These are the first knives i've made, 3 forged from 5160 and the fillet knife was ground out of an air saw blade. New to blades, new to forging, but having a good time figuring it all out!

Very nice first projects.  The burl handles are particularly nice.  You are setting a pretty high standard for a beginner bladesmith.  I assume you have some experience working wood or metal in the past to get such a good outcome?

How did you do for heat treatment?  For me that and blade geometry really define how successful a knife is.

normalized 3 times, quenched in Canola right at critical temp (lost magnetic so i think i did it right) and dont know if it did any good but the only tempering i did was to bury them in a bucket of sand after the quench and let them slow cool till ambient temp. And yes I have done a little of welding and  woodworking in the past. 

File skated right of of em and they took a good razor edge, hope they hold up. Time will tell. 

Stabilized Box Elder on the first 2, Maple on the 3rd, and Water Buffalo Horn on the Fillet knife.

Preheated canola to between 120 and 140 deg. F?  Only real insurance for knowing you hit critical temperature is to look for decalescence, but loss of magnetism is a good starting point.  Just don't hold too long above critical to avoid grain growth. 

Depending on what temperature you exit the quench bath the burying in a bucket of sand may not have adequately tempered the blades.  In the future you may want to use either a kitchen oven or toaster oven (with an oven thermometer) to do your tempering cycle. The pan of sand is a great idea, in the oven, to provide some insurance from hot spots.  For starters I would recommend two 1 hr. cycles at 400 deg. F.

oil was at shop temp (@80 F), didnt realize i needed to heat it. guess i missed that part in my reading and will do some reading about decalescence. Planning on making a quick blade or 3 and do some testing with my heat treating before i make anymore. These 4 were gifts and wont be seeing the abuse that tempering would affect (I hope). 

 

The oil is preheated to change its viscosity and give you a more even quench. Oil, when its warm, is thinner than when its cold. Therefore, the vapor pocket formed during the quench will be removed from around the blade faster. It also helps to gently move the blade up and down (never side to side) in the oil to break up that vapor pocket.

I agree, your blades look nice. I would suggest working on your ricasso and plunge lines though. Makes blades look a lot more professional, and IMO function better as well. Though that does depend on the blades intended use. 

Table salt melts at critical, which is just above the curi point. 

Critical for what steel is the real question.....

Let me refraze, most simple steels lol

Thanks for the info on quench oil and I definitely need to improve on my plunge lines. 

IF you really want more information, try reading the pinned posts in the heat treat sections

Will do.  I have already found a TON of information and education in the stickies and by using the ever so handy “search”.