MattBower

Four is nothing. Skip to about 1 minute from the end of this one, when they're riveting the shackle:

D'oh. Sorry about that, Frosty! I didn't think about someone possibly taking it that way.

I'm no farrier, but are you certain they're not aluminum? I know there are aluminum shoes. I've never heard of plated shoes. Seems hard to imagine any plating would hold up to that kind of abuse for long. (But again, that doesn't mean they don't exist.)

Modern leaf springs typically seem to be oil hardening steels, and some will even air harden a bit in thin sections. I have had only bad experiences quenching them in water, not that I've done it often. (Triple normalizing after forging and prior to hardening is good practice. It should not reduce grain size so much as to make something like 5160 require a water quench in order to harden.) Even if Ed has succeeded with water, I will stick with warm oil for modern leaf springs, unless I run across some that just refuse to harden in oil. (Antique, shear steel leaf springs may be a different matter.) I agree, by the way: nice lookin' chisels.

I saw a thread on another forum a while back, in which someone converted a leaf blower to a hand cranked blower using the back half of a bicycle, and was satisfied with the results. Just realize that the leaf blower was made to operate at high RPMs, so you'll need to generate some speed to get much "puff" from it. This guy figured he was getting 1100 RPMs, and that was good enough for his purposes -- but I don't know anything about his forge. homemade leaf blower to hand cranked blower conversion For some reason I can't see the Flash content in the post immediately before this one, so my apologies if I'm being redundant.

Good point, Steve! Sorry about that!

Actually, I have heard that that the free version of Verhoeven's book that's currently available on the web is in violation of his copyright. Verhoeven allowed it to be freely distributed for a while, but once he turned the revised version into a full scale book published by ASM (a rather pricey one, at that), he withdrew the license for free distribution of the older version. However, since the website that's hosting the PDF is German, apparently it's not that easy to resolve the problem. For folks with no formal knowledge of the metallurgy of heat treating, I think this is a pretty decent intro to the basics: http://www.asminternational.org/content/ASM/StoreFiles/ACF180B.pdf It's not a how-to, but it introduces you to the important concepts and terminology.

The salt doesn't just raise the boiling point. As water flashes to steam it actually forms tiny salt deposits on the hot blade, which then basically explode from the heat and disrupt the vapor jacket. See page 13 of Houghton on Quenching. The vapor jacket slows down the quench and also tends to make it extremely uneven, which is hard on steel. So by eliminating the vapor jacket you make the quench both faster and more uniform -- and the lack of uniform cooling is one of the things that makes water quenching so dangerous. And here's an interesting aside. If you look at page 12 of Hougton on Quenching, you see this quote: The stability of the vapor phase is dependent upon the surface finish of the component. The vapor film is very persistent on flat smooth surfaces, but breaks up readily with the onset of the boiling stage at sharp corners, rough surfaces, defects or other stress risers. This variation in stability can produce markedly different cooling rates across the component, resulting in distortion and cracking. I always used to wonder why the Japanese put a thin clay wash on the edge of the blade, which is supposed to get full hard. It seemed like the clay would only insulate the edge, which would be counterproductive. (When you're differentially hardening with clay you want to insulate the spine, but the edge...?) But I think this explains it pretty well. The thin clay wash a little roughness, and roughness breaks up the vapor film and gives a faster quench. (That's assuming that the clay is quite thin, of course. At a certain point the insulating effect outweighs the extra quench speed.) I think it probably also helps explain why Japanese smiths are able to get away with quenching in water as much as they do. The clay likely makes the quench speed more uniform. Clay quenching. It ain't just for pretty. :)

Warm (~130 F) canola is pretty fast. Maybe not quite as fast as a really fast commercial oil like Parks 50 or Houghtoquench K. You could start with canola and move to water or brine if you don't feel like the oil is giving acceptable hardness. Yes, Thomas, these anchors are much better steel than spikes. The guy who ran these for me did two spikes that the had picked up locally. The results on those were: unmarked, older spike C - 0.30 Mn - 0.80 Si - 0.25 Cu - 0.025 Cr - 0.10 Ni - 0.12 Sn - 0.02 V - 0.002 newer spike. He said it was marked MC. Not sure if that's a maker's mark, or what. C - 0.25 Mn - 1.00 Si - 0.23 Cu - 0.32 Cr - 0.10 Ni - 0.11 Sn - 0.02 V - 0.026 The Cr and Ni are consistent enough that I think they're not there by accident. And the V in the second one is high enough that that's probably not an accident, either. Interestin'.

