Richard, I can't answer your question except to say that I applied the edge bevel by hand and it felt a little on the soft side. Probably harder most khuks from Nepal, but not by much is my guess. I might be confusing hardness with wear resistance, though, since A2 isn't very wear resistant. I haven't gotten the edge bevel dialed in, the khuk was what I consider dull when I used it this afternoon, and large portions still had a wire edge. So far, edge stability seems pretty close to other A2 knives I've used.
All that said, one of my machinist buddies has access to a hardness tester and he offered to measure it for me. For the purposes of this prototyping phase, it's not particularly relevant, but considering this is the first knife I've ever heat treated, I am curious. It was in the oven for 35 minutes, a few of which it had to ramp back up from around 1500 degrees to 1725, and it was between the plates for maybe fifteen minutes or so. When I cut the foil off, it was warm but not hot. I stuck it in the freezer for an hour, let it go back to room temperature and then into the toaster at 450 for 1:20. I was anticipating the oven to take awhile to get up to temperature, but I didn't preheat it. It might have been over tempered, but I honestly don't know and won't unless I measure the hardness.
I have to say, with my limited amount of time with it today, (my shoulder's a little fucky so I had to take it easy) it's everything I was hoping it would be. The second version won't be much different, I don't think.
