HT'ing Alabama Damascus

K

KenH

Well-Known Member
Hello all, I've got a carving knife profiled using a billet of Alabama Damascus I purchased at Blade this year. Just now getting around to making the wife her carving knife. I've looked all over the Alabama Damascus website and can not find any HT'ing info. I do remember getting a pamphlet at the time, but that's paper and it got lost. I read on their website the composition is:

Material = (4) layers 5160, (3) layers 203E, (3) layers 52100, (3) layers 15N20 folded 5 times for 416 layer damascus

I was surprised at using 4 difference alloys - doesn't seem like those alloys really go together for a pattern welded steel, and 203E is a low carbon alloy for pressure vessels.

Based on the 4 layers of 5160 I would expect to heat in oven to about 1525ºF for 10 minutes or so (or does it need longer for carbon to get fully soaked?), then quench in 125ºF canola oil (only oil I've got).

Does Alabama Damascus benefit from normalizing? Heat to 1575ºF and allow to air cool?

I've read Alabama Damascus has a tendency to warp on quench, so I'm concerned about this long thin blade. 1" wide, .100" thick and tapered to .060" at tip and is 14" long. Would quenching for 10 (longer? Less?) seconds in oil, then clamping between aluminum plates help prevent warp?

Lot of questions here, but as I've researched HT'ing today I'm more confused than ever.

Thanks to all for any help,

Ken H>
 
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The friction folder I just finished was Alabama. Mine came with instructions, which are at shop not with me right now. But, I treated it pretty much like 1095. Heated to 1500 for a few minutes, quenched in 120 deg canola. Came out of quench at about 61hrc. I can try to find paper that came with mine this evening if you need it.
 
Thanks Anthony - "IF" it's not too much trouble if you get a chance please do post. I've emailed Alabama Damascus for HT'ing info but no response from them yet. I'd be interested if they say anything about normalizing before the quench temperature. That might help on warping which I've heard is a bit of a problem with Alabama Damascus.

Ken H>
 
Well Ken, not exactly an in depth description, but this what came with mine. You might give them a call, here's the business card I have.
 

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Thanks Anthony - you're right, that is pretty sparse HT'ing info. About what I expected and listed in my first post. I do think I'll normalize to de-stress a bit from forging when making the billet, in hopes normalizing will help prevent warping. Maybe quench for 10 seconds or so in canola, then clamp between plates?

You'd think they'd be more informative to help folks do a good job with their billets. I think the instructions you've got might well be what I got with my billet, but don't remember and can't find it now. As I mentioned, I've emailed them hoping for a response. All day now and no response. With this slow response, and no HT'ing info on website, it sure makes me leery of purchasing any more from them.

Thanks again for your help,

Ken H>
 
Hello Ken, if all the layers are the same size then the proportions of the billet would give a carbon content of around .63% if everything is ideal and the 203E has the higher .23% carbon. Not ideal for a carving knife but your heat of 1500F should be all right and the shallowest hardening steel would be the 15n20 which should still do fine in the canola. The normalizing you suggest would help with getting things into solution easily at that 1500F.
 
Thanks for the confirmation Kevin - your advice is ALWAYS greatly appreciated. From some info I found elsewhere that said Alabama does normalize after forging and before selling I didn't do the normalize, just held at 1525ºF for 8 minutes, quenched in 125ºF canola oil. From quench it's about 62 Rc. I did clamp in plates, but not sure that did anything.... good anyway. I had a bit of tang sticking out because the knife is longer than my plates and that's where I got the warp. Oh well, maybe the bit of offset I've clamped in for tempering will take care of the slight warp in tang.

Kevin, Do you see advantages to the 4 alloy (5160, 204E, 52100, and 15N20) mix that is used in this billet? If you don't wish to comment for your own reasons I do understand. To me, just seems that many different alloys would tend to promote warping a bit.

Thanks to all again,

Ken H>
 
I will avoid the controversy by stating that my comments are confined to my approach, my experience and my methods of making Damascus. For myself, personally, I want a good window of overlap in the steel characteristics and heat treatment requirements.

My first and foremost rule is to never use anything in my mix that I wouldn’t make a knife out of all by itself. Carbon moves, it wants to equalize, and it does it rapidly enough that there is no real beneficial, or even lasting, effects of different carbon levels. So instead I look for property differences based upon alloying to give me the benefits in my mix.

