Current projects

[Johnnyreb338]

Here's a picture of my current project, it's a 12"drop point I beat out yesterday and started finish grinding this morning. not sure what the steel is, my research has led me to belive it is 4140 or 4340. spark test show its high in carbon and it's tough to move on the anvil. I made a blade out of it before and after 3 attempts at hardening ( 2 in oil and 1 in water ) it still was not real hard, I could cut it with a file with some effort. 2 weeks ago I cut off a small piece of it and hammered it down for experimental purposes. this time I carried the heat till it was almost white before quenching in oil and whala it's hard as grandma's big toenail. I have about 12 feet of this stuff so I'm  hopeing I can work out a solid heat treat to put it to good use. 

[Steve Sells]

my math says its not 12, its 6.5 inch  good start.   Dont expect it to get hard with out case hardening, its not high carbon, low to medium at best.   Those grades are not blade steel,  Perhaps if you read through he knife making classes, or any basic knife making book you will save yourself some upset ? also read heat treating section, all you did with the over heating is make larger grain.

[Johnnyreb338]

Good afternoon Steve.    

All the info I dig up online from the ansi/astm steel mfgs. all say that 4140 and 4340 are quinchable hardening steels to the 55-60 rh with very high wear resistance and good shock load capabilities. Either way the steel was some I had left over from a welding project and was free and I needed the practice. I don't sell my blades of unknown steels to the public so it's no big deal if it doesn't work.       Thanks for the reply.

[ThomasPowers]

What we are trying to point out is that you are practicing golf using a soft ball.  Practicing golf using a golf ball will work better.  You may want to look into the use of carbides to increase the edge life of blades in steels with carbon contents higher than the eutectic.

I rather like your beefy design and expect you could reproduce it in other steels.  The 4140 and 4340's are great for tooling and I'd reserve them for that myself.

[Stormcrow]

I use a lot of 4140 for tactical tomahawks (as well as ax heads, hammer heads, and power hammer dies in the past), and they will skate a file with a quench in McMaster-Carr's 28-second quench oil, at far below "almost white" temperatures.

Which leads me to think there's something off on your heat treatment or this isn't 4140/4340.  What makes you think it is one of those alloys?

I'm all for using scrap steel to learn on, but scrap steel that is semi-known.  Lots of good blades have been made from leaf springs.  Stick to older domestic springs and you will have a decent chance of having something worth using when you're finished with it.  Of course, do some quench tests before you invest a lot of time and effort into it. 

 

 

[Johnnyreb338]

Good  evening Stormcrow 

The material I have is some old oilfield suckered rods used on workover rigs,  An Internet search yielded very little info except that most are made from 4140 or 4340.  It Sands beautifully to a fine luster and polishes to a ultra shine which leads me to belive it has a high nickel content or chrome.   Although I do greatly appreciate everyone's concern over me wasting my time on this project, I still see a certain entertainment value to it, I'm very new to forging steel so I still have a lot of bugs to work out of my techniques  ie.. shaping the hot steel, drawing it out, edge making and just plane old hammer control.  practice....practice...practice          

Thanks.