Stellite chisel !?

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Cliff Stamp

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At a flea market I saw in a "junk" pile I notice what looks to be an interesting small chisel. It is about 6.5" OAL, the blade is 1.5" long, 1/4" wide, with a grind about 1/4" deep (which looks modified). The handle is round (1/4") and just checkered metal. I pick it up and here is the kicker, I then notice it says "Haynes Stellite" on the side.

Anyone have any information on this? I am curious as to exactly what alloy it is.

-Cliff
 
Cliff,
My money would be on 6K. Stellite 6K has been used for alot of tools over the years, especially during WWII, when steel was needed for other uses. I've seen planer blades, lathe bits, and small hand tools made with it. I even know a guy that makes alot of knives with it.
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I've never heard of stellite chisels, but I'm not surprised. I have several industrial bandsaw blades for my re-saw that are stellite tipped. I've never had to sharpen stellite, so I wonder what it's like as a wood-working tool. Is stellite brittle?

------------------
"Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n"
John Milton
There are only two types of people; those who understand this, and those who think they do.
 
Kit, can you let me know who it is that makes knives out of stellite.
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I can't believe you'd make a statement like that and not follow up on it.
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Cobalt,
You caught me. I thought I might catch you napping.

Now I'm gonna have to finish the Stellite 6K U2 knives for you and Ralf.

Cliff knows that I like Stellite 6K.
 
Johan, I dig a 2mm deep hole (4mm diameter) in concrete with it which just blunted the edge a little. I then viced it and struck the edge with a wood rasp (old one very worn) about 12 times. The chisel's face was indented (.2-.3 of a mm) and rolled but it didn't chip. I wouldn't call it brittle.

Thanks for the info everyone, one more cobalt blade to use and I actually own this one.

-Cliff

[This message has been edited by Cliff Stamp (edited 04-28-2000).]
 
Herman--
The answer is obvious. How could anyone do a truly comprehensive blade review without including concrete data? Get real!
--Will
 
Tim a little red paint and alot of carving and you can make your driveway look like brick work.
 
will,

sorry
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i didnt know knives & chisels were made for concrete work. gonna chisel through an army tank next?

i think you guys should go into automobile testing......see how well they dig into concrete
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Knives and chisels are just pieces of metal, meant to be used by us, for us. It's no surprise when a blade fails at something it wasn't expected to survive--but it's not as if it were a living being sacrificed in some malevolent scheme. That's not the point at all.
The wonderful thing about such testing is that sometimes we discover something about a blade that works much better than anyone expected--and we'd never know that without pushing blades to their expected threshhold of failure and then beyond.
Cliff's genius, I think, is that he is not only able to uncover such unexpected and wonderful properties in blades--he also has the technical background to then be able to ascertain what it was that gave the blade its special properties. Which means we can learn what made that blade so good, and use that information to make future blades better. In fact, I think Cliff may be on the verge of some work, on indexing properties of blades, that could well have revolutionary implications for the industry.
What I find most surprising is that he takes as much flack as he does, for trying to bring out the very best in our tools and weapons. How can anyone take testing a piece of metal so personally as to become defensive on behalf of the tool? Mind boggling to me. I just don't get it.
 
Cliff,
You are gonna have to stay away from those flea markets. They cause too much heart burn.
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Herman :

i didnt know knives & chisels were made for concrete work
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Now you do, glad to have helped then. It is actually a fairly low stress, as conrete is very brittle compared to steel. For example take an Ontario 1095 machete, I had two and broke them apart on hardwoods fairly easy - yet both could chop a concrete weight to pieces with just slight impacting on the edge (.2 to .4 mm, it varied along the edge I assume the concrete consistency was not overly high). The latter looks really impressive though - if you have never done it that is.

As for this specific piece of work, I dug into the concrete as it was right next to me , and is an easy thing for someone else to duplicate if they wanted to know exactly what the performance meant. Since the concrete failed to do anything to the blade at all except blunt it a little I proceeded to smack it with the rasp. This was done to estimate its ductility. If it was really Stellite then it should be very ductile (based on past work I have done). It was as I was able to deform the material past the plastic barrier and not induce fracture.

Now you might ask what would you want to know this for? Well Will answered that in detail but to give a specific example, if you cut material long enough you will induce repeated deformation along the edge of a knife, if the ductility is low then you will see fracture early. If the ductility is high the blade will last much longer therefore high ductility -> high edge holding. You can also look at it from this perspective : the more acute an edge profile the less resistance to bending and thus the lower the edge holding -however- the more ductility the higher the tolerance for bending therefor high ductility -> high performance edge profile. So basically higher ductility (all else equal) directly improves a blades performance, it will cut longer with a higher level of performance. This assumes the maker knowns how to take advantage of it of course which he will only know if he has seen the result of low ducility, hence the need to fault blades in the first place.


-Cliff
 
Cliff I think you are assumming that all concrete is the same or even close to the same. Concrete has a very wide range of strenth and is much more than just cement sand and rock. In fact I bet it would be very hard to find simular strenth concrete from the same ready mix plant useing the same mix. Even weather, how it is finished, and little differentance in water makes a large difference.
 
Db :

Concrete has a very wide range of strenth
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Its strength is largely irrelevant (to the situation at hand).

is much more than just cement sand and rock.
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Actually, a cement + water + aggregate (usually sand / rock) is the defination of concrete.

Even weather, how it is finished, and little differentance in water makes a large difference.
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How much is large as pertaining to toughness? Unless it is in the range of steel (which is obviously isn't going to be) it is not going to make that much of a difference. I can't see it effecting hardness much at all because that would just be dependent on the aggregate.

To be specific to the above, the chisel just cut through the sand, there is rock is in but not at the surface. The concrete in the weights does not contain rock, just sand.

-Cliff
 
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