Frame handle hunter WIP...hope this isn't a disaster

I edited the photo using Flickr's built in app because the color balance was way off. Apparently when you hit save on an edited photo, it changes the title/URL. I think it should be working now.

Bob
 
Might want to give Maxim a call, I had a shipment of Parks 50 arrive today that I ordered last Wednesday, and I'm a little further than across town. They were great folks to deal with so it's confusing on why your order is taking so long. Hmm, maybe you accidentally ordered 5 thousand gallons!
 
lessismore said:
Might want to give Maxim a call, I had a shipment of Parks 50 arrive today that I ordered last Wednesday, and I'm a little further than across town. They were great folks to deal with so it's confusing on why your order is taking so long. Hmm, maybe you accidentally ordered 5 thousand gallons!
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Called them this morning. They said UPS returned the shipment because it was leaking. Maxim said they checked it out and believe something else leaked on it. They said it was supposed to picked up again today so maybe I'll get it tomorrow. I was forced to start on two more fixed blades today. CPM-S35VN so no oil quench; HT already finished.

Bob
 
Ok good, I was prepared for the long wait and was surprised when it showed up today. Thought I'd let you know.

......back to stalking this thread.....
 
Finally got back to work on this one. Of course, the weather here was very uncooperative today and I had a couple emergency notices that I must seek tornado shelter immediately. Also managed to get about 1/4" of water over half the shop from the crazy amount of rain. So I got one blade clayed with satanite. I found this cool squeegee thing at the store the other day and thought it would be good to use for making the fingers. I posted the photo of the blade with clay on it on Instagram and Nick Wheeler said it was too much. I ended up taking out every other finger. If our house is still standing tomorrow, I will try to HT this blade.

Bob

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr
 
Hope your house is still there, cause I really wanna see this blade finished! :D ;) lol sorry.. I honestly do hope everything is alright though. Man I couldn't imagine living in an area with frequent tornadoes! It's thankfully pretty mild with weather all year round as well as low on natural disaster scale up here in Seattle.. I guess all the gloomy days ( :thumbdn: ) are a small price to pay for that. :eek: Anyway, check in and let us know you're alright when ya can! :)

~Paul
My YT Channel Lsubslimed
 
Beautiful sunny day today. The clay was nice and dry this morning when I got into the shop so I went ahead and set a program on the Evenheat and ran the blade. I put the blade in the oven at ambient temp and hit start. Oven ramped to 1460 and held for fifteen minutes. I pulled the blade out and plunged it into the Parks 50 vertically and then moved it back and forth in a cutting action. When I pulled it out it was warm to the touch but hand-holdable. I scraped the clay off with a wood chisel and it looked like this. No warpage was a nice plus.

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

Once it was completely cool I put it into the oven at 375 for one hour times two. After tempering, I surface ground the flats.

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

Next I took a thickness measurement at the ricasso to determine a center scribe line for the edge. I then started with a Trizact A160 and progressed to A65 and then A45.

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

And then on to hand finishing. I started at P180 and I am at 600 grit right now but there are some nasty 400 grit scratches that are wearing me out. The blade seems pretty hard. I didn't check hardness because checking the flats won't really tell me anything and putting the tester on a bevel could damage my tester. Since I've never worked with W2 before it is hard to make an educated guess but, it feels like it's around 62hrc.

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

I think most people would have already etched it once to check the hamon but I will wait until tomorrow to see what things look like. I am planning to use lemon juice to bring out my final finish but it is my understanding that I should be able to dip it in FC for a few minutes to see if there is any action before continuing on.

Bob
 
Ok, it isn't a disaster yet but, it's certainly trying to go that way and I feel like a dumbass. I've wasted the better part of a day trying to get a decent finish on this blade. I finally tried putting a little etch on it this evening using some FC and it looks pretty jacked up. The differential line is riding right at the edge of the blade. No wonder I couldn't see anything while I was sanding. Now the blade is finished to 1500 grit and the edge is down to about .025" and I need to redo the HT.

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

I have re-clayed the blade with significantly less clay and unless someone tells me differently, I will bump up the soak time to 20 minutes and increase my temp to 1470.

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr

I am really puzzled by why this blade has been so hard to hand sand. I hand finish CPM-S35VN at 60-61hrc all the time and it's not as difficult as this blade with a bad heat treat. I tested the tang right behind the ricasso and it tested 45hrc. I can't imagine that most of the blade is too much harder than that. Of course the problem has been chasing deep scratches from the previous grit so maybe if I can get the hardness where it should be, I won't get deep scratches from fine grits.

