I have been given a couple of 14" cut-off sab blades that are broken. the saw blades are made from M2 steel, which is what the manufacturer told me. Are they worth playing with? I would need to anneal them and then re-heat treat. Is this do-able? Thanks, DonO
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M2 Saw Blades-worth messing with?
- Thread starter PaMtnBkr
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Not worth it. Too much alloy, too difficult to anneal & re heat treat.
If you want to mess with used saw blades, look for old sawmill blades made from simple carbon steel.
If you want to mess with used saw blades, look for old sawmill blades made from simple carbon steel.
Nathan the Machinist
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Like he said, it generally isn't worth messing with annealing and rehardening such complex steel.
That said, an old M2 power hacksaw makes a good knife blade if you like hard steel. I'm reminded of Alvin Johnson who used to make a lot of good utility knives from them. He'd grind them out hard and avoid heat treat all together. It sounds like a lot of effort for a rather plain outcome, but if you're wanting to make a knife out of one they do make good blades. M2 is a lower carbon cousin of M4, which is very consistently one of the best performing steels out there and usually wins the cutting competitions. I've made blades out of M2 lathe parting tools to split scotchbrite media feeding into a banking tool in a stamping press. The alloy does take a fine edge and holds it tenaciously in low impact slitting of abrasive materiel. *shrug*
That said, an old M2 power hacksaw makes a good knife blade if you like hard steel. I'm reminded of Alvin Johnson who used to make a lot of good utility knives from them. He'd grind them out hard and avoid heat treat all together. It sounds like a lot of effort for a rather plain outcome, but if you're wanting to make a knife out of one they do make good blades. M2 is a lower carbon cousin of M4, which is very consistently one of the best performing steels out there and usually wins the cutting competitions. I've made blades out of M2 lathe parting tools to split scotchbrite media feeding into a banking tool in a stamping press. The alloy does take a fine edge and holds it tenaciously in low impact slitting of abrasive materiel. *shrug*
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith
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A bar of CPM-M4 would be a far better choice if you want a knife "M" type steel.
I have been making small cooking knives out of that stuff, and people love them.
Like most people, I'm losing my taste for spending time making a product that I don't control the heat treat on, but if you're careful cutting them out and grinding, you can make good little knives that get a lot of use, with a minimum of time invested.
It was a pretty good little money maker, and got my foot in the door for the local market- now they're coming to me for better cooking knives
Also made this'n'that for some wood workers/carvers, and they're very happy with em. Some of my wife's favorite cooking knives.
Oh, my leather craft knives are made from the same stuff, just because I had a bunch sitting around.
There's nothing wrong with it, but most of us have other fish to fry.
Like most people, I'm losing my taste for spending time making a product that I don't control the heat treat on, but if you're careful cutting them out and grinding, you can make good little knives that get a lot of use, with a minimum of time invested.
It was a pretty good little money maker, and got my foot in the door for the local market- now they're coming to me for better cooking knives
Also made this'n'that for some wood workers/carvers, and they're very happy with em. Some of my wife's favorite cooking knives.
Oh, my leather craft knives are made from the same stuff, just because I had a bunch sitting around.
There's nothing wrong with it, but most of us have other fish to fry.
For my lowly shop, these would be a pretty big undertaking that I am not sure I want to invest in? At min, I would have to plasma torch cut them out oversized, slowly grind them to profile and then slowly grind them to final shape, tapers, bevels etc and then buy carbide bits for drilling mounting holes, etc. In the meantime, I have a 16 feet of 1084 and 1095 to play with! Maybe, I'll sit on the blades for a while till I get ornery enough to want to do something different?