CRUWEAR temper?

[sleepy]

i am almost ready to heat and temper but this is my first time to use cruwear. i have heard it should have double or triple temper and to what RC should it be? i also plan to send it off for cyogenic temper any thoughts on this? i thought this would be the best place to get a good solid and informed answer. im going for edge holding ability first and toughness second. i plan to keep this one for myself and it will probly see some rough treatment. my day job is electrical contracting i have yet to find a production knife that keeps a good edge very long when stripping 500 MCM copper wire(among other things).

[RJ Martin]

Sleepy: Cru-wear is a good choice for your application!!!
There is a "sticky" that allows you to see all of Crucible Steel's data sheets-it's the first post in this forum. I checked the sheets-I'd recommend Austenitizing @ 1950F, a 30 minute soak at this temp, cryo treatment then (definitely!) 3 tempers @900F for 2 hours each. This should yield 62-64 Rc. While that is a bit on the hard side, since you are stripping wire you are looking for maximum wear resistance, and, I don't think toughness will be that much of an issue for this steel at that hardness, particularly if you leave the edge at .020-.030 thickness.

You can always take the heat treated blade, put on a temporary handle and use it for a while-if it's brittle at all, you can go back and re-temper at a higher temperature to drop the hardness back a bit. My thinking is that won't be necessary.

good luck and let us know how things work out!

[sleepy]

RJ Martin

thanks for the info its greatly appreciated. i have one more ? i am using file/sandpaper method for blade grind as i dont have a machine. i noticed on this knife my grind to the left(point to left blade edge facing me) is off just enough to notice if you look carefully from the grind to the right. i think the cause of this is the difference in direction(im right handed). i tried to fix it by turnig point to right blade edge facing away and grinding but ended with same result. any thoughts on how to fix this? the blade looks good but my main concern is warp/damage during HT due to the uneven grind.

[RJ Martin]

Sleepy: Welcome to the club! keeping the point perfectly centered is a challenge even with a belt grinder and considerable practice! Just do the best you can, and, if the point wanders a bit, oh well....

I don't know who/how your blade will be HT'd. If it's done in foil and plate quenched, your heat treater will have a brief window in which to tweak that point and move it on center.

However it ends up, you'll have a useful tool that will strip wire for a long time.

[sleepy]

RJ Martin

thanks again for the help and info