I'm glad I have another blade in reserve, I'm probably going to need it.

Bob
 
Here is a post by Don Hanson back from when he was selling his W2 regarding how he heat treats it.

"Joe, W2 is a super simple, very clean carbon steel with just enough vanadium to retard grain growth at higher temps and boost wear resistance. In the as forged or normalized state it's very tough and pliable, it doesn't have the other alloys to cause probs with air hardening etc. W2 will also produce a very, very fine grain which allows for a scarry sharp edge and tough blade. The low manganese makes W2 my choice for an active hamon which is a bonus. 1095/W1 will harden to a depth of .090 were as W2 will harden to .125, this makes it just a little easier to HT. Quenched in water at 1425f to 1450f will produce a hardness of 68 RC, quenched in a good quench oil will give you 65/66 RC. I temper for 1 hour twice at 425f to 450f for a 60-61 RC, for a JS test blade I would temper at 475f to 500f.

You guys are running me ragged, cutting, boxing and shipping W2 I asked the little lady at my one person Post Office if these heavy boxes were too much trouble, she said " heck no, just keep em coming " So if she can handle it, I can handle it

Thanks all !"
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Actually, here is the link to that thread: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/s...-tool-steel?highlight=w2+round+bar+tool+steel The quote was taken from post #31 on page 2.

ETA: Sorry, I had that saved so I copied and pasted without re-reading it.. I just noticed there is nothing on soak time in it.. but who knows, maybe it'll help somebody? :D Hope you're able to figure it out! :)

~Paul
My YT Channel Lsubslimed
 
Ok, I just spent an hour googling every reference to W2 HT and it looks like there is no good reason for me to increase either the temp or the soak time. It probably makes sense to reduce my soak to 10 minutes. I thought I got the blade into the oil very quickly so the clay seems to be the culprit. Thanks for the sanity check Paul.

Bob
 
Reduce your soak to less than 5min if you have normalized and thermal cycled the steel. You can't go wrong following Don's suggestions. He set me on the right path with my W2 heat treat. :thumbup:
 
Bob, This looks exciting. :thumbup::thumbup: Zirc bolsters? If you still have it please bring to Atlanta. Would love a closer look.

RangerBobTX said:
Oh yeah, forgot to mention that while the blade was tempering, I was making good progress on this new flipper.

Bob

Untitled by Bob, on Flickr
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Sorry didn't mean to derail your thread

See you soon
Bing
 
Keep up the good work, I am especially interested in your project, I have plans to build a couple frame handles with Hamons later this year. With the differential hardening, do you have any idea what the RC is of the spine as opposed to the edge? With just the bevels hardened I am guessing it is not really possible to get an RC of the edge huh.
Thanks for posting this wip!
-tim
 
bbingenheimer said:
Bob, This looks exciting. :thumbup::thumbup: Zirc bolsters? If you still have it please bring to Atlanta. Would love a closer look.

See you soon
Bing
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Yes, zirc bolsters and ironwood. It is the same model as the in-progress knife I was hiding in my pocket at Little Rock. I feel like I've worked out all the details and am pretty happy with the performance so time to make another. I plan to bring a few new folders to ATL.

Russ Carswell said:
You are going great..looking forward for your finish product.
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Thanks...I'm looking forward to this one being finished as well.

timos- said:
Keep up the good work, I am especially interested in your project, I have plans to build a couple frame handles with Hamons later this year. With the differential hardening, do you have any idea what the RC is of the spine as opposed to the edge? With just the bevels hardened I am guessing it is not really possible to get an RC of the edge huh.
Thanks for posting this wip!
-tim
Click to expand...

I only know that I'm at 45hrc at the ricasso which I think is likely the same for the spine since it was all covered in the same thickness of clay and quenched the same. On the bevels, I just have to trust that if I get it right it will end up where others (Don Hanson III) have said it will be. I will certainly do some performance testing with it to make sure it is working as it should.

Realistically, I shouldn't have expected to be able to get this right the first time out. All the threads I've read about guys developing a hamon on their W2 blades, it took them a good amount of testing to start producing acceptable results. I kind of felt that with all the good info provided in these forums, all the testing had been done for me and I could just follow what everyone else had done. Problem is, there are a lot of little differences in what everyone is doing and there are little things that are not mentioned that one must figure out. I've somewhat resigned myself to the idea that this first blade is going to just be a test blade and really, that is ok.

Bob
 
I have done coupons to test this. Soft areas were mid 30's if I remember correctly, might have been 40's, but I'm pretty sure it was 30's, and the hard parts are rc68 with W2.
 
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