There are different kinds of anchors. Both the ones I had tested looked about like this: http://www.unitrail.com/wood_composite_ties/spring_anchor.html I forged a hammer drift out of one, by hand. It's good, tough steel. It doesn't move that hard under the hammer compared to, say, O1 or similar blade steels, but if you're used to 1018, yeah, these will get your attention. Anything between 1050 and 1065 should be pretty tough, and there's enough C to take a pretty good edge -- but probably not hold it for all that long. Should be good for hawks and larger blades that'll see impact. Not ideal for blades that'll do tons of slicing, but it'll work if you don't mind having to resharpen a little more often. The carbon content is low enough that you'll probably have to think about water or brine quenching to get maximum potential hardness. Maybe a fast oil. With that said, remember that just because we have two anchors in the 1050-65 range doesn't mean they'll all be.

I had my friend with access to a couple spectrometers run some more scrap steel samples -- a rail anchor, and a piece of new (within the past few years) Nicholson file. The first rail anchor I had tested came out around 1050, and I wanted to see if that held true in this instance as well. (This post is "dedicated to Thomas Powers" because Thomas and I have talked scrap steel chemistry, and specifically rail anchors, in the past.) And I wanted to double-check the oft-repeated rumor that new Nicholson files are basically 1095. Here are the results. -------RA-----File C **0.63***0.94 Mn *0.79***0.37 P **0.008**0.014 S **0.027**0.053 Si**0.20***0.25 Cu *0.24***0.01 Cr *0.13***0.22 Mo *0.02***0.003 Ni *0.08***0.02 Sn *0.009**0.005 Nb(Cb)*0.026**00 V **0.004**0.006 So yeah, new production Nicholsons seem to be very close to 1095, with a little silicon and chromium. (I'm guessing Cooper Tools -- the guys who own the Nicholson brand -- keeps a close eye on steel quality, and keeps the chemistry within a pretty narrow range. They'd just about have to.) And now we know that rail anchors can run at least as high as 1065(ish) -- or as low as 1050(ish).

I have encountered wrought iron spikes in thia part of the country. Work it at a near welding heat and see if that fixes it. But wrought won't quench harden much if at all (some will harden a bit in water), so don't expect to get much of a knife from it, unless you weld in a steel edge.

Is this your homework or something? Here's one of Fisher's patents: http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPATRE227&id=ilkqAAAAEBAJ&printsec=abstract&zoom=4&dq=october+16+1847#v=onepage&q&f=false

So you're limited to fairly small blades. Still, I'd be psyched in your shoes, too.

Heck yeah, they're useful for knifemaking, and all kinds of other stuff. I'm jealous. What are the interior dimensions? To echo Rich, 1200 C is more than you need for even the high alloy and stainless blade steels. It's way more than you need for low alloy and simple carbon steels. Nice find!

Or loan it to his worst enemy?

Yeah, pressure isn't really an issue with blown burners. High pressure, low pressure - doesn't matter as long as you're delivering enough fuel mass to provide the BTUs you need.

Very nice tutorial, and a very nice lookin' knife. I'm eager to see it finished! Thanks for posting.

I know bladesmiths who use mild steel anvils and are happy with them. It's vastly better than a cast iron ASO. So even if this anvil is soft, that doesn't make it unusable. Even if it's severely tempered martensite, it's likely a good bit harder than mild steel. I'd just start using it. If it seems soft -- dents easily, etc. -- then maybe consider rehardening it at some point, if you have the time and access to a fire hose or other high pressure water source. I wouldn't try hardening it unless I was pretty sure I could get the quench right. Otherwise you might very well just end up making it even softer.

For simple carbon steels, air cooling down to a black heat works well. Can't say about 4140. Quenching will not cause formation of martensite unless the steel is austenitic when the quench starts. That's somewhere north of 1400 F -- in some cases way north.

2 psi is really low as a max for a NA burner. I doubt the fact that it's NG instead of propane makes that much difference.

Doesn't look like anything a wire wheel wouldn't fix.

Have you tried getting in touch with your local ABANA affiliate? THE BADGER BLACKSMITH Pres: Paul Branch 1310 - 216th Ave. New Richmond, WI 54107 (715) 248-7788 [email protected] Ed: John Grump 5890 Prill Road Eau Claire, WI 54701 715-835-0894 [email protected]

BTW, there are folks here from Wisconsin. Keep your eyes open.

WD40 is just a bunch of petroleum distillates. Not a bigger deal than burning a little kerosene, AFAIK. I've heard of using it in a nearly sealed can to exclude oxygen for forge welding. Creates a reducing atmosphere in the can to prevent oxidation. The steel has to be very clean, though. WD40 isn't going to dissolve oxides like borax will. I've never heard of using it as a flux in an open forge, without a can.