Fredeen Blades

hey graham i got another question for you. i recently did a knew knife(i ended up breaking it but thats besides the point) i tried forging as near to shape as a could but didn't know how to forge the bevel near the choil (i think thats what its called).You have pictures on this site of blades that are beautifully forged to shape but i can't tell if you've forged the plunge or not???

Also do you have any satanite you could sell i'm looking for some to try some hamon work. The furnace cement keeps coming off in the quench which is causing problems. My knew knife was clayed with furnace cement and it came off the minute it hit the brine, the entire knife hardened which is not what i wanted.

one more question, where do you get your steel??? the guy i'm waiting on to get some 1084 is really getting to be too slow.

i sorry i keep pestering you like this i really wish i could give you something back. Just know that your input in really appreciated.

Thanks

Jason

I normally don't forge in the plunge cut. I always end up moving the plunge around as I grind until it looks right, and sometimes I shorten the ricasso, etc. Its just not something I've really done. I usually just forge in the beveling  and leave it "short" with some meat before the ricasso and where I want the plunge to start. Forging the plunge in can be helpful in some aspects, in terms of helping you start you grind, etc,  and can also create some issues in certain instances as well like if you decide to change the ricasso or choil, and have this pre-existing plunge  to mess things up. It can be done either way, and I'd say there are advantages and disadvantages to both methods. Really the only way I'd recommend doing it is with a butcher style fullering tool like the "double fuller" in the second post made in this thread http://forums.dfoggknives.com/index.php?showtopic=8214&pid=73876&start=&st=#entry73876&s=3986e644620e796405fb22383a127b92

Someday I might experiment more with forging in plunge cuts (just need to find the time to make the stupid butcher tool first :roll. But thats the way to do it none the less.

I've got satanite. Only issue I can see is that the shipping will make it much more expensive than what it should be. Normally it goes for about $2 a lb. A small flat-rate box to canada goes for about $12 (I think, I'd have to check), and has a max weight of 4 lb (if that much even fits in a little box like that... I'd have to check). There has to be a supplier somewhere up there that carries it. But I'll leave it up to you.

Somethings to try with the furnace cement to keep it from popping off durring the quench:

Let it dry really well before you stick it in the forge. The evaporating moisture from being rapidly heated can cause it to pop off in the forge pre-maturely.

Leave your blades with a bit rougher finish (I usually only grind to 45 or 120 grit maximum) so that the cement has some more surface area to grab onto.

And something else that will definately help keep the clay in place, wrap the blade with some small steel wire (just periodically, doesn't need to be super heavily wrapped) and then coat the blade. The wire will hold the clay to the blade and in place, even if it becomes detached from the blade surface itself.

That might solve your problem and prevent the need to get satanite. I know of a good number of folks who use the furnace cement with great results. I've mainly used the satanite because I needed some for the forge and when you have to buy it by the 55 lb bag from the supplier, might as well use it for the blades as well.

As far as steel goes, I've ordered alot of mine from admiral steel, mainly because they carry most of what I'm after and they aren't too bad on prices (there are some places that are better on some things, but usually don't carry the variety, etc. so you'd have to piece out orders and all the individual shipping would eat up any savings and then some). I usually do larger orders which is why I go through them a lot (they sell in larger quantites and have relative decent shipping for big heavy 8' long shipping tubes filled with steel). They don't have 1084... at least in their "online" store. I know that they do carry some, but you'd have to call to find out more about size, quantity, prices, etc. However, I'm sure shipping to Canada would kill you with a big heavy steel order.

Kelly Couples has 1084 (he is the steel supplier listed on Darren Ellis's website).

Tracey Mickley also has some 1084 fg (just has a hint of vanadium, which improves grain structure and carbide formation) he runs http://www.usaknifemaker.com/

Tracye is a good guy and will be hard to beat in terms of service. Don't know about his international shipping policy, etc.

But there are some sources for you.

And hey, the questions are welcome. Thats why this forum is here. Better to have it see some use every once and awhile than never.

thanks for the answer i think i'm going to try the furnace cement at least a few for times.

O i have one more question i forgot to ask in the last post. I know you have answered this before but i can't find the post, it might have been on the old PIW forums. Anyway i'm trying brine as a quench for any blades that i want to have a hamon, i know this is much more risky so my question is, if a blade comes out of the quench bent (i don't mean the sori) at what point can a attempt to adjust it without snapping my knife and without redoing the entire heat treatment?

Jason

In terms of straightening a warped blade, it can be fairly difficult, and best to attempt to avoid the warpage in the first place, however it can be done.

