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The Newbies Arena Are you new to knife making? Here is all the help you will need.

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  #1  
Old 11-17-2001, 12:34 PM
Steve Vanderkolff
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Hardness testing


Is there any way to test the hardness of my blades at home? I do not have access to a Rockwell tester but would like to make sure my knives are at least somewhere in the right area of hardness. Preferably something that does not test to destruction but if that is the only way then I will sacrifice a few blades.
Thanks
Steve

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  #2  
Old 11-17-2001, 01:30 PM
Don Cowles
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Steve, right after heat treating, run a file against the edge. If it skates off, it's hard. If it bites in, it's not. That won't tell you how hard it is, but it will tell you if it's hard enough.

I would be happy to test your blades on my Rockwell tester if you feel like making a run to the Detroit area.
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  #3  
Old 11-17-2001, 10:32 PM
primos
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Steve, did you read my article on Scale Prevention during heat treating? I showed testing the edge hardness with a file after hardening. Like Don said, if it skates off, it's hard, if it bites, it's not.

Here's some pics:



Give it a good rub with the file. I do the whole edge from just in front of the ricasso shoulders to the tip.



You can tell if the file is biting the steel or skating off just by the feel. But close inspection can show for sure. This one was harder than the file. No scratches at all. Just a little surface scratch is not a bad thing, but if the file "grabs" and bites the steel, you didn't get it hard enough.

There are also simple tests you can do after tempering. I plan to do an article on that as well. The pics are ready, but the article is not.

If you want to know the exact Rc on the blade, you'll need to drive over to Detroit and see Don.

##########

Oh!, don't let the black stuff on the blade above confuse you. That's some of my magic formula to prevent scale.

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  #4  
Old 11-18-2001, 11:55 AM
Steve Vanderkolff
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What is the normal hardness for a file? Can you get files with varying hardness? My thought would be to get some files at 70,65,60, 55 and see which of them grabs. Does that make sense?
By the way great description of the skating. I never really had a feel for what it meant before.
Thanks
Steve

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  #5  
Old 11-18-2001, 02:35 PM
Don Cowles
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I had a set of hardness testing files (about $75) that I sold when I got my rockwell tester. They are fairly subjective, and at best can only give you a 5 point spread.
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