With heat treatment you want a combination that will not force you to decide which steel will not get a proper heat treatment. Example- 1095 and L6 would never fly in my shop one is a very shallow hardening steel while the other is almost air hardening, which one will I give the bad quench to? Which one will I not austenitize properly? The 1095 shouldn’t exceed 1475F but the L6 needs at least 1500F. Carbon diffusion will change this a bit but will also give more carbon to the L6 carbide formers throwing the spread off even more, not to mention increasing retained austenite when coupled with the Ni. On cooling one steel will set at a different rate, increasing distortion problems, normalizing this mix gives a new definition to distortion. It is worth noting that almost all the guys over the years who said they had no issues with this mix actually ended up having what they thought was L6 turn out to be 15n20.

Because of the carbide formers O-1 has an austenitizing window that allows up to 1500F, the bottom range of L6, and in this case the carbon diffusion actually widens that window a bit. Combine this with the exact same quench requirements that these alloys share and you can see why I choose this mix for my setup.

Even under these best of circumstances that ideal window of overlap is still fairly narrow, and because of this I personally do not like working with multiple alloys in one billet as it gets all too hard to line up all the heat treatments. I have likened pattern welding to handling venomous snakes, one or two snakes you can keep track of and hopefully survive, the more serpents in the bundle the greater your chances of getting bit.

My first consideration is carbon levels, i.e. how much will I have when I am done. So the first thing I do is determine the right percentage of steel A to mix with steel B to get an overall carbon percentage of at least .8%, but if there are carbide formers I may want more. Next, if I am trying to get something that resembles the mythical properties if Damascus I ignore the idea of low carbon/high carbon or even the very idea of hard and soft layers, as I have years of testing data that shows this is not good. Instead I go for the two properties that I want in two distinct types of knives- abrasion resistance (fine slicers) and impact toughness (large choppers), and this I achieve through the alloying. I want higher levels of carbon in the presence of things like V, W, Mo or even Cr. For the other I want things like nickel.

When combined well, these chemistries will give you a blade that sacrifices no strength or edge holding but can take bit more pounding, and the edge will be more stable over the long haul on a wider variety of materials. The added benefit is that as the edge wears the abrasion resistance alloy will leave higher spots on the edge allowing you to still cut from a micro-saw tooth effect, where a steel with true hard and soft layers will either simply smooth over or have its harder parts break up from lack of support from the softer partner.

As you can see I tend to overthink my Damascus mixes but it has served me very well over the years.
 
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Kevin, great post there. Thanks for sharing that. There is a lot of sound metallurgy there but also a high level of practicality and common sense.

Very well worded and well written.
 
J. Doyle said:
Kevin, great post there. Thanks for sharing that. There is a lot of sound metallurgy there but also a high level of practicality and common sense.
Very well worded and well written.
Click to expand...

John, you have took the words from my mouth - no way I could have phrased it better. Kevin did a GREAT job of telling us the science behind pattern welding without bad mouthing anyone. Great job!

Ken H>
 
I know the old adage, you get what you pay for probably applies, but Alabama's steel is comparably cheap in price. Being a newb that doesn't yet make my own pattern welded steel, I have a hard time justifying spending 4 or 5 times their price for a "name brand" steel. I'm not at a place that I can charge $500 for a pocket knife, so my material costs have to be realistic.

They had some great prices at the Little Rock show and the piece I bought seemed to harden just fine and no warping. Of course, I only made a folder blade so warping's probably not likely anyway. Guess what I'm saying, I think they fill a niche for guys like me who want to try some pattern welded steel but maybe their skill level isn't to the point that they want to tear into a $400 piece of Chad Nichols stuff just yet. I'm basically happy with mine.
 
I have used A.D. in the past . It seems to harden quite well . Had them make me a sword billet , that hardened and did not warp . I think their prices are the best online .

you can easily make a 500$ blade with their steel . I will continue to buy A.D., its a good buy for the money and makes good blades . Lacy will make whatever you want , can be your own steel .

Its nice to buy custom billets at a decent price .He did not get to be one of the largest Damascus makers around and not have a good product... Just my 2 cents.... Bubba
 
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