Knife making

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Commonly annealing is as you said, but any form of softening steel is an annealment. I ain't a linguist, but hardening in a quench is merely the conversion of austinite to martinsite into a crystalline form trapping the carbon before it can escape. The plan was to give as simple instructions as I could so someone could heat treat their knife flawlessly. There's a million pages we could write on our take but in simplicity, I was just saying enough to give the basics of what's going on to get them to experiment, compare and learn. A large part of steel technology is really opinion I've been making Damascus knives for forty years, and no not pattern welded, I'm talking about folded steel with 100,000 layers and carbon nanotubes running full length of the blade.( duplicating nguro masamuni ) ask Wayne Goddard,John boy rickter. I didnt just set down yesterday with a file and make a shank.
 
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We could discuss all the details of austenite, martensite, ferrite, pearlite, and cementite...but that would have most people heads spinning.

To super simplify things:
Annealing: converts steel to austenite, then to ferrite and cementite (soft)
Quenching: converts steel to austenite, then to martensite (hard)
Tempering: starts with martensite, and keeps it martensite but makes it tougher and usually a little softer...but not always.
 
In what case would it ever not be softer
Tempering below 300 degrees F (or 150 degrees C). In this case you are looking for maximum hardness and only a modest amount of toughening, and is possible with some alloy steels. O1 is tough enough quenched that it doesn't need full tempering for small blades where you won't be subjecting them to much stress.

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When I started making knives, I bought an ASTM steel manual, and got on bladeforums and read a lot, and made shanks out of a bucket of files just to learn how to make something that wouldn't snap instantly, or bend in half.

I really liked four forty C, I could work it without annealing, and it seemed to make a nice tough blade.

I never got good at making handles, and it was definitely all back yard stuff.

Sorry I brought up an argument, all I wanted to do was correct some terminology, so the OP wouldn't make a mistake by using the wrong search terms.

I understand you knew what you meant, Bill.
 
No problems. I'm not a professional knife maker, I'm happy to bow out of the conversation and leave it to those better qualified.
 
I accept it. It's still softening though converting it back to austenite. Which is what I said. Read your chart. Even with nominal heat it drops. Even at that its basically not doing much to toughen your steel or soften it. The light yellow colors are where your steel heated to about 400 degrees the purples are at 700 to 800 degrees Fahrenheit. Your chart was in Celsius.
 
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