Heattreating oven: Suggestions needed.

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aarya

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Jun 21, 2006
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I'm thinking about taking up knifemaking as a hobby, and i'm wondering if i should just bite the bullet, and get myself a heattreating oven right away.
I'm thinking about the paragon PKM9D, since it's small, and i've no real need for a larger oven. Also, it is within my budget, if i stretch it a little.
The reason i want to get an oven and do my own heattreating, is because i'm planning to do some experimenting with heattreats, and see what i can do with it. Also planning to do some experiments in regards to lamination of different materials, aswell as other stuff. If i had planned to just make a few knives, i could've shipped them out for heattreat.

I'm sorry for my rambling.

1: Is the paragon PKM9D any good? Experiences from owners/users of said oven are highly appreciated.

2: For those knowledgeable in metallurgy, is there anything to gain from doing your own experiments in regards to heattreatment, rather than sending blades out for a well-known and worked-out heattreat to a well-known heattreatment specialist?

3: Would an electric oven like the PKM9D suffer in any way, if one used said oven to heat other things in it? Like firing pottery, experimenting with lamination of brass/bronze/aluminum/etc. Think mokume-gane type things. And ofcourse... Would it survive if i baked a pizza in it? (Would it be possible to bake a small pizza in such an oven?)

4: Is it silly of me to even think about purchasing a heattreating oven, if i just want to do this as a hobby? (This last question is mostly rethorical, as i'm well aware of the answer myself. But it has to be asked.)


Please be kind and civil. I appreciate all advice, critical or supportive, but i do not tolerate sarcasm, or trolling comments.
Thank you. :)
 
If you've got the itch and the money, there is absolutely nothing stopping you from getting a heat treating oven. Paragons are nice ovens, as are Evenheats. I have an Evenheat 22.5" kiln, and it works great.

I think using the oven for anything else besides knifemaking is just fine. It is possible that exposure to some things may shorten the life of your coils (moisture, oxygen, etc).

As for experimenting with heat treatments, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. The important thing is that you have a goal for your experimentation and that you try to work towards that goal. Keep careful notes on everything you do, and perform careful testing. Industry has established known and effective heat treatments to acheive optimum performance in the steels we use. These are a great place to start, and then play with your parameters from there.

Keep in mind that you may not improve anything at all, and it's pretty easy to actually make the heat treatment worse. While you may not vastly improve the overall heat treatment, it is possible to tweak it to acheive certain characteristics such as improved toughness or improved hardness. Usually, these tweaks come at the cost of something else. Many times, on the surface, you may think you've done something new and improved, but there may be unintended but unavoidable consequences to your altered heat treatment. Knowing what happens to steel through various heats and holds will help you reach your goals.

--nathan
 
There's nothing wrong with the paragon, though I think they are a bit pricey.

There's not much use in experimenting, there is already good, published heat treating info available. You can results just as good as your commercial outfit at home, but you have to put in the work.

Nothing wrong with owning an oven, if you can afford one, get it.
 
I wonder if you will find the size limiting. Any kitchen knives, camp knives, fillet knives or just folders and small knives in your future?

You may want to note that sending out just a few blades can be expensive for heat treat where as 20+ is very reasonable.

The steels you plan to use will be critical to your plan. Do they need special quenchants, and cryo and are you willing to deal with that. Many bladesmiths that have heat treat ovens send out much of their knives for heat treat because they don't want to deal with cryo or don't have the proper oil to cool the blade with.

Good luck, David
 
Basically, i've got quite small knives in my future. Folders or fixed blades, i doubt i'd ever cross the 7" mark, which means the small oven is just perfect.
And the steel i would want to work with, is AEB-L/13c26. Possibly CPM154 and CPM3V. Neither of these requires a cryo treatment, though ofcourse it is beneficial. Eventually, if i find that i want to get that "little extra" out of the steels, it shouldn't be too difficult to add the cryo-setup and routine.

Anyway, i've decided to put off the purchase of an oven, until atleast June.
But i'm still open to suggestions from the people here.
 
My only suggestion is to with a bigger kiln. It is better to grow into the bigger size than out grow the smaller one and you end getting the bigger one anyway. Don't ask how I know this.

