Time to heat treat! There are
various ways to heat treat
steel and various
temperatures that have to be
reached etc. This is a very
indepth subject that is outside
of the scope of this pictorial.
What I will be showing is how
to do a differentially hardened
blade with a simple torch you
can pick up at the hardware
store. In this picture I'm using a
mapp gas torch to preheat the
blade before using the
mapp/oxy torch. This helps
save on the amount of oxygen
used. The regular map torch
wont get hot enough to heat
treat the blade and the flame
is too wide for this small of a
blade
After the blades get hot
enough I switch to the small
mapp torch. Normally I do
these steps in very dim lighting
but i kept the lights on to show
you the general setup. Notice
the water bucket next to me?
That is my saltwater quench
tank. After the steel is hot
enough I will plunge it point
first into the water. I must keep
the blade perfectly straight
while quenching or it will warp
like crazy.
I heat the whole blade up to
nearly red hot then I fan the
flame over just the edge. What
I am doing is trying to get the
edge section to critical
temp(the temperature needed
for steel to harden once
quenched)
The first pic shows me starting
to heat the edge and the
second pic shows the edge
almost to temp....the spot right
where the flame is is the temp
i am aiming for. At this point i
quickly move the flame up and
down the edge to bring the
whole section to a uniform
temp. Once it reaches the
proper temp I quench the steel
into my bucket of saltwater.
(some people use oil, i prefer
water)
