the guys over at Peter's Heat Treat though. By the time you pay for all the extras(foil and cryo) Peter's starts getting a lot cheaper as that is all figured in on their cost, especially as the batch size increases. If you are sending out knives all out of the same steel at a time, you might consider increasing your batch size a bit and look at Peter's.
Good luck Larry.
Chris

 

[Jack O'Neill]

I always used Paul Bos before he retired and I started doing my own . I have heard good things about Paul who was trained by paul Bos

 

[Stark Knives]

I use peter's.

 

[jdm61]

I have used Peters a couple of times for stuff which I am uncomfortable heat treating myself in my Paragon and the results were very good. They have a minimum rate of like $100 for the first 20 blades and $2 a blade for any after tlat em I used them, but it includes everything including cryo and any straightening that needs to be done. if you are sending out 7 or more at a time, then it is not too bad. the other good thing is that even though they say that the blades must all be the same steel, if the austenizing temps are the same and only the tempering temps are different, then it counts as one batch. I had 12 3V blades and 8 AEB-L kitchen knives done as one 20 blade batch last time. They all came back at the hardness requested with the ability to take nasty sharp fine edges and no indication of RA like a hard to remove burr.