Thread: Herder blank

I believe you are right the eBay seller is based in Tennessee and he has other herder blanks. The others are some kitchen knives but clearly advertised as unmarked. I am crossing my fingers and hoping that this only need to be grounded and/or honed. I did ask the sales after the sale and he told me that the black only needs to be sanded/polished, honed. Anyway ten dollars is not that big of a loss.

Randy's right, those were interesting blades to work on. I still don't know what the base alloy is, but they were hard. If I had more data it would be interesting to do some heat treating to see if I could dial in an acceptable hardness that didn't make the honemeisters cuss.

Would you give it another go? Just in case...

If it's an unknown alloy, I'd rather have mike heat treating it than myself.
From just this pic, it really looks like a finished blade. But I'd happily grind it for you if you need someone to do it.
However, first hold it in your hands, because if all it needs is some TLC, you can easily do that yourself.

Btw, I do remember honing herder razors, and they were harder than normal. Or at least they felt that way.

Originally Posted by rocarule

Would you give it another go? Just in case...

I can Rockwell test it first and let you know where the blade is, then let you decide if you want that changed. The steel, while still uncertain to me, responds to simple methods. I didn't have enough samples from Geezer to really play with the times and temperatures to develop a range of behaviors. If I had the time and samples of enough blades, the graph of it's behavior could lead to identifying the steel indirectly. Or at least a better range of certainty of behavior for anyone else who wanted to HT these blades. It's really too bad that Herder did not publish that information. I wonder if there are any documents left over from the factory.

Originally Posted by randydance062449

snip....
Maybe Geezer & Mike Blue will post here.

Your blank will be a lot easier to work than was mine! It is almost all the same thickness and will clean up fairly easily. I used a sanding block of a little less than 1½ inches diameter to get the area under the spine. Whoever ground these blades in production had to be a master. Assorted small pocket knife hones, shaped on sandpaper or a cheap grinder, will help to finish the surface to a dead flat! No ripples that way

Have fun! The effort is worth it. I have no other blades that take that high a polish nor a long lasting edge. But, the steel is very hard and it took a long time to get the final edge without chipping it.
~Richard

So that particular blade on the picture, did it need to be heat treated?
Anyway here is a picture of mine which I just got today. The blade comes in at 7/8 barely and and the edge measures about .004 in width.

If you want to hone that, you'll be honing until kingdom comes
It needs grinding. Interesting, because with the stabilizer ground like that, the first pic makes it looks like it was already ground.

I know, it will take me forever. I am still wondering if it is tempered. There's is this guy on on eBay selling dorko blanks and he claims they are tempered, I am still crossing my fingers. As for the grounding; I will pay one of the merchants here if they are willing to do it.

Originally Posted by rocarule

So that particular blade on the picture, did it need to be heat treated?
Anyway here is a picture of mine which I just got today. The blade comes in at 7/8 barely and and the edge measures about .004 in width.

I believe that you mean 1mm or 0.04 inch. That blade appears to have been stamped to that dimension. That is about a minimum to leave for heat treating.
You might do as suggested and run a good quality file along the edge at an angle to see how hard the blade is. A hone will not give you a true answer as to that...trust me!!!!
My blade may or may not have required heat treating. I didn't know so I sent them to Mike Blue.
Have fun, Yours looks to become a winner!@
~Richard