How Fast Do You Have to Quench? Hardenability of Steel

Thanks Larrin, just finished reading it, came here to ask you something about O1/O2: given the timeframe needed to reach M is 100sec, one would assume that a thin sheet of it, say 2mm - 3/32" would harden exactly the same in oil or between aluminium blocks, is this true or I'm missing something? Thanks!

I'm itching to turn on the oven just to test this, unless you correct me wrong.

Pablo
 
PEU said:
Thanks Larrin, just finished reading it, came here to ask you something about O1/O2: given the timeframe needed to reach M is 100sec, one would assume that a thin sheet of it, say 2mm - 3/32" would harden exactly the same in oil or between aluminium blocks, is this true or I'm missing something? Thanks!

I'm itching to turn on the oven just to test this, unless you correct me wrong.

Pablo
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That appears to be the case based on the CCT. And there have been reports that a plate quench worked with thin stock: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/plate-quench-o-1-how-thick-can-i-go.607224/
 
I know plates cool down the steel within 10 seconds, so i'd be surprised if even thicker stock o1 doesnt fully harden with plate quenching. We have 100 seconds to cool it which is not hard. I will test it one day when I fix my oven.
 
10 seconds seems a little fast to me for plates. Maybe 10 seconds to get under the nose.
 
Thank you for the in depth description of the alloying elements, and the effect on hardenability. I’ve been looking through many resources for this, and this is a great write up for what we need to know for knives. Being able to calculate for a steel that one can't find the datasheet for is helpful.
 
PEU said:
Well color me stunned!!! thanks for the reply, I will do my tests ASAP, O2 is one of the steels I use the most!

Pablo
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I can't wait to see your results! I use O1 all the time.

For the tests, will you be using a stainless envelope? My worry would be that if you coat the blade in antiscale, it won't lay flat on the aluminum blocks.
 
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bmilleker said:
I can't wait to see your results! I use O1 all the time.

For the tests, will you be using a stainless envelope? My worry would be that if you coat the blade in antiscale, it won't lay on the aluminum blocks flat.
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I never use foil nor coatings for carbon steels. Since I grind post hardening these thin steels, there is no point.

Pablo
 
Interesting that you have categorized 52100 and even CruForgeV as primarily fast-oil steels. I always understood that Parks 50 was a little faster than ideal for quenching those two.
That's good reading, thanks! Now I'm off to try to understand some of it a bit better...
 
Salem Straub said:
Interesting that you have categorized 52100 and even CruForgeV as primarily fast-oil steels. I always understood that Parks 50 was a little faster than ideal for quenching those two.
That's good reading, thanks! Now I'm off to try to understand some of it a bit better...
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The dividing line is up for debate, of course. O7 is usually called a water/oil steel so that’s where I put it.

Edit: The O7 in the article is a little more hardenable than the American version. I have decided to put the dividing line between 52100 and CruForgeV.
 
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Salem Straub said:
Interesting that you have categorized 52100 and even CruForgeV as primarily fast-oil steels. I always understood that Parks 50 was a little faster than ideal for quenching those two.
That's good reading, thanks! Now I'm off to try to understand some of it a bit better...
Click to expand...
I always had low test scores with 52100 using medium oil unless i aust at 1550°.
I like 1525 range using parks50, never had any more distortion than quenching say 1095. Sometimes I'll push as high as 1540 using parks but if I aust any higher I'll switch the to AAA oil
-Trey
 
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