1080 heat treating

[PJ234]

I have seen reports and recommendations of tempering 1080 anywhere from 375 all the way up to 500. I just took delivery of some 1080, so I'm interested in knowing what is correct.

I know intended usage, etc. matter, but this is quite a range that has me scratching my head and not sure what to do.

[Suicycle]

As a side note to the tempering in the kitchen and toaster ovens... they are not all created equal. My toaster oven cycles very even according to the dial thermometer I use in it. Usually I cannot see the dial move with the element coming on and off. The temperature dial usually is about 40 to 60 degrees off what the thermometer is too. The thing I learned last night was the blade and the thermometer are not the same either. I used a 350 and a 400 degree Tempilstick just cause I had them in the tool box. The 350 melted when the thermometer was reading 380 or a pinch more. This was not because the steel took time to reach oven temp either. It had cycled at around 360 for 25 minutes or more before I slowly upped the dial. I got it to register 375 for about 10 minutes before I upped it again. As soon as the needle broke 375 the mark melted. The thermometer later on was reading 415 and the 400 degree mark hadn't melted yet. Be alert for hot spots or the relation of the gauge to the elements in the oven.

[Mike Krall]

We are on our third toaster oven. They were USED to begin with. The latest has a reflector below the element and that helps uneven heating. We thought about wrapping the oven in ceramic wool to even out the hi-low temperature swing but used it in a forge instead. The toaster oven has a shallow tray and it dawned on me I could put sand/rock in the tray and that would damping temperature swings.

Believe it or not, cooking sites that do testing of equipment have reports on oven thermometer quality. A good oven thermometer is a handy item along with an element guard and heat storage mass.

So no one gets caught up in what I got caught up in... more mass is not good. I tried a half brick of fireplace brick in one of the early toaster ovens and the time it took for the oven to reach set point was WAY too long... hours...1/4" to 1/2" of sand/pebbles heats a lot quicker and still dampens temp. swing well.

Mike