My first experience with my new quenching oil...

Phillip Patton

Phillip Patton

Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
Joined
Jul 25, 2005
Messages
5,362
...didn't go too well. I had a blade of 1095, coated with clay, which I was waiting for this oil to get here to harden it. The oil is parks #50, preheated to 135 F.
I austenitized at 1455 for ten minutes, and quenched the whole blade.
When i had tempered it a couple times, and ground it some, I could see that the hamon followed the pattern I had applied the clay on, but was very close to the edge.
I had normalized this blade 5 or 6 times, and it was also quenched several times before that. I've read here on the forums that it's possible to get the grain too fine, making the steel more shallow hardening. Is this what happened?
The clay extended almost halfway down the blade, and was about 1/4" thick.
Would raising the austenitizing temp fix this? Or at this point should i just quench the whole thing, and hope for a natural hamon?
It definitely got hard, along the edge.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Multiple heat cycles on 1095 will make it even shallower hardening but there's not such thing as "too fine of grain" I think thinner clay (on mine, around 1/8'') and a bit longer soak will get you there. A lot of times I don't like the first line I get, I just do it again and try someting a bit different. I go to the grinder right after the blade cools out of the quench, grind enought to see the line, if I like it then it goes to the oven for temper, if I don't like it it gets more clay and back to quench. This is fun stuff but can be very frustrating. Just "get-r-done" :p

P.S. I have very good results quenching in room temp Parks #50.
 
I think your culprit is clay thickness. Regardless of quench speed, that thick huge hot mass of clay on the spine is going to leech heat down towards the edge and considering the tiny length of time youre working in, i bet taking that clay line only about 1/3 of the width of the blade and thinning it to 1/8 will solve your problem. Also ive had luck lately going for a longer soak at just above ms temp, then a very short soak at 1450. I need to experiemnt more but ive heard many times that a longer soak at lower temps is a good idea in these cases....I have a lot to learn, so keep posting your results! Try one with very thin clay and see what happens. In my head from what I understand, the most active hamons must be created when the clay only insultates from the quench for just barely long enough that below it, the steel gets below the nose. It seems to be a very fine line, even finer due to the extremely fast nose for 1095.
 
I was wondering about that. I'll try thinner clay, with a different blade. I'm tired of trying with this one. I went ahead and quenched the whole thing.
Got nice and hard.
 
Listen to Don -- he knows his stuff. :D

room temp? I'll have to give that a try Don, I get tired of sticking red-hot irons in my buckit of 50. Do you think that slows the quench just a touch to slow some transition or allow some deformation below the main transition line? (i.e. get ashi)
 
Yep, thinner clay. I was able to get away with thick el-cheapo furnace cement when I was using that, but when I switched to Satanite I had to watch how thick it was. Temper line is a lot more active with Satanite, but man, that stuff can be frustrating sometimes.
 
Burchtree said:
Listen to Don -- he knows his stuff. :D

room temp? I'll have to give that a try Don, I get tired of sticking red-hot irons in my buckit of 50. Do you think that slows the quench just a touch to slow some transition or allow some deformation below the main transition line? (i.e. get ashi)
Click to expand...
Not sure what it does Burch, just like what I see in the line, lots of activity :thumbup:
 
sunfishman said:
Not sure what it does Burch, just like what I see in the line, lots of activity :thumbup:
Click to expand...

I tried it at room temp, and got the blade hard all over. No hamon, but maybe next week. :thumbup:
 
I'm not sure if it's on topic or not?
But have any of you tried porcelain slip ?? for coating..
I've seen it some where here.
I have 4 gal's of it for lost wax casting .... playing :D
it takes some time to biuld it up but it should work..for that too.
 
Good idea Dan, but may be very hard to get off the blade, I don't know. Hey somebody try this and let us know :)
 
sunfishman said:
Good idea Dan, but may be very hard to get off the blade, I don't know. Hey somebody try this and let us know :)
Click to expand...


Don I know this is what David Boye uses for his Diernic steel <spelling
or rather the Company that does it for him now..
I believe the shock of the quench will brake it off , but I'm not sure if it stays on just long enough to do it's job or not ?? I wish I could remember where I read something about this.:confused:

I got to try it :D
 
The first knife I did with a hamon, (which is in the for sale section now) I used castable refractory. I didn't have any satanite at the time. Satanite's what I'm dabbling in now.
Haven't tried the ceramic stuff. I remember someone said they used ITC-100. It'd probably be similar.
 
According to what I have discussed with other makers, if you edge quench properly you can get a hamon, ashi, and all sorts of other activity without any clay at all! I think on the last blade I made, I used Satanite and also just edge quenched the blade rather than dumping the whole thing in ATF, and it was the most active hamon I've gotten, personally. A lot of wild stuff going on. This stuff is all weird.
 
You can also get a wild hamon with a full quench and no clay. :D Love this stuff!
 
I would assume the most action would be if you can get the top 1/3 of the blade dancing right at the transition time and temp when the edge goes under the nose....that being said, I have no idea how to do that other than to practice like mad.


Ive been toying with a Hamon KITH for a long time...sounds like we'd have lots interested. I may put it out there once i free up a bit of time. I'd love to host a site on my webspace with pictures of everyones blades including specific insctructions on clay used, temps, soak time, thickness of clay, quenchants, etc....might be a very valuable tool!
 
Actually, take a blade up to full heat, then do a full quench. You'll get an interesting hamon.
 
Do you think active hamons with full quenches are due to the thickness of the steel? I would think the hamon would then be dependant on the thickness of the spine not being able to get down below the transition temp in time....how much does thickness play into this? Is it easier to get high activity on 1/4" stock vs 1/8"?
 
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