Thread: Temper question
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Old 11-16-2017, 04:10 PM
jimmontg jimmontg is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: Now live in Las Cruces NM.
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Blitt at 400 degrees a 2 hour temper would have worked better than heating and cooling it twice. Try it at 400 for two 2 hour tempers. It should be around RC 60 if the austenize heat was in the range to leave the fine grain you said you had. The 5 degree break on .090 thick material is a bit too hard, but how hard do you want it to be? 1080 is a simple steel and if you want flexibility you'll have to temper down properly. As stuart said above you won't hurt it to temper it at the same heat, but one hour tempers are not going to temper it properly. Stuart can explain it better than I.

I temper 1080 at 425 for one temper @ 2 hours, but I haven't used it by itself for a long time except for making Damascus which I prefer to make a little softer like in the RC 57-8 range. I also made two huge daggers and tempered them at 475 because I wanted them to be more flexible as they are for a bear attack or for fighting and breaking isn't an option, but that also means they won't hold an edge as well.
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