Olive oil for quench vs......

[Dana Hackney]

Hi Ed!

Dana from the cold south! Tomorrow - high of 5 for Monument, CO.

Anyhow, I read the article posted in the latest Blade magazine by Tim Zowada and I was a bit concerned
after reading it, regarding the use of olive oil vs. that expensive tough quench (another one was mentioned but I cannot recall it's name). Tim said that for the faster hardening steels like 1084, 1095 you need somehting like
the aforementioned oil because oil olive (and the like) do not do a very good job of quenching. I forge with 1080, 5160 and O-1, and use light olvie oil preheated to 120-150 degrees. Now I'm worried that the 1080 blades are
not top notch when it comes to ideal hardness.

Shoul d I consider going with that expensive stuff or, maybe, that vet. grade mineral oil you use is better than
the olive oil I'm currently using?

Thanks Ed!
Dana

[Ed Caffrey]

"Better" is a very ambiguous term when your talking about quenching oils. The only difference between the "high dollar" quenchants, and the basics (olive, mineral, vegetable,ect oils), are some very small additives for flame reduction. In fact I got my hands on a formula for Texico Type A, and it is 99.5% mineral oil. (the other .5% is nothing more than flame retarders and sulficants (wetting agents).

I've not read the article that Tim wrote, but have a great respect for Tim and his opinions/findings. My way of thinking is that if it isn't broken.....don't fix it. Changing to another quenchant involves MUCH more than just changing the fluid in your tank. You'll wind up having to reinvent many aspects of your process, so unless your having problems, think long and hard about it before jumping in. If your willing to take the time and effort, and have the money to spend on the quenchant, go for it!

[Dana Hackney]

for your take on this topic. I feel better but I think I might just opt for some of that vet. grade mineral oil you use.
I figure if you're using it and get the results you do, then I'll go that route and leave no stone unturned
Is there a particular company/site I can order this stuff from?

Thanks, again, Ed,
Dana

[Ed Caffrey]

I just go to the local farm/ranch store and buy it by the gallon. It's the stuff they give horses for colic. Cost is about $13 per gallon in these parts.

[Dana Hackney]

I just got back from a local ranch/hardware store and they are selling it, as you said,
for $12.99/gal. It's got a viscosity rating of 95, and from the web searching I've done
the Texaco Type A is rated at 100 SUS. So this vet. grade oil is slightly lighter, which, I'm
guessing is better yet.

Thanks Ed!
Dana

[jdm61]

I just read the same article and Tim Z. lists tough quench as a "medium" speed oil amd I had been led to believe that it was "fast" (10-11 secondson the test medium. So now I was kinda freaking because i have all of this W2 and 1080 and wasthnking that I had the wrong oil and was going to have to chance using water quenching for the W2.

[plain ol Bill]

When I started this knife making adventure bother Ed recccomended the mineral oil to me and that is what I have been using since. It ain't broke so I'm not going to fix it either! I have gone to using salts for my carbon HT and using the mineral oil leaves a blade cleaner than any other medium I have see used and this is a plus for me.

[Ray Rogers]

I agree that if it ain't broke don't fix it theory. At one point though, for me at least, it was broke and tough quench did fix it.

For years I used hydraulic fluid as my quenchant and it worked fine for every steel I used from 1095 to BG-42 stainless. Then one day, along came S30V. Try as I might, no matter which one of the factory formulas I tried, I could not get that stuff to harden properly in the hydraulic fluid. Perhaps if I had switched to mineral oil that would have solved the problem to my satisfaction. I don't know because I didn't try it. Instead, I bought 5 gallons of Tough Quench. That did the trick, so I guess that means that Tough Quench is faster than hydraulic fluid. Even so, it may be slower than mineral oil but, again, I didn't try mineral oil. I will say that TQ is fast enough to give a clay coated 1095 blade a hamon line that is pretty darned close to what you can get with a water quench and I have NEVER had a 1095 blade crack during the quench in TQ, which is more than I can claim when using water....

[Doug Lester]

I'll vote for "if it aint broke, don't fix it". I was reading the $50 Knive Shop by Wayne Goddard of Goddard's goop fame and his position was that oil was pretty much oil. Granted, he was probably not speaking of the new fancy stay-sharp-forever-which-is-a-good-thing-because-you'll-never-be-able-to-resharpen-it modern steels ( oops, I think I left my prejudice showing) but the so-called plain carbon steels. Remember, if it walks like a duck, swims like a duck, looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck there's a real good chance that it's a duck. So if you quench you blades in axle grease and it holds an edge, doesn't chip in normal use, and can flex a few degrees and spring back to straight what more do you want?

