Woody

Recently there has been a lot of questions about the hazards of various chemicals. The internet is full of information on the hazards of chemicals. There are many web sites that give you free access to Material Safety Data Sheets and other chemical information. Here are a couple links to sites with good information. http://ull.chemistry.uakron.edu/erd/ http://hazmap.nlm.nih.gov/index.html Woody

The following is extracted from 29 CFR 1910.146 the OSHA Regulations on Confined Space Entry "Note: Some materials – hydrogen fluoride gas and cadmium vapor, for example – may produce immediate transient effects that, even if severe, may pass without medical attention, but are followed by sudden, possibly fatal collapse 12-72 hours after exposure. The victim "feels normal" from recovery from transient effects until collapse. Such materials in hazardous quantities are considered to be "immediately" dangerous to life or health." Sources of cadmium vapors as Irnsrgn said are cadmium plated bolts, they are usually but not always Grade 8 Bolts, and NiCad welding rod. On any welding rod you would be well served to get the Material Safety Data Sheet, MSDS, and read it thoroughly before you use the rod. Fluorite is sometimes used in the flux on welding rods and when it burns off it produces Hydrogen Fluoride Gas. Woody

RegionalChaos, coke is a mild acid solution. Weak acid solutions are more corrosive to metal than concentrated acid solutions, heating acid makes it more corrosive to metal. For sulfuric acid every 10 degrees the acid is heated over 80 degrees F. it doubles the corrosion rate to steel, or so I was told years ago by the manager of the acid plant at Inspriation Consolidated Copper Company. If you heat any acid solution, coke, ferric chloride, vinegar, it will make it more corrosive to metal. I have used a boiling vinegar solution to clean up brass shell casings prior to reloading. Woody

Great News Paul, I pray for your complete and speedy recovery Woody

There are many myths about America's favorite soft drink. Coke is a very weak acid solution and if my memory serves me correctly it has a pH of around 4. Lemon juice has a pH of around 3 as does vinegar. I doubt the statement that coke will dislove a nail in 4 days. Coke is packaged in aluminum cans among other containers. Aluminum is much less resistant to acid than steel yet the can does not dislove. As for disolving a T-Bone steak in 2 days I find this highly unlikely. To be corrosive to skin or animal tissue a substance must have a pH less than 2.5 or greater than 12. The more concentrated the acid the more corrosive to skin, the weaker the acid solution the more corrosive to metal. I was involved in the transportation of hazardous chemicals including many acids and alkalis for over 20 years. Sulfuric acid in concentrations over 50% are hauled in unlined steel or stainless steel trailers. Concentrations under 50% must be hauled in trailers that have a lining impervious to the acid either rubber or plastic. As for an engine cleaner, to remove grease and oil you need a strong alkali such as Sodium Hydroxide (caustic soda) or Potasium Hydroxide (lye) which will turn the grease into soap, a weak acid solution would have little or no effect on it, while a concentrated acid solution could cause the grease to ignite. Sulfuric Acid H2S04 contains twice as much oxygen as pure oxygen 02. Nitric Acid HN03 is placarded as an oxidizer in shipping instead of a corrosive because of its strong oxidizing potential is a greater hazard than the corrosiveness of the acid. As for etching a blade in coke you could do it if you wanted to wait long enough, but there are other substances that would work faster and better. Woody

Ferrous: what you are describing is "Case Hardening" it does impart some additional carbon to the metal part, but the depth of penetration is only a few thousandths of an inch. You can check Richardson's Practical Blacksmithing, I believe it has several pages on the process. If you had a forge big enough to handle a buggy axle, you could case harden it, but the results would be the same, an axle with a hard layer that is only a few thousandths of an inch thick. Rather than an exercise in nostalga, I fear it would be an exercise in futility. Woody

Chopper glad you came through the surgery ok. My prayers are with ya mate. Take care and get well soon Woody

Tim: There was quite a discussion on the subject of eye protection for forging a while back on Anvilfire. You might do a search of the archives there. Woody

If the paint contained lead and it was removed with a grinder sander wire brush or burned off in the forge it would put lead particles in the air. If you breathe these, you will get lead into your system. Lead is shed by the body, but slowly so it is possible for toxic concentrations to build up in the system. The amount of exposure you get will be determined by the concentration of lead in the air and the length of time you spent in the contaminated atmosphere. Remember that the lead will not magically disappear, it will settle with the rest of the dust in your shop and every time the dust is stired up, you will get more exposure. The effects of the exposure depend on many things, you size and weight, your general health, your gender, the amount of exposure etc. There has been more than one police officer who was in charge of an indoor firing range suffer the effects of lead poisoning from the small amount of lead that is vaporized each time a lead bullet was fired on the range. When it comes to heavy metal poisoning, Cadmium is even worse. Sources of Cadmium exposure would be heating grade 8 bolts that are Cadmium plated, or using welding rods containing Cadmium. NiCad rod, which also contains Nickel another toxic heavy metal. Woody

I also have had the unfortunate experience of a piece of steel removed from my eye. It happened while I was wearing safety glasses. I was replacing some boards in my patio deck using an electric drill to drive the deck screws. the screwdriver bit spun out on the head of a screw and ripped out pieces of metal. One went under my safety glasses and imbedded itself in my eye. The point here is safety glasses are not enough in many instances. They are made to protect the eyes from a foreign object that is coming at the eye at close to a 90 degree angle. Objects can come in from the bottom and the sides. Take a close look at what you are doing, a full face shield or goggles may be in order. woody

