To Buy or not To Buy H.T. oven

Jack O'Neill

Jack O'Neill

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Joined
Nov 15, 2007
Messages
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Strange question I know , I would like to hear from makers who bought there own heat treat oven , who use to send them out for there H.T.
Are you happy that you did ?? I have run all the pro's and con's through my head for a couple of years now and can still not decide . So I guess I'm asking are you glad you did bite the bullet and put out the funds .

Thanks for your thoughts.
 
Well, I'd like to chime in, even though I don't have an oven yet. I just figured it out, and it's gonna cost me $25 just to HT a 3" s30v blade. $15 for the HT, and $5 each way for shipping. I've got 9 more s30v blanks waiting for me to start working on. That's $135 just in HT, and probably another $25 shipping. I have also had the need to anneal some files for working on. There's another however much. . . I'm not sure how much it would cost to get an oven for it, but it seems like it would be worth it. Plus, I could re-HT my screwdriver bits and make them a bit harder. That would be nice. It appears around $400 on ebay. Might well be worth it.
 
I bought a 22.5" deep Evenheat a few years back, and commercial oil. I would not be without either. If you sell knives, it is worth the cost. If you make knives as a hobby, it might depend on how many you make in a given time. You would have to make the call on that.
 
An alternative is to build your own HT oven. It's easier than making a knife.
 
I can say I wish I had one. I do not make many knives due to limited time but it sure would be nice to walk into the shop and heat a knife instead of waiting two weeks. With the quality of your work it will pay for it's self in no time!!
 
Another vote to build one if the cost is a hurdle. I finished mine this past weekend and it works great, from what I have heard its speed is on par with the Evenheat 110v units of comparable size and it cost less than half what an Evenheat would have. The difficulty involved in building one is not as great as you might expect, although it does consume some time.
 
I bought an Evenheat just recently. Until that point I'd been doing my Ht with the forge and Parks #50. I put a LOT of work into getting the best performance and Ht I could from my forge, but the Evenheat is allowing me to do things with a new and impressive precision.

The way I see it, heat treat is what make a knife a knife. I wouldn't leave that to anybody but myself...

-d
 
I have been heat treating most of my blades in an old lab kiln since 1989 (I'm on my second Cornell surplus kiln now, this one has been refitted with a PID controller) I have always based my heat treats on the manufacturer's recommendations, and adjusted from there (usually lengthening my soak time, and adjusting my setponts to compensate for any inaccuracy in my controller) rather than following the latest advice from whomever the columnist of the month in the knife trade magazines, and have missed out on most of the typical problems that people seem to constantly ask about here. My blades consistantly harden, my decarb layer is very thin because I close up the kiln nice and tight and put in a chunk of lump charcoal to absorb any free oxygen into carbon monoxide and dioxide (reducing atmosphere to inert atmosphere) having a kiln eliminates many variables from your process

-Page
 
Justin King said:
Another vote to build one if the cost is a hurdle. I finished mine this past weekend and it works great, from what I have heard its speed is on par with the Evenheat 110v units of comparable size and it cost less than half what an Evenheat would have. The difficulty involved in building one is not as great as you might expect, although it does consume some time.
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I was considering doing this myself. Unfortunately I don't have much experience with making sheet metal boxes and ones that allow of setting up soft firebricks in. Last thing I made out of sheet metal was a little box in metal shop in Jr High with a tack welder. I'd like to make my own at some point if I think I can do it. Aside from the box problem I'm a caveman with electric.... Come to think of it buying it might be a better idea :o
 
After years of sending out blades I took the plunge and got a sugarcreek oven with digital control. And a small forge. I still have a few odds and ends to get but I cant wait to learn and experience heat treating. I love the idea of being in control of every aspect of the process. I will have to post pics of my new toys soon:)
 
I'm definitely glad that I bought a HT furnance. I feel much the same as Deker the HT makes a knife a knife and being able to do the HT on my knives makes them all the more my own. The final decision to get a HT furnance was based on turn around time and cost. If you make knives to sell it will pay for itself just like any other tool you use and you get to be in control of that important process of transforming your work into a knife.
 
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I finally took the plunge two years ago and have no regrets. Like others, I got tired of paying for shipping costs and HT costs, not to mention the time delays waiting for the blade to return home. It is a big bite, but well worth it in my mind. Plus, you get the satisfaction of doing your own HT and living with the successes and failures.
 
Well, I've done both, as you know, Jack. I've never sent out blades for heat treating, so I can't answer that question directly, but I do know that I'm an impatient fella and waiting on the smail might very well drive me mad :D. I started heat treating in a small propane forge but quickly realized the need for better control to improve my HT.

So I built a roughly 13" deep digital control heat treating oven. After getting all the parts, it took me about a week of evenings building and tinkering with it to get it to run. But once it fired up, it did very well. It was relatively fast, and it would hold temperature to a degree up or down.

Fletch, I'm willing to bet that you have more experience at sheet metal that I did when I set out (I had ZERO). My box is built in a U-shpae from one long piece of weld steel. I just took a piece of 2x4, placed it over the sheet on the ground, and stood on while lifting the steel sheet to get it to bend. Then I used a mallet to sharpen up the corners a bit. It's not pretty, and it's not perfect, but it worked. The back was just riveted to the frame, and the top is removable. I like the mostly one-piece body shell as I feel it gives me just a bit more insullation.

After several years of use, I refurbed the oven with new coils and some new side bricks (as my original coil grooves were never really up to the job of controlling the coil).

Being the tool collecter I am, I also ended up pinching pennies until I bought a 22.5" Evenheat at the end of last year to do longer blades and more detailed programs. I couldn't be happier with the quality and control of the Evenheat. I still have my homebuilt, but most everything goes into the EH now.

I'd say you can't go wrong with buying a good oven. If you want to put that off for several years, you can build your own for much cheaper ($400-$500 done well, less if you have some of the parts on hand), and it will work just fine. I do like having the confidence that the EH is going to work for me when I need it. I've had my coil in the hombuilt burn out twice due to a bad connection on my part at the very end of the coil. When you're in a pinch to deliver a blade by a deadline, a non-functional heat treat oven really blows.

--nathan
 
Thanks all for taking the time to help . I no longer have to wonder . I won the bid on e-bay for a new sugarcreek kiln . Saved enough funds to pick up the plates I now need . Then I need to pick up a digital controller later .

Now who was the joker :D bidding against me ? Dang it , I had to go over my minimum set price . :eek:
 
i got my kiln before i got a reall grinder (was using a 1x42 delta)
i wanted all the control over the most inportiant part of the knife and if i had just one blade then so be it or if i had a whole batch all the better but i only had to wait over night to get my blades heat treated and ready to keep working

BTW you will wAant to get SS foil also and be ready to cut yourself a few times learning how to wrap blades (its liek folding razor blades)

edit (WRAP WAS WARP ) so that did need fixed :)
 
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Congrats Jack! I have a shipment of ats34 blades heading your way. Lol...Hehehehe....
 
I'm in the process of building one I'm also tired of paying $25 a knife for shipping/heat treat, I'm just trying to do it as cheap as possible I think I am getting my firebrick for free. my wife works for a ceramic tile manufactor.
 
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