Heat Treating 0-1 steel

HI everone ive decided to grind my own blades now and have chosen to start out with 0-1 as my first steel to learn with. People say it easy to learn for beginers and easy to heat treat on your own with a torch. Could any one explain to me the process of heat treating this steel with a torch and tell me what other items i will need. Also how can i figure out if i have achieved the proper hardness.

Since no one else has piped up I'll explain how I Heat treat my O-1. I mostly use O-1 although I have been screwing up a fair amount of 1084 lately learning to forge.
Items you'll need

essential
eye protection
Heat source {torch or forge or bbq pit and blow dryer}
oil {veg oil or vet grade mineral oil I use elcheapo 10w30}
tongs or vice grips
magnet

Nice to have
gloves
some thing to hold the oil in
vise
borax

Some of the steps I use can probably be omited, but I try to make the best knife possible. Using these steps I have gotten pretty impresive results with the O-1.

First normalize your blade after you have finished grinding and and before polishing. To normalize heat your blade untill it is red\orange {the point where the magnet won't stick to it} Heat it slowly over several minutes. (Be very careful not to overheat if you get it to the point that the steel starts sparking you probably won't be able to recover it.) When it becomes nonmagnetic clamp the butt end in the vise and let it cool to room temp. This step will help keep it from warping during the quench.
After the blade is normalized:
polish to 220 or 400 grit
place your oil in it's METAL container (plastic smells real bad when you burn it during the quench) and heat it to 160 or 180 degrees. I use a piece of mild steel heated to red and placed in the oil.
Decide if your going to edge quench or fully quench and draw the spine back. I personaly edge quench and that is what I'll explain here.
slowly heat your blade untill its hot but not glowing sprinkle borax onto it and let it melt to the steel.
Slowly heat your blade to nonmagnetic. the edge will heat the fastest because it is thinner be careful with it. when the blade is nonmagnetic place the edge in the oil. Terry Primos has a great picture of an edge quench in this tutorial
scale prevention
let the rest of the knife cool until it is no longer red drop it in the oil and let cool until it is cool enough to handle. pull it out knock the scale off with your sander. Place in a prewarmed oven between 325 and 350. on my oven 340 is perfect. Use and oven thermomiter for two hours. let cool to room temp. do this twice more for a total of three times. Put a final finish on your blade.
to test for proper temper I use the brass rod test at the minimum. Ed Caffrey explains it well on his web site under knife articles at this link Ed Caffrey
this is not the be all end all to treating O-1, and I've probably left out a couple of minor steps that I do with out thinking. But this will get you started. Practice, do things a little different, test some blades to distruction to see how well it works. If you have any questions don't hesitate to contact me. If anyone else sees any glaring holes in this process let me know. {long day in the salt mine}
Steve
ouble S Custom

Hello !

Normalize it si absolutly necessary ? It's the first time that I read that ! At which time is this the best ? Right before the heat treating (when th knife grinding are finish) Is it really obligatory to remove the scales afterwards or one can make the heat treating immediately afterwards?

I read on other newsgroups that triple tempering was not necessary with O-1. That made a large difference?

Thanks !

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Normalizing is not absoutely necessary. But if you are like me the grind on both sides will not be identical, if you don't normalize you run the risk of warping during heat treat. I normalize after I grind to 220. Then finish to 400, coat with borax then heat treat.
Removing the scale is not the reason for polishing to 400 grit. The way I understand it deep scraches cause stress on the steel. When you quench these can cause your blade to crack or break. I haven't had it happen but again I don't want it to either.
A single temper will work. Ed Caffrey has written alot on triple tempering the steels he uses. I tried it and have seen some improvement, not alot, but some.

The thing to remember with this post is "" This is the way I do it "" This is not the best way or the only way. Again some of these steps can be left out and you will still have a good servicable knife. I am a firm believer in you play like you practice. I'm not going to use O-1 exclusively during my knifemaking experience.So I'm trying to instill good techniques now for better knives later. I hope this helps.
Steve
Double S Custom

Thanks Steve !

I practically finish to grind some of my first blades and I am ready to make the heat treating but I am a little afraid to waste all that I have make... I will test your method to normalize, that cannot harm...

Alain

Thanks for the replies everyone. Just got my first shipment of 0-1 from admiral steel. After making alot of knives with prefinished blades i look foward to the experience of making my own. Im sure ill be asking plenty of questions on grinding soon.

Normalizing is a good practice to start, it will only get you into good habits if you continue to work with high carbon non stain resistant steels. Most steels are handled in a rolled form at sometime or another, I have found both to retain a memory; if that 18" or 36" stock has a bow at full length it will also have one at 8".

0-1 has showed some improvements with the double temper.

Good luck and happy grinding.