I want to make my own bench-mounted shear for cutting sheet & small sized rods. Its pretty simple to fabricate, but... I would welcome any suggestions about the correct temper for the two cutting edges.

Please don't tell me the temperatures in degrees! Colours to look for or comparisons to other tools' tempers (e.g. punches, hammers, springs, hammers etc.) are the kind of guides I'd like. The steel I'll be using is old vehicle leaf-spring.

Many thanks in anticipation of useful advice given.

Temper as you would a cold chisel? Seeing as how you will be cutting the stock cold. Blue temper.

If you KNOW what king of steel your working with there are specifics on tempering THAT type steel. To guess at the steel and to guess at the tempering is still at best just a guess.

Thanks for that Apprentice Man, I guessed a blue temper but am glad for a second opinion.

Glenn, I have some old leaf-springs but have no idea what make of vehicle they came from, let alone the exact type of steel. I think that getting the temper right for the shear will be a case of trial and error.