Eric
 
i got a evenheat 18inch and now i want a bigger kiln (36inch)

remember a 7 inch blade has nearly 5 inch handle and you cant have it touyching the coils (a bit of bufferespace is a good thing
also if you use SS and are foil wraping a blade that eats up space in the kiln too

see how fast you can make a small kiln "too small"

a kiln was the first big buy i made and i was looked at a bit funny (grinding kitchen knives on a delta 1x42 and having a 1k$ kiln ) buy i likek you wanted full control of my HT and not jsut a caned HT form some other source

jsut remember that the kiln is only part of the "tooling" you need good quench oil or AL plates (all depends on the steel you want to use ) and HT foil can fell spendy at first

jsut some thoughts i hope they help one way or the other
 
To be totally frank, I've found mine to be a $1300 something-to-trip-over. It's way cheaper to send batches of blades out and be done with it. However, if I do get around to learning to HT, the kiln is there and will eventually pay for itself.

Don't forget to consider your electrical requirements, I think most kilns run on 220v. My Paragon runs on 115v but draws 13 amps. The manual strongly suggests having it on its own circuit, so when I wired my shop we put in an extra 20-amp circuit just for the oven.
 
You guys make some convincing points. But i can't see me needing a bigger furnace. The largest knife i'd ever make, would be 7" including the handle. But i want to get into the making of traditional folding knives, which generally have parts always under 4". Ofcourse, i dream about making beautiful long katana swords... But.. I'd much rather try to make well constructed, good looking traditional folding knives, that one wouldn't be afraid to use. Lately i've been thinking about maybe making some miniatures aswell, but only time will tell.

Also, i'm thinking that if i some day, far into the future want a larger kiln, that it's easier to sell a small kiln to someone, rather than finding out some day, that knife making isn't for me, and having to try to sell a large kiln. That may be completely illogical or irrelevant, i don't know. Generally, when it comes to this, there are so many things i don't know.
 
I recommend an oven and controller that will work to a minimum of 2,200°. Several steels have austenitizing temperatures above 2,000°. If you are going to spend the money get the maximum possible usage from your tools.

I don't know austenitizing temperature for pizza. ;)
 
Ouch.. It's strange how a jump of 200 degrees fahrenheit, gives a jump in price of over $1000. Hmmm.. This has given me even more to think about.
 
I consider the three most essential tools in my shop:

The Paragon
200 lb Beaudry
a life time supply of Texaco type A
 
but Ed i think the paragon tops out at a listed temp of 2000f and some of the stuff that the OP wants to do would need a hair more temp
that said the paragon looks liek a great kiln but i sure dont lik emaxing out tools every time i use them. i lik eto have a bit of over head (my even heat has been run to 2100f for some cpms125v and that was a reall push even tho its rated to 2200f (oo and yes mine is a 220v )
 
Good point: I have gone up 2,000f on experiments but usually below 1,700f. What I do like is the consistency or repeatable temps. I am not very smart when it comes to other steels. Thanks for correcting me.
 
no worries if i was only working carbon steeel i sure would not need the extra 200f
but HSS and some of the super alloys call for temps that are half scary

working with the high alloys narrows your kiln choices quickly tho i hear you can have the paragon loaded with high temp coils and a reset controller to allow for the higher temps (never called to check on that tho)
 
Butch: Thanks for clearing it up. I do not have high temp coils, just the standard Paragon. The only time we tried for higher temps was to take three of four 52100 experimental blades forged down at low temp to about a 1/4 inch thick, then give them a high annealing temp as per the book. 2,000f for two hours, drop a little lower for an hour and on down slowly to room temp. This annealing cycle took almost a full day.

The result was very large gain, blades would not cut and were far from acceptable toughness. We tried multiple normalizing heats, multiple quench and I even cold forged a blade at room temp. before heat treat. The cold forged blade did the best and is now being used by a taxidermist who loves it, but he has a stone right next to where he works and uses it regularly. He was a good friend and in my shop when I was working on it or it would have been destroyed in testing as were the rest. He requested it as it was, all I got to test it for was edge flex (2 flexes) and cut, about 60 as I remember. The blade is unsigned.

The control blade did 1,000 cuts, 10 edge flexes and 6 180 degree flexes before the edge cracked. Some of the other experimental blades would not to one 90 degree flex.

Now the highest temp the Paragon reaches is 988f.
 
Ed is you kiln argon purging or did you foil wrap the test piece? as at 2000f and a kiln environment the carbon will be burned right out and the scale will decimate the test piece
i know this cause of a failed foil pack before

i never heard about a 2000f anneal but i ll hav oet start a new thread for such talk as this is about a kiln and not HT specs
 
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