Hi David,

The kitchen Oven is something I use on a regular basis to temper my blades as well. Yes to your first idea- I degrease the blade first with whatever I have on hand, and then give it a wash in hot soapy water. That should eliminate most of the stink, and all of the smoke. Marriage intact!

-Evan

Thanks, Evan. That's what I'll do!

I can't tell you how many years I used the kitchen oven for tempering back in my early days. Like most others I actually tried the toaster oven thing, and to this day I cannot hide the fact that I am not fan at all and have never been able to figure out why so many knifemakers are so enamored of what has to be one of the worst possible heat sources for tempering. So yes, thus far the only sound reason I have come us with is the marriage threatening factor of oil covered blades in the kitchen oven. In that 350-450F range, a properly calibrated kitchen oven has the space and thermal mass to do everything a kiln could do, just wash the blades with some Dawn detergent before hand and you are good to go.

I used the electric home oven in my early days as well. Usually, I got the wife to bake something at the same time...….or you could make some brownies and a baked chicken while you temper that knife and really get the wife to say "this is a good thing" <img src=' http://www.americanbladesmith.com/ipboard/public/style_emoticons//laugh.gi f' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':lol:' />

Update:

Before I started I used a high-quality temperature probe (I use it for monitoring brisket in the smoker) and determined that my oven fluctuates between 390 and 410 when set at 400. Acceptable, I guess.

Degreaser and then some detergent seemed to work well; no smoke and only the faintest smell in the kitchen when I was done.

However, afterward I wasn't completely convinced that I had a hard blade. I did do a file test coming out of the quench and THOUGHT it skated nicely, but after tempering I tried it again and wasn't so sure. Then again, it's going to be softer after tempering, right?

I fretted over what to do, and finally contrived a test: I took a knife, also from 1084, that I heat-treated at my ABS intro course in August, and both tried to scratch the new blade, and used the new blade to scratch it. Turns out the old blade easily scratched the new blade, and the new blade slid over the old one like it a polishing rag on glass.

Bleh. Back to the forge.

On the positive side, I figure I now have a pretty good way of testing. I also have a hardened but untempered blade from my course (or a piece of it...we all snapped untempered blades to look at the crystal structure), so I can use that between quench and temper.

Damn this is fun.

Thanks, everyone, for responses.

|quoted:

Update:

Before I started I used a high-quality temperature probe (I use it for monitoring brisket in the smoker) and determined that my oven fluctuates between 390 and 410 when set at 400. Acceptable, I guess.

Degreaser and then some detergent seemed to work well; no smoke and only the faintest smell in the kitchen when I was done.

However, afterward I wasn't completely convinced that I had a hard blade. I did do a file test coming out of the quench and THOUGHT it skated nicely, but after tempering I tried it again and wasn't so sure. Then again, it's going to be softer after tempering, right?

I fretted over what to do, and finally contrived a test: I took a knife, also from 1084, that I heat-treated at my ABS intro course in August, and both tried to scratch the new blade, and used the new blade to scratch it. Turns out the old blade easily scratched the new blade, and the new blade slid over the old one like it a polishing rag on glass.

Bleh. Back to the forge.

On the positive side, I figure I now have a pretty good way of testing. I also have a hardened but untempered blade from my course (or a piece of it...we all snapped untempered blades to look at the crystal structure), so I can use that between quench and temper.

Damn this is fun.

Thanks, everyone, for responses.

OK. What is the steel and what is your hardening and quench process?

|quoted:

OK. What is the steel and what is your hardening and quench process?

1084 steel, heating in gas forge, quenching in Parks 50. I was using a magnet to test for critical temp, but tomorrow I'm going to try again and just go a little hotter (judging by color). I might also use the salt trick.