Glenn: The little white threads floating in the air were only a small portion of the problem, what is more hazardous is the stuff in the fumes that you can't see. These are particles that are able to pass directly through the lungs and into the bloodstream. A while back I did a written blueprint on Toxicology but I can't find it in the blueprint section now. Maybe it got lost in the move, but perhaps now is a good time to publish it again. I still have the original copy let me know if you need it. Woody

Make a list of all the body parts you can live without, now protect the rest. Woody

There is a product called "Rockite". You just mix it with water and pour it in, it sets in 15 minutes and is harder than concerte in 1 hour. It is a dark grey in color but some concrete pigment could be added to make it darker if needed. It expands as it hardens to make a completely tight fit. The Manufacturer is hartline Products Co. Inc., 4150 Mayfield Road, Cleveland, Ohio 44121, phone 216-291-2303. The product is commonly sold in lumberyards and hardware stores. Woody

My condolences to the family. My prayers are with them Woody

We spend countless hours at the forge creating beautiful objects and then devote mere minutes to applying a finish to the object. Often all it gets is a quick blast from a can of flat black spray paint or we burn some wax or oil on the metal and call it good. I think the fruits of our labors deserve better treatment. How about everybody listing their favorite ways of finishing their metal creations. Some of my favorites are listed below: 1. Watco Dark Walnut Oil with a little gold paint mixed in to give an antique bronze finish. 2. Dilute oil based paint with at least 50% polyurathane varnish to give a translucent paint finish where the metal will show through. 3. Cold gun blue with a lacquer or clear coat finish applied over it. Woody

my junkyard steel list shows connecting rods from cars to be 1040 steel or plain carbon steel with 40 points of carbon. It also shows connecting rods from trucks to be 2340 which is an alloy contining 3.5% Nickel and 40 points of carbon. Either one has 10 points more carbon than a HC RR spike that many people turn into knives. Interesting idea for a blade anyway. Woody

brucerdn: My thoughts and prayers are with your brother. May God keep him safe and return him to you and your family. Woody

Motor oil is an effective quenchant, but it can contain many toxic addatives that are vaporized when hot metal is quenched in it. Breathing the fumes can be hazardous to your body. Vegetable (cooking) oil is a much safer material for quenching steel. You should have a tight fitting lid handy for any oil quenchant tank in case a fire results and also a fire extinguisher at the ready. Although most of us have done it at one time or another, quenching steel in oil inside a shop or garage is not recommended. This is something that is safer to do in the open air. Woody

When high carbon steel has been quenched and before it is tempered it is EXTREMELY hard and EXTREMELY brittle the state is called "glass hard" for a reason it will break with the slightest provocation just like glass. Blades should be tempered immediately after quenching. Also when making knives out of files be sure you grind all the teeth off the file first otherwise they will produce cold shuts when the blade is forged and make it even more prone to breakage. Woody

Clark: It looks very similar to what some of my Lakota Friends have had me forge for them as buffalo spears. The spears they constructed had a short shaft, 4 or so, and were ment to be used from horseback. If I were you I would have it checked by the Anthropology Dept at your nearest college before I converted it to any other use, you may have a valuable antique. Woody

no hamon, I didn't differential temper them

Canman: you will need some basic blacksmithing skills to make a knife from a file unless you are just going to do stock removal, that is taking a file and grinding away everything that don't look like a knife. However you will need more knowledge about the properties of steel and the effects of heat upon the steel. A down and dirty file to knife process follows. 1. Heat the file to above critical temperature, that is the temperature where it goes non magnetic. You can check with a magnet to tell when you are there. 2. Insert the hot file into a bucket containing ashes, vermiculite, lime or other insulating material and let it cool overnight. This will anneal the steel and make it very soft. 3. Grind all the teeth off the file if you plan on forging it into a blade, otherwise the teeth will make cold shuts in the metal as you forge it which will develop into cracks in the finished blade. 4. Heat the blade to a bright yellow and forge to the desired shape, reheating as necessary. Don't try to forge the blade below a bright red or you will put stress cracks in it that will only show up when the blade is near finished. 5. Once the blade is forged to you liking, heat it once again to above ciritical temperature and let it air cool, this is called normalizing and will disipate the stresses developed by forging and shrink the grain in the steel that has grown from the forging process. You will get a more uniform grain structure if you can hold the blade at temperature for a while before letting it cool. 6. Once the blade is cool you can grind and finish it as you desire, then reheat it to above critical temperature and plunge it point first into vegetable oil, this will harden the blade to a glass hard state but it will be very brittle. Take the cooled blade from the oil, wash off the oil and immediately place it in the oven at 375 degrees and bake it for about 3 hours. This will temper the blade, removing some of the hardness and brittleness while keeping it hard enough to hold a sharp edge. 7. After the blade is cooled from the tempering process it is ready for final grinding, polishing and the handle of your choice . Keep accurate records of what you do so that when something goes wrong, and it will, you don't have to make the same mistake twice. If there is anything I can do to help you let me know. Woody

short sword is Torsion Bar off a Toyota, probably 5160 or perhaps 1095. Long sword is a piece of Rifle Barrel Blank according to my junkyard steel chart it should be 4140 but it got harder than what I would expect from only 40 points of carbon but it is very springy it will take a 45 degree bend and spring back but you can hardly cut it with a chain saw file. Both heated to just above critical temp and then quenched in room temp veg oil. Short sword tempered at 375 degrees for 3 hours, long sword tempered at 425 degrees for 4 hours. Woody

Here is the Katana I finished this week along with the Wakazashi that I made earlier this year Katana has a 28 inch blade and is 36 inches overall Wakazashi has a 14 inch blade and is 21 inches over all http://www.iforgeiron.com/gallery/showphoto.php/photo/1166/size/big/cat/500 Woody