Hi friends,

 

I want to make a diamond awl for leather stitching. The awl blade needs to be very strong so as not to bend or break while pushing it through fairly thick leather, so whatever metal I use, I am planning on heat treating it...

 

 

A few questions...

 

--Would 1084 or 01 steel be better to use for making an awl?

 

--What would the basic heat treat workflow look like for 1084 or 01?

 

Thank you in advance for your time and expertise!!!

look in the knife section, there are many HT details in the knife referance section

I make my own stitching points.  I leave them almost full hardness and don't worry if they break as they are easy to make and near full hard cuts through the leather much better with little or no resharpening.  I've used it on 4 plies of 8-9 oz leather with ease.

I use "music wire" from a local hobby shop.  I've read that is 1080 to 1095 and it acts that way so I can believe it.

I cut to length then just sort of flatten one end hot, then heat treat like 1095 (tempering in a kitchen oven set to 325 F, measured with an oven thermometer) and shape and sharpen on a wet wheel.  I don't bother attaching a handle, I use a pin vice to hold the points.  It takes all of maybe 1/2 hour to make 8 or 10 points and music wire is cheap so I consider them disposable.

 

ron

Thank you Steve, and Mr. Bluegrass, I really appreciate your kind words of advice!!! :DDD

What dimensions are you guys talking about...in parts of an inch instead of gage numbers.

 

 

Carry on

I 've made several by chucking a 7/32" chainsaw file in the cordless drill,  then grind to shape on the bench grinder.  Draw a temper on the back 3/4 of it so it doesn't snap to easy.  Polish with fine sand paper.  Then you just drill an undersized hole in a piece of hardwood.  Clamp in vise  drive wooden handle on.  Stay sharp last good and cheap if lost.  use a few at work for o-ring picks and poking holes in oil filters on the trucks.

Stubs of high strength carbon steel welding rods are perfect for this sort of thing. Right size, right shape, right stuff, right price - free. If you get a handful, sacrifice a few to the heat-treat test gods.

 

I have a friend who has made replacement firing pins from E8018 - E11018 stubs, and they have held up fine.

For stitching points (diamond cross section awl, used for making holes in leather before hand stitching), the size it going to depend on the size of needle and thread (or lacing) used.  I generally am stitching sheaths so I make my points around 1/8 inch by a bit under 1/16 inch at the base and maybe 1 inch long, tapering to a point like a double edged dagger blade.  I have made bigger for some work.  

 

I have made scratch awls from roughly 1/4 inch round that I ground as described above with a drill.

 

ron