Heating quench tanks

[Hammerfall]

So I've read that some people use a torch, some use a heated chunk of metal they dip in the tank, and some use electric heaters for the quench tank. I'm looking for the easiest best technique. Any ideas would be helpful. I think I'm going to build a tank like the one below. It was posted here and I think it is a great design.

 

[Kozzy]

Looks like you can get a 750 watt silicone pail heater off Amazon for about 70 bucks...with lots of other offerings available too at ranging prices.  Thermostats are built in for repeatability.   Rated to about 300F at a quick glance.  There are other options which go higher but I didn't search.

To me, those best follow the KISS principal.  Strap it on and ignore it.  The only real negative is the time-lag between turning it on and having hot oil.  

[Hammerfall]

Yea the lag if you're not doing more than one blade is kind of a downer.

[Frosty]

I usually heat a piece of 2" rd. and dunk it to preheat. It's not like it stinks up the shop more than quenching, the preheat bar is hardly hot enough to smoke and gets dipped a couple few times.

You could make a basket that wraps around your tank from expanded metal to hold a couple few burning charcoal briquettes. Not enough to boil it of course and REMOVE BEFORE QUENCHING! In case of a boil over. Humongus shop fires aren't recommended procedure.

I have my 15gl. grease barrel with snap on lid contained in a cut down 55gl. drum also with a lid. It can boil over and flash into a fire but it ain't going farther. 

The thing that concerns me most looking at  quench oil tanks is the lack of containment in case of a boil over fire.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Hammerfall]

That sounds like a good set up Frosty.

[SLAG]

Aquarium heater?

SLAG.

[Steve Sells]

On 3/13/2017 at 9:22 PM, SLAG said:

Aquarium heater?

SLAG.

most of them are made for 65F to 85F temperature range

[SLAG]

Oh dear!

Rats!

Foiled again!

Mr. Sells,

thank you for the information.

SLAG

[JHCC]

1 hour ago, Steve Sells said:

most of them are made for 65F to 85F temperature range

Any hotter, and you’ll be poaching your fish. 

[RobS]

You could stick oil pan heaters on the outside of the tank.  

You could drill into the tank and use a block heater.

You could also use a deep fryer heating element set in from the top.

[John R]

Shanghaied  from  a rival forum:

[Zippy Ustar]

What metal is used to make a quench tank is an aluminum three feet high two feet wide; it was formerly the inside of a metal garbage bin?  I heard no questions are stupid so please give me a leg up?

 

[pnut]

Whatever holds your quenchants and doesn't leak or doesn't burn. A drain may come in handy. I use a bucket as a slack tub. I'm careful not to bump into it with hot steel but that won't work for flammable oil. I only use it for water.  When I get something better I'll use it. I have an aluminum canister I'm going to fill with peanut oil but I don't need it yet so I haven't got around to it.

Pnut

Edited August 24, 2019 by pnut

[CrazyGoatLady]

I use an old turkey fryer for a water quench tank. The handles come in handy to move it

[Frosty]

Mine is a 15 gl.: grease, gear oil, ATF, etc. barrel I scrounged from the heavy duty shop. It's in a cut down 55 gl. drum for fire containment. I have the lids for both leaning against the containment drum when I'm quenching something largish, otherwise the lids are always ON the quench tank and drum. I preheat the oil by warming up a length of 2.5" steel bar and dipping it till the oil is to my satisfaction. I put 2 pieces of 14 ga. steel sheet in the bottom as a puncture shield and I made a basket on long 5/16" rnd. stock hanger handle to make dropped small pieces easy to fish out. That works so well I just chuck small pieces in to quench. The basket isn't in the tank when I quench large pieces so if a fire gets going I can drop the quench tank lid on without interference, then comes the lid for the 55 gl. containment. I play with fire all the time on MY terms only.

If you're going to play with fire PLAY CAREFULLY!

Frosty The Lucky.

[Couch]

Anybody tried an engine block heater?

[Frosty]

Welcome aboard Couch, glad to have you, if you put your general location in the header you'll have a much better chance of meeting up with members living within visiting distance.

What kind of block heater do you mean? I have a couple magnetic stick ons I use to keep stuff less than frigid during winter. There are freeze plug heaters, heck, I don't know if they even make those anymore! There are circulating heaters that are inserted in a heater hose. I'm sure there are more but those are the only ones I can recall off the top.

In my experience a pair magnetic stick ons couldn't warm my quench oil more than a couple degrees above ambient. I don't think I'd circulate quench oil through a circulating engine heater and those are thermostatically controlled at maybe 40f or so.

Guys have used stock tank heaters though I don't know how well they worked.

I have a piece of 2" round bar I heat about 8" to low orange and plunge the hot end completely under. Two dunks typically warms the 10gl. in my quench tank 100 degrees. I don't heat treat in winter so I'd be guessing 3-4 dunks to get from -10f to 120f.

Frosty The Lucky.

[George N. M.]

From my oil well site geologist days in North Dakota in January (it never broke zero for the whole month) there are a couple other types of engine heaters.  One is the dip stick heater which worked pretty well.  Another was a flat one with a heating element in it which attached to the bottom of the oil pan.  That worked pretty well until I scraped it off going through a snow drift.  I think the dip stick type might work in quenching oil but it might take some time to put enough btus into it and the oil might cool faster than the heater could heat it.  A stock tank heater would probably work better, having a larger heating element.

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

[Frosty]

I haven't seen an oil pan heater in so many years I don't remember when. One of those might do it alright in a quench tank. 

Frosty The Lucky.

[Goods]

For my large quench tank (basically 5gallon steel bucket with about 4gallons of oil), I just heat up an old sash weight to a red heat and that usually gets me pretty close to 120F. For my small quench tank (3” Square tube about 15” tall filled to 12”) I just heat it up with a propane torch. Both methods don’t take much time or effort…)

Keep it fun,

David