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Ed Caffrey's Workshop Talk to Ed Caffrey ... The Montana Bladesmith! Tips, tricks and more from an ABS Mastersmith.

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  #1  
Old 02-24-2004, 11:10 AM
ORYXMAN2003 ORYXMAN2003 is offline
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Question Heat Treating 01 Tool Steel For Dumbies

ED, I HAVE A SIMPLE QUESTION I WAS HOPING YOU COULD HELP ME WITH. IS THERE A WAY I CAN HEAT TREAT 01 TOOL STEEL THAT IS EASY TO DO? I HAVE A LOT OF WAYS OF HEATING IT I JUST DONT' KNOW THE STEPS TO TAKE. I DON'T WANT TO HAVE TO SEND MY BLADES TO SOMEONE ELSE?

THANKS FOR THE HELP ROB DUNLAP
LAS CRUCES,NM


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Old 02-24-2004, 11:45 AM
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Ed Caffrey Ed Caffrey is offline
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Leave the blade a bit thick in the edge section. (around 1/8" or so). This prevents warpage during hardening. The blade should be finished to at least 120 grit to prevent any stress risers that could create cracks during hardening.
Ensure you have a tank large enough to submerse the blade. Fill the tank 1/2 to 3/4 full with a light oil such as automatic transmission fluid, straight SAE 30 oil, or mineral oil (this is what I currently use). Pre-heat the oil to 130-160F. (you can do this with a chunk of steel that has been heated in your forge) (using a meat/candy thermometer to measure temp) For a full quench, heat the blade slowly and evenly until a magnet will no longer be attracted to it. (around 1550F for O-1) (this can be done is the forge, or with an oxy/acteylene torch with a "soft" flame) and place the blade in the oil until it stops bubbling and fuming. Depending on the type of oil used, there will likely be some flame, and smoke, so be prepared for it. DO NOT pull the blade in and out of the oil. This will creat hard and soft spots throughout the blade. Just leave it in the oil until it gets below 400F. The blade should come out mostly dull gray in appearance..........this is a sure sign that the steel has hardened. There will be some black areas, but that is only the spots where the scale did not "blow" off. Let the blade cool in room air until you can comfortably handle it. DO NOT COOL IT DOWN BY DUNKING IT IN WATER!
Clean up the blade to at least 120 grit finish, and then temper. Tempering temps for O-1 can range from 375F to 500F depending on what you want the finished product to come out as. Lower tempering temps will leave the blade harder, but also more brittle. I would recommend starting at about 400F to 425F, and see how it performs from there. If it's too hard, you can always re-temper at 25F higher than the last temper and check it again. Once you find the tempering temp that you feel works best for you, WRITE IT DOWN. That way you don't have to re-invent the wheel every time you temper a blade of O-1. Temper for at least two hours at the chosen temp. I temper three times, allowing the blade to cool in still air to room temp, between tempering cycles.
To edge quench, follow the same procedures, but try only to bring that area of the blade you want to harden to non-magnetic. The whole intent of the edge quench is to have a blade with a hard edge and a softer spine........O-1 has some air hardening qualities, so whatever portioins of the blade you heat to non-magnetic will get hard to a certain extent. A "limiter" plate in the quench tank will help with edge quenching too. It is nothing more than a piece of aluminum chocked full of 3/8" holes, with threaded holes at each corner that will accept carriage bolts. Put the bolts in with the heads facing the bottom of the quench tank, and you can adjust the depth of the limiter plate by screwing the bolts in and out. Generally for an edge quench I look to harden between 1/3 and 1/2 of the blade's width from edge to spine. Stiffness and toughness of the finished blade is controlled by how deep the edge quench is accomplished.

Hope this helps!


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  #3  
Old 02-24-2004, 11:46 AM
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Jamey Saunders Jamey Saunders is offline
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I'm not Ed, but if you click on the search button in my signature and search for "heat treating", you'll get so much information, your head will spin...

And welcome to the Forums!


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Old 02-24-2004, 12:04 PM
ORYXMAN2003 ORYXMAN2003 is offline
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THANKS ED


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Old 02-24-2004, 12:42 PM
paul harm paul harm is offline
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might add [sure ed just forgot to mention it]- make sure the blade goes into the oil STRAIGHT. doesn't matter if your doing a point down, or edge first; if you let it get on an angle it will warp. 10 or so years ago all i did was stock removal in the shop where i worked. tool room had a heat treat room- first class [ hot salts i could adjust and circular heated oil quench tank]. the only time a blade ever warped, i was hurrying to the quench tank and had the blade swinging [ wire through the tang looped around a rod so it could sit it the salt bath] - swinging left- warped left the good thing is if you goof up O1 , it can be reheated and done again [ or straightened]. paul
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Old 02-25-2004, 10:59 AM
Jerry Shorter Jerry Shorter is offline
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ooh,ooh, I got a question, Once you are past the nose does it really mater how fast you get down to room temp? The reason I ask is for the purpose of straighting after quench. I tried to straighten a blade once after quench but while still warm about 300 deg by an infared themometer, and by she snapped real quick , so now I have a neck knife Seems if I could straighten it at about 600 to 800 deg there would be more likelyhood of success.
Jerry
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Old 02-25-2004, 11:21 AM
paul harm paul harm is offline
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i've straightened O1, but think it was around 400 deg. it's a risky deal. also read once [ think it was tim zawada who said it, but can't be sure] that O1 h.t.s better if at around 400 deg. it gets put in the preheated draw oven. guess it would be like martempering. anyone have thoughts on this? paul
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Old 02-25-2004, 12:53 PM
ORYXMAN2003 ORYXMAN2003 is offline
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01 HEAT TREAT

