o1 chef knife

Bailey Knives

Bailey Knives

Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
Joined
Oct 18, 2004
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I am in the middle of making an o1 chef knife for my bro in law. I need to know what the best temperature is to temper the knife and how many cycles I should use. thanks for the help.

matt
 
You should use 2-2 hour cycles. Personally I temper O1 at 400 degrees. You should start out lower and check the color (or do a brass rod test). Most ovens are off by quite a bit and you don't want to temper too high. I like to temper to a deep straw yellow color, this makes a pretty hard blade but I haven't had any trouble with chipping or anything.
 
thanks for the input. I may be a bit ignorant, but whats the brass rod test?
 
Color is a pretty good indicator (talking about the oxidation on the blade after tempering), assuming the blade hardened well in the quench. The brass rod test can help you tweak things to your own preferences. Everyone has slightly different expectations for their knives.
 
I also TEmper at 400. I have tempered lower but I can tell the difference when it comes to resharpening. Alot easier at 400 than 375. You wouldnt believe it would make that big of difference but it did in my case.
I also etch the blade to sort of prestain it so the tarnish doesnt jump out as much when its used. Just a thought ;)
 
The charts I have say that a 400 degree temper could leave you as high as RC62. Blades perform really well at this range, and like Brian said, any harder than that and sharpening is a real PITA!
The reason I said to start lower is that your oven may be off. In my mom's old oven I had to set it at 375 to get the straw color. In the new oven I have to set it at 400 to get that color. The gauge on the oven doesn't really tell you much :grumpy:
 
I tempered a batch of sample pieces and sent them for RC testing. They came back with an average of 58 rc. one was 59.5 one was 57.5 the rest fell in between. You could bump it up to 425 degrees. Be sure to get an oven thermometer though. I used 2 at the same time for a while them I settled my oven in and now I use one at 400 dead nuts.

Hope this helps. I too found chart info to vary but I will stand by my test pieces. Thats the only solid info I found on RC hardness and temp temperatures in 0-1. Maybe others will jump in with better info.
 
Do not expect to exactly match the numbers. It [chemistry and hardness] can vary depending on what mill made it and the particular batch.
 
I also etch the blade to sort of prestain it so the tarnish doesnt jump out as much when its used. Just a thought ;)[/QUOTE]

I always meant to ask, if you don't mind telling, what do you use for etching? I always liked the color O-1 turns, but I know some people get freaked out when it happens. Thanks

Rob
 
I use ferric chloride from Radio Shack. 1 part ferric to 3 parts water (I think ;) )
You can always get a lime and rub it on about 20 min.

I steel wool everything once etched. Others may jump in with different ways of doing it. Find what works for you.....
 
I have a worn out piece of 800 grit sandpaper that I use just to take off some of the tarnish left by the etching. It works pretty well for me, but I have used the same piece of sandpaper about 20 times and it is about dead. (I sand it under a stream of water to wash away the ferric chloride)
 
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