Thread: Design you own razor blank and build your own.

Originally Posted by Philadelph

I've got a digital kiln and industrial quenchant...

I saw that, nice setup Alex!

Originally Posted by Seraphim

Here's another possibility:

This one looks exactly like a 1930's H. Birks razor I have. It's a great shaver.

Originally Posted by Philadelph

I've got a digital kiln and industrial quenchant...

in te long run it really is the ony way to go (goood temp controles adn the right oils ) ues i knwo there are salt pots and the like tooo

i also have the kiln and parks oil

in the long run the gear pays for its self in making less mistakes adn in heat tretaing the steels you what how you want and not wait on shipping and turnaround times from another maker or HT shop

most you guys could get a small kiln and 2 gal of oil and be set maybe 700$ tops
not sure the price on this little kiln but i have a larger even heat kiln and love it for bang for the buck i have the 18 inch (900$ ish)and have plans to geta 36 incher

Yep, I agree
Food for thought.
Where is a good place to shop for a small kiln.

Deckard

try to get some scraps of the steel you are using and practice HT on them...
It isn't impossible, and if you are just wanting to make a razor or two for your self, it's an economical way to do it...
I just have a hollowed out fire brick, and a propane torch... it's challenging to keep the heat even inside, but that's because I put my fire hole too far back. What isn't hard is judging when it is hot enough... When I did my heat treat, I could see a line where it went from red to cherry red... not very hard to distinguish.
I double checked using a strong magnet on a pair of needle nose pliers. on one side of the line, the magnet stuck, on the other it didn't.
By the time I was able to get the whole razor up to this temp, and even (which took a little bit of adjustments on my part) I had the edge soak pretty much done. The thin part heats up the fastest, and cools quickly too.
A quick turn, and it was in oil and cooling.
That also only takes a couple of seconds... I left it in the oil for about 30 seconds, and tested on a file... the file just skipped...
If I did everything right, I should be shaving with my first home made razor in about a week... (sooner if I didn't have other responsibilities)

I can't tell you what the hardness is, I only did one temper at 400 degrees for 1 hour, and it is some tough steel... I'm guessing high 50's primarily because It's O-1, and my first try... I figure it isn't perfect, and there probably is some retained Austinite. But if it holds an edge, and shaves smoothly, what more do you want?

1095 or 1080 will retain less austinite with the same heat treat, and probably come out a bit harder, simply because of more room for user error...
Next time I do it, I'll try to get it on video. I'm not great at it, but the mystery goes away with practice.

Thanks for sharing, glad you have gone before me.
Would you say it's better to watch the coulour of the edge, and not worry to much about the rest, tang etc.
Non magenetic can be a little short of critical temp, so figure using eye to judge cherry is better, dull orange/orange is not good, (bigger grains).
File test can be a bit misleading, but better that nothing.
from the bit of practice I've had with scrap bits of 1084 I find the colour is duller than you might think, I've been overheating and need to recalibrate my eyes.
Have you thought about dry ice to pull out that retained austenite and another tempering cycle?
At the end of the day, the shave is the ultimate test, can't wait to hear how you get on with that.

Deckard

I did my heat treat in a dark room, so it went quickly from dull red to bright red almost orange, but that is also where the magnet stopped sticking.
I have a small left over oiece of steel that I'm going to HT and break to look for grain structure, just to see what happens...
But as said, it's the feel of the finished product that counts...

Any word on when we'll move forward with this?

if doing by eye simple steel look for the shadow to stop dancig then jsut a hair more heat then quench

its decalensence SP? when the phase of the steel shifts it cools the steel (the shadows) then if you keep the heat up then quench you get as low a tempas you can and still make the steel as hard as yu have preped it for

prep ?
we did the normalizing steps right ?

I did what me book told me to, which was some "heat cycling"... I'll have to look back to be sure, but the piece I bought was quote unquote annealed and normalized, and I kept the temperature way down when doing my grinding... No color change at all. so hopefully I did things right.

I may have to send one of them out to have the hardness tested and my amatuer work evaluated once I can test shave with it...

I'm stil learning, so if these turn out just okay, I'm still happy. I'm learning loads from my experiment, so hopefully I will improve with every attempt.

Good for you Mike, at least you have had a go and my guess is there will be more.
When you start shaving, it will be interesting to know how long you go before you need to go back to the hone.