Trouble with o1

T

The Gopher

Joined
Mar 4, 2011
Messages
176
I was heat treating a batch of knives this morning and everything was going great it would seem until knife number 4. All the blades are fairly small 3 to 4 inches, .125 inch o1 steel. The first three were fully hardened, a file would slip right off, but the fourth one a file would still bite a little bit. I am using a small fire brick forge I built, propane was at 20 psi. I know I probably don't have all the proper details to diagnose the problem, but do you think the forge was to hot? Or did my quench (canola) get too hot by the fourth blade? Thanks,

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Could be any number of things, but the first thing I would do is work the blade with a file in the same spot to be sure you made it through the decarb layer. I always get nervous, but hit the hardened steel eventually.
I have also learned from the good folks on this forum that O1 in a forge is a crap shoot at best due to the difficulty of getting the proper soak, but that wasn't your question. I've done the same with good results.
 
Not enough information. I forge weld Damascus at 15PSI with my welding forge, and hold 1500 in the heat treat forge at 3 PSI.........so who knows what 20psi in your brick forge equals for temp.
Not knowing temperature makes all other questions irrelevant. How much oil in the quench tank? How long of soak time?........too many guesses.

Not trying to be a smart-arse, but 1084 is your friend.
Darcy
 
Thanks guys, live and learn, I just ordered a bunch of 1084 from Aldo!

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