Woody

Pain in the extremities, especially legs and feet can be a sign of nerve damage from a very high blood sugar level from uncontrolled or undetected diabetes.

You wouldn't ask a doctor for advice on tempering a chisel, why would you ask blacksmiths for medical advice. Intense pain is an indication that something is drastically wrong. Seek medical attention immediately.

I bought a plastic jar of nozzle dip, gooey greasy stuff but it keeps things spatter free. Only problem, the nozzle has to be hot to dip it properly. Word of caution, make sure that any sprays don't contain clorinated hydrocarbons, perchlorethylene, trichlorethylene, methylene chloride etc. The key phrase is "CHLOR" these products turn to phosgene gas when heated. Probably wouldn't product enough to hurt you but you never know. With Phosgene you can be right a thousand times but you can only be wrong once.

Very Nice

I live in Rapid City, if I can help you out with anything let me know

Your wife is in our prayers Woody & Jackie

Mineral spirits or WD-40 would be ok IF the part were washed with soap and hot water to remove all traces of the mineral spirits or WD-40 and then just for safety sake, I would put the part in a pan of water and boil it for a few minutes then let it air dry. That should get rid of all traces of mineral spirits or the WD-40. When I mentioned grease, it is just one form of a hydrocarbon, mineral spirits is another form of a hydrocarbon, and WD-40 contains some sort of a solvent which is another hydrocarbon. Any hydrocarbon and oxygen under pressure gets the same results which isn't a good one.

FireyFurnace, the proper fitting, New, is available from most welding supply places for a very reasonable price. If you buy a used fitting and it is for the Oxygen tank make sure it is thoroughly de-greased before using. Grease + Oxygen under high pressure = new address with 17 diferent zip codes.

Not bad at all. Looks good to me. Be sure to post a picture of the finished knife.

When you work with junkyard steel, it is always a gamble, there is the possibility that you have an air hardening steel. I would just pack the blade with jigging putty to keep the heat from running into the blade and then hot punch the holes in the handle.

Why does it have to be square, garage door springs are great for making strikers. If you must have square stock, take some coil springs off a car and beat them square.

Doc our prayers are with you Woody & Jackie

To warm up on a cold winter day try my 5 pepper chili http://hansoncustomknives.com/recipies.html scroll down, it's there somewhere

Think of a small pair of tongs except riveted on one end, make sort of a wolf jaw taper the reins and a nice little scroll on the end. I tried to attach a drawing but the attach file thing didn't work. Message me with your email address and I can email the drawing to you.

quite nice, make 5 more and you will have a cool set of steak knives.

Anything with a pH of 2 or less is a Characteristic Hazardous Waste by the characteristic of corrosivity, 40 CFR Part 261. Waste Muratic Acid falls into that category. The penalty for illegal disposal of a hazardous waste is a fine not to exceed $50,000 and or 5 years in prison. Cement being on the alkaline side of the pH scale would tend to neutralize the acid although to what extent could only be determined by testing. Myself, I would be careful about advising people to just dump something on a public forum that has world wide access. There are several stickies on this site on the effects of Zinc fumes I would suggest that you read them. If one uses proper respiratory protection with adequate ventilation, grinding and welding should not be a problem.

Joshua these people http://www.texasknife.com/vcom/index.php have all sorts of blade blanks, heat treated and ready to assemble. They also have knife kits with everything you would need to put your knife together including pins and handle materials. I have never bought a blade from them but I get other materials from them and they are a very reputable company. I am sure they can ship to Canada but I am sure there will be the normal customs fees added to the price of what you buy. Good luck with your knifemaking

Our condolences and prayers to the family. Eternal rest grant unto him O'Lord and let perpetual light shine upon him may he rest in peace. Woody & Jackie

