Guns & Outdoors Forum

Supposedly even the cheap lawnmower blades are made of good carbon steel. Might be worth an experiment.

Well done.

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 6:26 am Supposedly even the cheap lawnmower blades are made of good carbon steel. Might be worth an experiment.

I’ve heard that.
But……that word…. supposedly gets me. Good carbon steel from known sources with known composition and known heat treating process is cheap. Besides, my robot fixture is designed for consistently sized material.

The US made Sharpfinger (bottom) and the China made.
The grind line on the USA model….what the French, toast?

Anyway, mine looks better I believe. Not sure if I should call it the Sharpmiddlefinger or the Stinkyfinger.

CPJ 2.0 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 6:04 am I’ll do it myself. High carbon is pretty easy to do. Get it cherry red,(non magnetic to be more precise ) quench in oil. Temper at 400-ish for a couple hours.

Cool

CPJ 2.0 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 11:25 am

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 6:26 am Supposedly even the cheap lawnmower blades are made of good carbon steel. Might be worth an experiment.

I’ve heard that.
But……that word…. supposedly gets me. Good carbon steel from known sources with known composition and known heat treating process is cheap. Besides, my robot fixture is designed for consistently sized material.

I can understand that. It'd suck to put in the work on a blade and then it turn out to be a waste of time. Theres a guy on another forum making knives from boat propellers which was a new one to me. Apparently the stainless from them are some top notch stuff

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 5:18 pm

CPJ 2.0 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 11:25 am

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 6:26 am Supposedly even the cheap lawnmower blades are made of good carbon steel. Might be worth an experiment.

I’ve heard that.
But……that word…. supposedly gets me. Good carbon steel from known sources with known composition and known heat treating process is cheap. Besides, my robot fixture is designed for consistently sized material.

I can understand that. It'd suck to put in the work on a blade and then it turn out to be a waste of time. Theres a guy on another forum making knives from boat propellers which was a new one to me. Apparently the stainless from them are some top notch stuff

Same goes with files and saw blades. Whyyyyyyyy when a blank is so cheap. I get being apprehensive of heat treat, but if you have charcoal and a hair dryer you’ve got a forge capable of getting it hot enough. A soup can full of oil to quench. And your kitchen oven to temper.
Butt loads of videos on the subject on the YouTube’s. Making stick removal blades is easy. Remove everything that doesn’t look like the blade. Hacksaw, files, angle grinders. Cheap tools that will get the job done.

Walter Sorrels on the YouTube’s has tons of beginner videos. He’s got a dry sense of humor that I love. And he doesn’t subscribe to the typical knife maker lore and BS. Just the facts and moves on.


Stainless DOES have some heat treat challenges. As well as the fancy pants steel types. Typically involves temps in the 2000 degree range, held accurately at that temp, for X time. That requires heat treat oven.

Funny you mention that. I was watching that Forged in Fire show for a bit and they were always big on showing and mentioning the importance of heat treating but NEVER once showed them temper a blade. Hell, that's probably the most important part unless you want a blade as brittle as an ice cube. I've gotten pretty good at heat treating and tempering for gun parts, but they're usually much smaller than what your dealing with.

Tempering is bad TV. Put it in an oven and away you go.

Hardening involves glowing red metal dumped in oil with smoke and fire.

All TV theatrics. Like when what’s his dude says “this will kill”.

Yeah. So will a butter knife if I jam it in your ear hole far enough.

I remember heat treating a screw driver I made in HS metal shop.
There was some sort of powder we quenched the red hot tip in.
Carbon?

PFD45 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 19, 2024 9:09 pm I remember heat treating a screw driver I made in HS metal shop.
There was some sort of powder we quenched the red hot tip in.
Carbon?

Yep. Sounds like they had you case hardening it. I make my own from crushed up charcoal.

I do like that knife.

Rugerfan wrote: ↑Tue Feb 20, 2024 12:56 am I do like that knife.

Appreciate it.

I’ve kind of enjoyed making them. My machining advisor sent me a new program. I’m doing everything step by step, proving each operation as I go.

As the cutter moves across the fixture, it’s *supposed to raise the tool ABOVE the screws holding the blank down.
I caught that on the first program. Missed it on this one.
But the machine didn’t miss the hardened cap screws. Plowed right though them.

Cost of business.

Only takes about .0069 seconds to burn a 20 dollar bill.

Grinding bevels is for SUCKERS.

We took our 8th graders to a local community college last Friday. We toured their “trades” programs. I thought if you when we were in the precision machining part. Idk how many Bridgeports they have in that place. Plus several CNC machines.

I think I might have gone that route if it had been available when I left high school.

Rugerfan wrote: ↑Tue Feb 20, 2024 3:06 am We took our 8th graders to a local community college last Friday. We toured their “trades” programs. I thought if you when we were in the precision machining part. Idk how many Bridgeports they have in that place. Plus several CNC machines.

I think I might have gone that route if it had been available when I left high school.

ENCOURAGE THAT! Trades will be where it’s at, real soon. (Now)
They will be able to name their price if they are good.

I finally finished this damn thing that I started on 5 years ago. The wood is flame scorched with only a coat of tung oil.

Number two practice blade. Have a few tweaks still. But overall it’s working. One more practice tomorrow. Hopefully one more.

You should case harden one for shìts and grins.

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Tue Feb 20, 2024 4:40 am I finally finished this damn thing that I started on 5 years ago. The wood is flame scorched with only a coat of tung oil.
20240219_173845.jpg

That’s pretty cool looking.

CPJ 2.0 wrote: ↑Tue Feb 20, 2024 4:56 am Number two practice blade. Have a few tweaks still. But overall it’s working. One more practice tomorrow. Hopefully one more.

Looks shorter?

Zee wrote: ↑Tue Feb 20, 2024 5:13 am

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Tue Feb 20, 2024 4:40 am I finally finished this damn thing that I started on 5 years ago. The wood is flame scorched with only a coat of tung oil.
20240219_173845.jpg

That’s pretty cool looking.

Thank you!