So I don't have to keep asking... Heat Treating

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Philadelph

Joined
May 23, 2008
Messages
115
I've finally gotten my Paragon KM-14D (which I will post pics of soon) and am almost ready to heat treat a bunch of stuff. For the time being I first wanted to figure out how to do a spheroidal anneal on some cable damascus I made up with IG. It's supposedly 1084. So I did a search and found a pretty good answer that referenced a "heat treater's guide". I was then thinking about the other HTing I have to do and I find a lot of varied answers depending on the equipment people have.

So here it is: Is there one place (book, online, etc.) where I can go for most of my heat treating questions? Obviously for use with my Paragon rather than a forge. I'm guessing this heat treat guide is a book- is it completely valid for knives? Just figured I'd get this question out there so I don't have to search and/or post for every steel I start using! lol Thanks!
 
have you read the stickies at the top of the page labeled 'good info here?'
there is a lot of really good HT info in there

-Page
 
I have gone through a lot of that stuff but it's hard to find one source with all the info compiled- such as a book might have. There were some steel spec pages that have a ton of info but might be very vague like "Temper between 400 - 600 degrees Fahrenheit" with no HRC chart. That doesn't help me you know? Anyway, I found the heat treater's guide in a google search but wow, $250 and I don't even know what info it contains! Thanks for the suggestion though- maybe I'll compile my own info from scattered sources!
 
You can get lots of good info in the seco warwick heat treating data book. Best part is it's free. Just go here:
http://www.secowarwick.com/htdb/htdb.htm

It has good info, but not specifically for knife making so it does give a range of tempering temps. Still, worth the effort of filling out the form.

-Mike
 
Philadelph said:
Anyway, I found the heat treater's guide in a google search but wow, $250 and I don't even know what info it contains! Thanks for the suggestion though- maybe I'll compile my own info from scattered sources!
Click to expand...

I got a copy of Heat Treaters Guide through Inter-Library Loan. Little by little I stickied all the pages I wanted then took it to a local printing shop and had them copy and bind all of them. I probably have almost 1/2 of the book for $16, including sales tax.

Seems like a lot of industry HT methods for knife steels are a little different than what many knife makers do for the same steel. It took me a while to start understanding the reasons a knife maker might go to the top or bottom of a HT range, or do something a little differently. Once a person gets those understandings, the data in the guide is about the best there is in one spot. At least it's right, which a lot of "compiled" data found on knife sites isn't.

If I were to start in on the HT-ing for knife making again, and wanted to keep life simple, I'd pick 2-5 steels and get serious about collecting HT data for them and let all the rest of it go... a person does have to chose their sources well, though.

Mike
 
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