new guy with a few questions

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figgy1682

Joined
Aug 16, 2007
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ok i tried the search option but it didn't work for me, so sorry if this is a repost of some sort. first off i work in the aero space industry and have plenty of scrap metal around to use to try and make my first knife. well i see how you guys heat treat your metal with fire , living in a community with a home owners ass. i can't just use a fire pit. my job has kilns ( i think this is what it is called) that go up to 2200 degrees and was wondering if i could use this method for my knife. now im not sure what type of metal im going to use but has any one else used this method before or got any tips before i do this.
 
A gozillion knifemakers use a kiln to heat treat their knife blades. First off, you have to know what you're actually heat treating as far as what steel, grade, hardness in order to know how long and how hot to heat treat it to. You have to choose air hardening, oil hardening or even water hardening. Personally using a kiln i'd suggest you go with Air hardening steels as they will air quench in still air or a fan. You also have to use stainless steel foil to protect the blade from atmosphere inside in the kiln unless you have some sort of inert gas you can pump into the kiln to level out the oxygen in the kiln. You probably aren't going to be able to forge with a kiln as opening the kiln doors will change the temperature drastically dropping it. You could even go as far as to build a gas forge that isn't gonna put a bunch of black smoke or whatever into the air. I also live in a home owners association and they are a real pain in the ass. I do all my actual heat treating somewhere else. Just be hella careful if the kiln is top loading as when you go to take the blades out the heat is gonna rise straight up and could cause serious burns as most kilns are used to heat something up and then the thing is to cool down inside the kiln while the doors are still closed. Evenheat Kiln makes a very good knife oven if you just want to buy one and use stock removal technique (which is alot quieter than forging and hammering on an anvil if you're worried about noise)

But yes, most professional heat treaters that heat treat blades for professional knifemakers use a kiln to do the work. It's best to have 2 kilns as one will be used to temper the blades at alot lower temperature and kilns just don't drop temperature fast enough that you need to put a blade back in to temper when it falls to a certain temperature as not to cause addition stress on the blade if it falls down to room temperature.

If you're going to use scrap metal i'd suggest you find out what kind of metal it is and find heat treating data for it. Alot of metal is just simply no good for use as a knife blade. Do some research on steel types...there are tons of makers on this forums that are willing to help out anyone interested in something they love to do. Steel is cheap, especially the 10XX series of steels. Air hardening steels are a wee bit more expensive, but still not badly priced.

You can even heat treat with a torch and quench in some kind of medium, water, oil, etc.
 
thanks. i belive there is some kind of gas being pumped into these kilns, but these are industrial size kilns. we use fork lifts to load them with parts so there huge. ill find out what type of gas and go from there, and i think ill talk to the heat treat guy in the department and see if he can find temps and length of time for me. talking to some of the guys here i come to find out we dont have steel here we have alot of aluminum but very different types, so i guess ill be buying some steel and going from there. now i got to find a shop that sells different steels in my area and go from there.
 
You can get steel from www.admiralsteel.com for the 10XX stuff. Their tool steels seem a weee bit pricey. I buy from www.flatground.com for any tool steels as their prices to my knowledge so far, can't be beat and shipping for a ton of steel that is fairly heavy is VERY reasonable. They don't carry any water hardening steels that I know of, mainly Air and Oil hardening. Don't bother buying from Industrial metals...WAAAY TOO EXPENSIVE! They are good for if you have an emergency and want steel now then buy from them. I'd suggest you invest into a knife kiln if you want to do this alot. The kilns at your work sound massive and would cost a hell of alot to run just for a few blades. Not to mention, forget trying to open the door while that thing is blaring red/orange hot....you're liable to get burns from hell seeing as you say you need for forklift to lift things in there i'm imagining it's pretty damn huge. You can get a fairly great kiln for about $1000.00 bucks to $1200 bucks shipped. Or you can go buy some water type hardening steels and just build a forge. Practically everyone and their mom on here probably knows how to build on (except me) lol. I have only ever used kilns and coal forges. If the blade isn't too large, you can even heat treat with a mapp torch as a starter project. Good luck.

http://www.evenheat-kiln.com/knifeovens/knifeovens.htm

http://www.paragonweb.com/

http://www.cresskilns.com/

if you like the evenheat-kilns, I believe Tim Zowada is a dealer for them. He gives like 10% off retail (or he used to?) his website is http://www.tzknives.com/

Evenheat is sold through dealers and not direct, not sure about the rest.
 
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