OK I HAVE BEEN HEARING ALL KINDS OF DIFFRENT THINGS ON HEAT TREATING 01 TOOL STEEL. IF I PUT A PIECE OF 01 TOOL STEEL 1/8 THICK 1-1/2" WIDE AND 8" LONG IN THE OVEN AT 500 DEGREES FOR 1 HR. ON LET IT AIR COOL WHAT WOULD THE ROCKWELL SCALE BE?


THANKS GUYS




ROB


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Old 02-25-2004, 01:10 PM
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Unless you bring the steel up to critical temperature (about 1350*) and then quench, you're not going to get any kind of hardness. You have to do that first. The heating to critical and quenching rapidly imparts the hardness to the blade. What you've described would be the temper cycle, where you draw some of the hardness out of the blade in a trade-off for toughness.


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Old 02-25-2004, 04:04 PM
ORYXMAN2003 ORYXMAN2003 is offline
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THANKS JAMEY, HOW IS A GOOD WAY TO TELL WHEN I HAVE IT TO 1350?


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Old 02-25-2004, 04:13 PM
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Use the magnet test.

Get a magnet, and as you heat the blade (evenly!) keep checking to see if the magnet will stick to the blade. When the magnet no longer sticks to the blade, it is at critical temperature, and it's time to quench.


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Old 02-25-2004, 08:24 PM
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Ed Caffrey Ed Caffrey is offline
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It never occured to me to tell you that hardening and tempering are two distinctly different steps tha must be accomplished to "heat treat" a blade. Hardening is what occurs when you bring the blade the critical temp (where the magnet no longer is attracted to the steel). At this point, all of the elements contained in the steel should be evenly distributed through out the blade. Quenching the blade (cooling it rapidly) freezes the elements in their distributed state, and also creates a different matrix structure within the steel, causing it to become hard. At this point the blade is hard, but it is also brittle and will easily break.
Tempering is the next step.....this is a controlled softening, which does a couple of things. It relives the stresses from hardening, it of course softens the blade to a level that will be hard enough to withstand use, but not be so brittle that it will break either at the using edge or the entire blade. Secondly, it once again converts the steel's matrix to a tougher, more stable structure. I have had blades that have been hardened, but not tempered, crack while lying on the bench over night because of the internal stresses caused by hardening, and not tempering quickly.
Time and temp are everything where blades are concerned. I'm fully convinced that by tempering a blade for only one hour, you are not fully converting the matrix and run the risk on not achieving the full benifit. Two hours is what I consider minimum, with a second tempering cycle being better, and a third even more desirable.

Here's a link that will give you some idea of heat treating O-1


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Last edited by Ed Caffrey; 02-25-2004 at 08:31 PM.
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Old 02-25-2004, 11:13 PM
Micky Wise Micky Wise is offline
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Was anyone going to mention normalizing? Who knows what condition the steel was in before it got in the hands of the maker.
This will help with warping and make a better blade(hold an edge better).


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Old 02-26-2004, 08:05 AM
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Since he's just starting out, I didn't want to overload with too much information. At this point I feel that grasping the very basics is essential, and once that is understood, move on to things like normalizing. I fear that I've already done my part to confuse..........and if so, let's make sure we all work together to help him past it.


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Old 02-27-2004, 07:41 AM
ORYXMAN2003 ORYXMAN2003 is offline
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HERE IS WHAT I DID

HERE IS WHAT I DID AND I WILL TEST IT OUT THIS WEEKEND ON ONE OF THE MANY ORYX HUNTS I GUIDE FOR HERE IN NM.
I HEATED THE 01 TO WHERE A MAGNET WOULD NO LONGER STICK,THEN I PUT IN LIGHT MOTOR OIL FOR 7 MINUTE'S KEEPING THE BLADE STRAIGHT IN.AFTER REMOVING I CLEANED OFF ALL MOTOR OIL AND PREHEATED MY OVEN TO 500 DEGREES.
THEN I PLACED THE BLADE ON THE RACK FOR ONE HOUR AND IT THEN TURNED A BROWN COLOR ANDI REMOVED AND LET AIR COOL. EVERY THING SEAMS TO HAVE WORKED OUT OK. IS THERE A TEST I CAN DO TO KINDA SEE WHAT THE ROCKWELL"C" SCALE MIGHT BE WITHOUT BREAKING IT?I WILL LET YOU GUY'S KNOW IF IT HOLDS A GOOD EDGE OR NOT. ALSO IT DID NOT WARP"TAHNK GOODNESS' I WOULD HAVE CRYED.AND WHEN I FINISHED GRINDING MY BLADE I USED ONLY FILES AND ELBO GREASE SO NOT TO GET THE BLADE TO HOT....

THANKS FOR ALL YOUR HELP ROB DUNLAP,LAS CRUCES,NM


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