Need more help

[Dave G Knox]

Ok I have another question. I have heated and quenched an 01 tool steel knife then tempered once at 400 degrees for 2 hours. Blade turned out good, but my question is can I now heat treat and quench handle then temper knife again or will the overlap of heating affect knife. The reason I want to do this is after temper I stuck blade in vise and flexed to make sure it would spring back and it did but the handle bent a bit up by ricasso. Ideally I would have a kiln to heat entire knife but I'm doing it on the cheap with little firebrick forge.

 

[Kevin McGovern]

You can either try to bend it back, or redo the heat treat. You will soften the blade if you try to just heat the tang.

 

[Frank Niro]

First if it's just the handle that is softer and will bend then can you bend it back without damaging it? This will sound weird but it will work.Slice a piece of large potato about 1/2" thick.push that down to the guard area. You can now heat up the handle section and straighten it.
Frank

 

[Kevin McGovern]

First if it's just the handle that is softer and will bend then can you bend it back without damaging it? This will sound weird but it will work.Slice a piece of large potato about 1/2" thick.push that down to the guard area. You can now heat up the handle section and straighten it.
Frank

He still needs to be careful not to let the blade exceed the tempering tip correct (the potato is acting as a heat sink right)? I just want to make sure he's clear on the process.

 

[Dave G Knox]

Even with the potato on knife I would be afraid to try it and ruin heat treat on blade. I can bend it back to straight no problem I just wanted handle to be springy as well as blade. I will live with it for now. Maybe some day I can buy a fancy kiln and heat treat entire knife.