I seek advice on my heat treatments...

[DaQo'tah Forge]

I have a problem understanding if there is something more I should be doing to my steel... Should I spend more time just heating the steel in my coal forge to help it?

Here is how my knives are made so far -

I get the steel from Rex Walter.

Its 52100 forged down from a 5 and ½ bar to a very workable size for me.

It comes to me about ¼ inch by 1 inch by 2 feet.

I heat it in my coal forge to normalize it, and let it air cool. Then I again heat it in my coal forge to anneal it by letting it cool under a pile of fresh coal over night. (Takes about 6 hours to cool)

Then I heat it one more time to straighten it flat, then I begin to grind it to size.

Next I do 3 heat treatments on the cutting edge, each one waiting 24 hours before the next. I quench the blade in preheated Texaco Type "A" quenching oil.

After the last heat treatment and quenching, I temper the blade 3 times in a 400-digree oven for 2 hours each time. This tempering is as the heat treatments, once every 24 hours for 3 days.

Then I finish the knife.

QUESTION; what else could I do to bring out more High performance quality to my blades?

(I don't have a power hammer; I only have a homemade coal forge and a railroad tie anvil.)

 

[Chuck Gedraitis Knives]

I don't think that there is much more that you could to? Maybe cutting tests to make sure that what your doing is working. If you don't know how far you can push your blades then you don't know which area to work on. You could clay coat your blade to get a more distinct temper line, that way you could see how high up the blade it goes, which would tell you if you are quenching deep enough. It could also give you mulitple quench lines for looks.

 

[C L Wilkins]

I need more DaQo'tah news!!! I split a gut when you told us about your cats and then the Viking funeral for your car!

 

[misque]

I think the missing ingredient in your process might be the cryo treatment in liquid Nitrogen (between tempers, IIRC).


All the best,
Mike U.

 

[DaQo'tah Forge]

well...perhaps,,,but I just dont think I could even do that...

Is there anything else that a new blade maker like myself could do?

 

[burke531]

Just make knives and then test them. do it over and over again until you get it right.

 

[Rick Baum]

DaQo'tah,

A simple cryo treatment isn't all that tough. In Ed's book he drills a hole in the tang of the knife and lets it hang in the liquid nitrogen for about 24 hrs or so. I just bought a dewar on ebay so that I can treat my blades in liquid nitrogen. My first forged blade got the "poor boy" cryo in dry ice and kerosene for about 36 hours. I think it cost me less than 20.00 for everything I needed. If you decide to try the dry ice method let me know and I'll fill you in on how I did it and everything you'll need.

Rick