Through my work I have access to the below steel which come in 18 foot x 4 inch steel rods used as grinding media in rod mills. This steel eventually wears and is discharged from the mills in pieces around 1-2 foot x 1-2 inches in diameter and is sold as scrap, used for other purposes or thrown away.
I usually only use known steels bought from a knifemaking supplier for making my knives but I walk past this steel every day at work and can't help but give it a try and after looking at the data sheet from the supplier I think it would make an okay knife steel?
Any help with identifying what type of steel this is or what it is similar to and any recommendations on temperature range for forging and tempering would be very much appreciated?
Below is the stats from the data sheet information from the supplier:
Straigtness: 6mm in 1.5M
Average surface hardness: 32HRC
Microstructure: Pearlite & ferrite
Chemical analysis: C = 0.80 - 0.95, Si = 0 - 0.40, Mn = 0.50 - 1.00, S = 0 - 0.04, P = 0 - 0.04, Cr = 0.50 - 0.80, Ni = 0 - 0.45, Mo = 0 - 0.20
Any information or recommendations are appreciated
Thanks
Barry
Barry,
This sounds very close to W1 drill rod and should work for blades quite well. I would try using a W1 H/T and see how the hardness turns out. [Soak @ 1450-1500 for five/ten minutes and quench in a fast oil. Temper @ 400-425 degrees.]
Any time that you're using a steel for the first time there are always adjustments that need to be made so do some trial blades and test them to destruction.
Let us know how it turns out.
Gary
Thanks for the recommendations Gary!
Again I usually only use known steels brought from knifemaking supplies but on this steel I will use your recommendations as a starting point before I conduct some experiments and trials to see how it goes.
Cheers
Barry