If you are having warpage problems be sure your are normalizing well (tripple step down normalization cycles is what I recommend). If you are still having problems with warpage its because of one of two things, firstly your blade is not ground semetrically. In other words there is more mass on one side of the blade than the other, thus as the side with the more mass has greater contraction as it cools, causing warpage. You'll know you have this problem when you normalize and straighten the blade afterwards and then after your next normalization cycle the blade has warped the exact same amount and continues to do so. Another issue may be uneven clay application. If you get your clay on the blade thicker on one side than the other, it has greater thermal mass and therefore will create uneven rates of cooling side to side and cause the warpage. Also, if you arent careful with how you quench and accidently go into the quench at a slight angle, etc, or move the blade around in the quenchant too soon, you can create uneven cooling and cause warpage. If you pay attention to these things, you can probably cut down on the warpage issues you are having a bit.

Now to correct warps after HT there are a couple different ways that will work, however the first is only applicable in certain cases, differential HT is not one of them.

The first way to correct warpage is to pull the blade from the quench "early" and correct the warps before the austenite in the blade has had a chance to form. To harden a blade all you have to do is cool it quickly enough from critical to down below critical (say 700F-900F) fast enough to miss the pearlite noseline. After that the cooling rate can be much slower and the blade will still harden (unless you hold it at that temperature for a long while, in which case you will re-enter the pearlite regioin, or possible some of the bainite region, depending on the steel and cooling rate etc etc. Anyway, in the region between critical and the martensite start point, the steel remains in an unstable austenite phase and is still very malleable. You can correct warps by gently bending the blade by hand (with gloves) so long as the blade remains above 400 F (or so) at which point martensite begins to form. This isn't going to work with differential hardening, especially with brine and water quenches, as the blade will cool much too quickly for you to catch the area between the pearlite noseline and the martensite start point. Plus, your edge will probably already be forming martensite and the spine would not be, and you'd probably end up cracking the edge.

The other way to correct warps and probably the best way to go about it is to correct the warps durring the tempering cycles. This will really only work with gradual warps, nothing severe. If you have really severe warpage, you probably have some other big issues that need to be addressed and it would be best to re-HT (possibly re-grind etc,). This method takes patience and does take the right "touch" and you still have the risk of breaking blades if you try to take things too far too fast (however if you follow these instructions, you shouldn't have a problem).

Step one: NEVER EVER EVER hammer on a blade to try and straighten it after you have hardened it. It is almost a certain guarentee that you will break it doing that.

First thing to do is to give the blade a good temper cycle after HT (2 hrs, at about 350-375 F will do it) before you even start to think about straightening anything. After the first cycle, give it another 2 hour cycle, but this time, while the blade is still hot out of the tempering oven, slowly flex the blade to try and straighten the warp. I find for really uniform gradual warps that go the entire length of the blade, you can set the blade (concave down) on a flat surface, then with one hand lift up on the tang, while applying pressure downwards on the blade with the other. You'll have to flex the blade a good bit further past straight to correct the warp. It might take multiple heats to straighten things out as well, so be patient. Once the blade cools, don't try to move the warp any more, return it and let it get back up to heat before trying again. For pesky warps you can use the "three point" method, in which you can make a straightening jig for the vice using some wooden dowles. Have 2 dowles on one side and a single dowel on the other. Place the blade between these dowles in the vice with the single dowel on the high point of the warp so its something like this | - ( = | .  Then slowly tighten the vice and let the blade flex. It may flex relatively extremely, but its already been through two temper cycles so (so long as you have your basic HT down) it should hold up just fine.  You can correct more severe warps this way, and "tighter" warps that are more confined to a certain part on the blade. Again though, don't try to push things too far all at once, try a little bit at a time. If you aren't careful you can accidently push things too far and introduce a warp in the opposite direction.

You can also use "straightening sticks" which are basically two sticks with notches cut near the ends of them. You place the blade in the notches and can correct warps along the length, or even twists if the blade has twisted. Just don't crank down too fast or too hard all at once.

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m284/TarAlderion/Straighteningsticks.jpg

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m284/TarAlderion/straighteningsticks2.jpg

And finally, in the case of differentially hardened blades, sometimes you can just plain bend them to fix the warps, depending on how much of the blade spine remaind unhardened (again, do this after or durring tempering). Often you can bend a differentially hardened blade and it will take a set, just like an unhardened piece of steel would. Not always though, sometimes there might be sufficient elasticity in the hardened portion of the blade to spring the steel back and "un bend" the soft steel.

Hopefully that should get you on your way. Takes some practice and patience, but it can be done.

This is my first knife to come out of the quench with a problem it didn't actually break in the quench it just came out a little warped. After 2 hours at 370 in the oven i took it out and noticed the warp i figured because the spine was soft i could gently bend it to shape. I ended up snapping the end off. I think the problem was the furnace cement popped off too soon and hardened the entire blade. After it broke i broke it into 5 pieces to see if i could find the problem. I don't think its the grinding and its not the normalization ( i do a three step down and the grain in the blade is super fine). I'm thinking i either put it in at a bit of an angle or one side of the cement came off before the other side. Anyway next time it warps i think ill try fixing it while its hot right out of the oven. That probably would have saved my blade but its ok because i was going to a hamon and i know it wouldn't have had one.