Quenching a miniature sword?

[viking252200]

I'm far from being a knife maker, so my question might be somewhat stupid...but please bear with me.

Yesterday, being a wee bit bored, I decided to try to make a miniature broadsword.
Using an old needle file as material, I annealed the file on my stove and using a couple of files got the shape pretty much as I wanted.

I'm at the stage where i need to harden it, but since it's pretty thin, I'm a bit worried that it might warp badly.
I plan to heat it to a dull red and then plunge it vertically into some oil...but as I said, I'm very much a beginner, so any advise would be greatly apprciated.

 

[Drew Riley]

Depending on the brand of file, and due to its size, it was likey case hardened to begin with. You may not be able to harden it. Being that it's a miniature, you really don't even need to harden it if you ask me, as it's more for decoration than anything.

At any rate, if were a hardenable steel, I'd try heating to non magnetic and plunging into 120 degree (farenheit) canola oil. Temper in a toaster oven for an hour or two at 350 to 400F.

Warps can be straightened out during the tempering process, if needed, by clamping the blade to a straight edge and tempering for an additional cycle. Sometimes it may be necessary to "over correct" the bend and temper again.

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Minis harden just like big swords. Heat to above non-magnetic and quickly quench striaght down in oil. Temper at 450F. Because of the thin section, warp is less of a problem. They starighten easily durring and after temper.

 

[fast14riot]

Yep, I harden all my minis. With longer mini pieces I always to 3 normalizing cycles before quenching, seems to help with coming out of quench nice and straight. Also, if you have some aluminum flat stock you can possibly plate quench.


-Xander

P.s. Stacy, I haven't forgot about the mini I am gonna send you.