I need to add a bit more to my last reply. We originally started with me questioning the necessity of normalizing repetedly because I can find nothing that documents this as being benificial. You have used a process that bears similarity to normalizing only in that the metal is heated to the specific temperature, in normalizing the metal is slowly cooled back to room temperature in still air after a soak time at temperature. in the paragraph you quoted "New Grains formed by Phase Transformation" from Dr Vs paper, the metal is rapidly cooled in air quite a difference I would think. Einstein said that it is foolish to do the same thing and expect different results, I would submit that it is equally as foolish to do different things and expect the same results. One can not prove one process by using as evidence results obtained by a different procdure. The objective of normalizing is to relieve stress in the metal, as I read it, this is accomplished by changing the grain structure to pearlite which is a very uniform grain structure. This is accomplished by heating the metal to a specific temperature, soaking at that temperature for a given period of time. The soak time is given as one hour per inch of thickness. in a knife blade of 1/8 inch thickness that would give us a soak time 7 1/2 minutes or 15 minutes for a quarter inch thick blade. The shrinking of grain size in the paragraph titile "New Grains formed by Phase Transformation" calls for "a simple technique is to heat into the austenite region holding the maximum temperature as low as possible and the time as short as possible and then rapidly cooling back to room temperature as fast as possible without forming bainite assuming it is not desired." The soaking at temperature in the Normalizing Process would promote grain growth. " Grain Growth As austenite is heated to higher temperatures or held for longer times at temperature the average grain size is found to increase. This process of grain growth occurs by smaller grains shrinking in size until they disappear and larger grains growing in size; the net effect being an increase in the size of the average grain. The confussion seems to be what we call normalizing and the results we expect to obtain from it. So what most recommend as "normalizing" is not actually normalizing because there is no soaking of the metal at temperature and what is expected of the process is both stress relief and grain reduction. It would seem that the latter would be difficult to achieve if the correct normalization were conducted. So what we have is more of a "Phase Transformation" that will reduce the grain size and hopefully relieve stress. I would think that a better proceess would be to do the normalizing correctly with proper soak time once to relieve stress, then if grain size reduction is your goal to do the Phase Transformation process to achieve that end. I am not sure of the need for this in knifemaking however, since Dr V states the following was done to obtain an ultra fine grain structure. " A series of similar experiments was performed here on 3 steels to examine the effectiveness of thermal cycling alone, no cold working was employed. The steels were heated by immersion in a salt pot. Initially the steels were austenitized for 15min. at 1650 oF and oil quenched in rapidly stirred oil. Then the steels were given 3 thermal cycles consisting of a 4 minute austenitization in 1450 oF salt and a quench inrapidly stirred oil. It would seem that holding the steel at temperature as outlined here would result in grain growth that might negate any reduction in grain size that was accomplished by "Phase Transformation"

I am well aware of the difference between hardenability and hardness, but why the personal attack. You are the one that pointed out that large grain is harder see your quote below. "So let me ask you: if increasing grain size moves the start curves on the IT diagrams to the right, indicating greater hardenability -- which is what Professor V just said -- what must we necessarily conclude would happen if we reduced grain size? Which way would the curves move, and what would be the effect on hardenability of the steel? Remember: we've already established that changing grain size moves the curves, and that moving the curves affects hardenability. So . . . " 5.4 Normalizing This is a very common form of annealing. The method is to austenitize, then air cool to room temperature. You get...? Yes, pearlite. The biggest advantage is to get a uniform microstructure and to soften up the metal for subsequent operations like machining. I'ts done after cold-working to re-crystallize the microstructure. The stresses imparted to the metal crystals cause them to "break up" and re-form when austenitized. Soak periods for normalizing are typically one hour per inch of cross-sectional area but not less than two hours at temperature. It is important to remember that the mass of the part or the workload can have a significant influence on the cooling rate and thus on the resulting microstructure. Thin pieces cool faster and are harder after normalizing than thicker ones. By contrast, after furnace cooling in an annealing process, the hardness of the thin and thicker sections are about the same. http://www.stainless-steel-tube.org/The-Heat-Treatment-of-Steel.htm here again the process calls for a soak time but no mention of repetitions of the process. Dr. Dmitri Kopeliovich Normalizing is a process in which a steel is heated to about 100°F (55°C) above the upper critical temperature, followed by soaking and cooling in still air at room temperature. Normalizing treatment is similar to the full annealing treatment. The difference is in the cooling method and rate – full annealing involves slow controlled cooling if the furnace or in some medium providing slow cooling rate. As normalizing requires less time, it is more economically efficient heat treatment method than full annealing. Normalizing relieves internal stresses caused by cold work while grain growth is limited by the relatively high cooling rate therefore the mechanical properties (strength, hardness) of a normalized steel are better than in an annealed steel. Since the cooling rate in the normalizing heat treatment is not controlled, the resulting structure is dependent on the thickness of the steel part, therefore the effect of increased mechanical properties is greater in thin parts. Quality of surface after machining of a normalized part is also better than in an annealed part. This effect is caused by increased ductility of annealed steel favoring formation of tearing on the machined surface. http://www.ehow.com/how_7831831_normalize-temperature-carbon-steels.html You seem to make a lot of assumptions about what my motives are, they are plain and simple. Find documentation that states repeated normalizing is ncecssary. Everything I have listed above calls for a soak time none call for a repetiton of the process. .