Doug Lester

[Chris Meyer]

I'm not trying to be obnoxious (I'm really not), but how do you really know whether "it ain't broke..." unless you actually have some blades tested by a metallurical lab? Might not these blades being quenched in assorted oils be even better if they were quenched in oils that were specifically designed for them?

I use Heatbath's AAA for O-1 and Heatbath's #50 oil for 10XX series steels. I use real heat treating oil for the same reason I use new steel for my blades; I screw things up enough on my own, so I don't need my materials and tools adding to my problems.

By the way, Heatbath's oil is not all that expensive, although it can be a little hard to get. I bought ten gallons of AAA and ten of #50 a few years ago, and I believe that I paid less than $100 for all.

Here is what Heatbath's website say about the two oils I mentioned:

#50 QUENCH OIL Low viscosity quench oil that approaches water in quench speed, yet gives a more uniform, less severe quench than water. Recommended for open quench system operating below 120 deg F.

AAA QUENCH OIL The most popular, widely used quench oil. This patented accelerated quench oil provides a maximum, uniform cooling rate for austenitized steels, as well as clean, easily washed work when properly maintained.

Heatbath also has an article entitled Proper Quenching Option Yields Better Heat-Treating Results that I found interested reading.

[Jon Christensen]

Dana,
I used olive oil when I first started. It worked fine but I got tired of smelling like french fries all the time. I then switched to vet. grade mineral oil and used that for many years with great results.

I now use "Tough Quench". I feel it gives as good or better results but doesn't smoke or flare up as much as the other two.

I got my "Tough Quench" through Brownells.

Hope this helps,
Jon

[Ed Caffrey]

Speaking strictly for myself and my work, it has been, and continues to be tested.
For the pasted 15 years I've been sending samples off for spectrograph analysis. Thats how I come to the conclusions that I speak of on these forums.
I agree in that without experimentation and testing, your only guessing at what you can achieve. I have always encouraged experimentation and testing, and continue to do so.

I'm not sure how much you've studied quenchants, and what their makeup is, but if you have, you should already know what I stated in the previous posts. Mineral oil comprises a large portion of many commercial quenchants.

What it all comes down to is the rate at which the steel is cooled. If the proper cooling rate can be achieved for a given steel, causing the correct matrix transformation, no matter what the media, then your OK.

Yesterday I had a total of 6 phone calls and 3 emails from newer makers who were worried that they were going to have to change their quenchant because they had read that article in blade magazine. As I stated previously, think about what your doing before you jump! If you have a process that achieves the desired results, and wish to change what your quenching with, be aware that your likely going to have to change other aspects of your process. Each step that an individual conducts while creating a blade should compliment the following steps. I'm not saying DON'T change your quenchant, all I'm telling you is that IF you do, be prepared for some down time while you readjust the other steps in your process in order to strike a new balance.

I have confidence in the process I use, including the quenchant. Had it not worked I doubt I would have ever achieved my JS or MS rating, nor would the blades that I have won cutting competitions with performed so well.

Who knows, I might just change my mind in the future and go with a different quenchant.

[Dana Hackney]

for all the input. It's been very helpful and, at the same time, comforting.

It looks like the "if it aint broke don't fix it" philosophy really is the bottom line, and, as you mentioned Ed, your mineral oil methodology has produced for you (obviously!), as well as many others (from all the posts I've read and the research I've been doing).

I'd opt for the tough quench if it wasn't so dog-gone expensive. I will definitely take a look at the
Heatbath products but will, for the present, go for the vert. grade mineral oil - $25 for a couple of gals is pretty
reasonable.

Thanks, a bunch, folks for all these posts! This thread will go into my library .

Best regards from the cold Colorado foothills! (-17 this a.m.),
Dana

[Alan L]

I may be steering this away from the original question, but I have another one: I've been using mineral oil for a few years now and I love it, especially for 5160. I have one question for those folks using ToughQuench or Parks/heatbath #50: Mineral oil seems to cause my 1084/15n20 and 1095 dirk blades to nosedive in the quench.

Do the "real" quench oils also have this effect on thin, wedge-section blades? Seems like it's always the last three inches of the point that dives just a little bit. Proper normalization keeps the sideways warps at bay, and sabre-grind blades don't seem to do this either. It's just the full zero-grind flat grinds that are doing this on me. I leave the edge about .040" or a little thicker, and this "nosedive" seems to start about where the back is about .125".

[Ray Rogers]

I haven't observed any nose dive but then I haven't made a blade from 5160 either. I have noticed that my 1095 blades willl tend to bend upwards in the way a katana is said to bend when quenched only to a lesser degree. The 1095 blades don't 'squeal' like they do in water, and they don't crack either! My guess would be that 5160 might still nose dive but maybe it would do it less...