Fillet knife questions

I have a few knives under my belt now, having done enough to have some questions. I have been working 1095 and 01 and doing my own heat treat in a gas forge. I want to start making some fillet knives 6"-9" blades. Since it will be saltwater and at the end of a long day I'm thinking stainless but carbon is not out of the question. My concern is heat treating 1/16 or 3/32 steel and any tendency to warp. Will the carbon steel have problems? I don't have much temerature control so I would send out the stainless for heat treat so I also wonder where to send them, any favorites? Any help would be appreciated.
Phil

For stainless HT or any HT for that matter I suggest contacting Brad at Peters Heat Treat. They have a forum here on Knife Dogs with there contact info.

I send all of my knives, Stainless & Tool Steels to Paul Bos Heat Treat.
It's part of Buck Knives. I just got a batch back in today from them and their work is always second to none!

I use 440C Stainless quite a bit and it works for Fillet knives very well! I wouldn't recommend a Carbon like 1095 or O1 for fillet knives. Unless you are just making the fillet for yourself?
I started knife making in my garage, I live about 3 blocks from the ocean and after messing around with 1095 & O1 steels for a few knives I moved to Semi or Stainless only!

After watching what I was working on literally rust before my eyes at times just from the salt air.
Most people don't care for their knives well and all you need is them to rust up one of yours to kill any future sales from that customer.

Good luck with your project.

Laurence

www.rhinoknives.com/

I would go with stainless, and have used 1/16" thick 440C for fillet knives, full flat ground, and have some warpage problems when heat treated after grinding. So I have changed to heat treating before grinding the bevels, then grinding is a slow go, and eats belts. The first fillet knife that I made was a fluke, as all went great, ground to .010 thick at edge pre heat treat and no warpage doing a plate quench, I thought this is great, the next 2 couldn't have gone worse, they warped, and couldn't get them straight, so I remade them and heat treated before grinding the bevels. Now I do some grinding pre heat treat, maybe half, and have had good results with that so far. Sending out for heat treat may help on warpage, not sure. But do grind equal on each side as you go, don't get the blade extremly hot while grinding, this is a must if you grind after the heat treat, but also helps eliminate warpage while grinding before heat treat, anything that builds up stress in the blade will cause warpage on thin long blades.
Sorry for the long post, just trying to give some tips that i have learned the hard way, hope this helps you out.
Dale