I know its a slide show or pictures with written text, the whole point is exactly what temperature was each piece of steel heated to? Answer unknown. How long was each piece soaked at temperature? Answer, Unknown. Was each piece of steel cooled at the same rate for the same time? Answer unknown. Was each piece of steel quenched from the same temperature? Answer, Unknown. If it isn't documented and repeatable no matter what the results it's junk science. Take that neat little slide show into any university and submit it for peer review and you would get laughed off the campus. Verhoeven quenched his steel in rapidly stirred oil, quite a difference for air cooling wouldn't you say. He also states "rapidly cooling back to room temperature." Which don't seem to be the slower cooling that is the normalizing process but more like an air quench. This brings up another question large grain = harder metal, why are all the knifemakers triple normalizing and many triple quenching to shirnk the grain size to get better edge holding properties? It would seem counter productive. As far as I can tell the objective of normalizing is to relieve the stress in the metal produced by the forging process and prevent cracks and breaking when the metal is further processed. Once again, everything I have been able to find on normalizing calls for a soak time at a specific temperature and then air cooling, nothing I have been able to find calls for a repetition of this process, you would think that if there were some benefit to be had, it would be documented somewhere. I would like to find that documentation. I really didn't mean to hijack this thread, in regard to the original question about the O-1 breaking. Obvious answer is you hit it when it was too cold and cracked it.

I saw that video, junk science at best, totally lacking in any scientific proceses. No one had documented how long the material is held at temperature, the exact temperature the material was heated to or anything else that could be duplicated by others. Once again is there any publication that documents this or is it just alchemy and blacksmith hear-say. On Page 69 of this document Metallurgy of Steel for Bladesmiths and Others who Heat Treat and Forge Steel by John D. Verhoeven Emeritus Professor Iowa State University it is documented that repetative heating and quenching in oil reduced the grain size in the steels tested. In the above mentioned article where repetative quenching has reduced the size of the grain, he states " The toughness of steel is improved as grain size becomes smaller. For this reason it is important to do heat treatments at as low a temperature as possible to reduce grain growth of the austenite " And the last I knew, repeated quenching did not make the steel less hardnable. I think that it is about time that this Forum either fully documented this normalizing theory by finding a published reference that proves it, or drives a stake it's heart and gives it a decent burial.

As far as I have been able to determine, normalizing is a function of time at temperature. That is you heat the metal to the specific temperature specified for the steel and then let it soak for a period of time depending on the mass of the piece. Then the piece is allowed to cool in still air. Nowhere have I been able to find a documentable reference that says there is anything to be gained by repetitions of the process. One of the sources I have queried is a professor of metalurgy at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology. Could someone please point me in the direction of a publication on metalurgy that documents the benefits of repeated normalizing?

Jeff our condolences on your loss. Eternal rest grant unto him O'Lord let perpetual light shine upon him and may he rest in peace. Amen God bless and keep you all Woody & Jackie

Bill, the coke burns great, it is hotter than coal. That blacksmith coal from Eisenbrauns did have some sulfur in it. I have seen pieces that looked yellow. The coke is quite clean but it still forms clinkers. I don't think I will mess with any more of that coal from Eisenbraun, I have been able to catch the lady there the last two times I went out there, but the phone has been disconnected for quite some time. Merry Christmas to you and Lee, stop and see us when you are in town Woody