oil heater

v-6

v-6

Well-Known Member
the rino rod i was using went up in smoke. so what do you use when heating parks 50
vern
 
I've seen a few guys who used old hot water heaters of which they cut the tank in half.
 
I use an electric 110V water heater element that I installed into the bottom of my quench tank. I just flip the switch on for about 10 seconds or so, and I'm usually good to go..
 
My quench take is a a piece of hydraulic cylinder 5" in dia. and 30" tall. I welded it to a brake rotor which makes a very good base. I attached a 110v water heater element to a round plate that sits on top of the tank. It takes 30-60 sec depending on oil temp to get it to 130F. One needs to be careful to keep enough oil in the tank to cover the element. I covered the lead attachment points with a pvc cap filled with epoxy.

Milt
 
milt sounds like a good tank everyone has been using old water heater elements for years keeping it low is the key. kellyw
 
Personally, I do not pre-heat Parks 50. I did it the first time I used it, and got two cracked 52100 blades for my efforts. Since then I've done a lot of experimenting with Parks 50.....I've found that for most of the "forgeable" steels, it does it's best at between 70-90F.....anything above that and it's risky for edge cracks....especially if you quench with edges less then .050"
 
Ed, what if your shop is unheated and the oil is at ambient temp in the winter?
Down in the single digits at times.
Unless I am mistaken, it sounds like you would try to bring it up to 70-90F.

EdCaffreyMS said:
Personally, I do not pre-heat Parks 50. I did it the first time I used it, and got two cracked 52100 blades for my efforts. Since then I've done a lot of experimenting with Parks 50.....I've found that for most of the "forgeable" steels, it does it's best at between 70-90F.....anything above that and it's risky for edge cracks....especially if you quench with edges less then .050"
Click to expand...
 
Although my shop is heated, the thermostat stays set on 55F year round (hot water heat in the floor). Even when it's that cold I still don't pre-heat Parks 50....because one small drop point hunter will bring the heat up to 70F....even in the 4 gallon quench tank that I use. If it's really cold, then yes, I would bring the Parks to the 70-90 range....but unless we're talking below zero temps, and the Parks thickens up, I don't think it will make a lot of difference.

Since my shop is heated, I can't say that from experience, since my Parks has never seen below 55F....... just making an educated guess based on my experiences with various quenchants.
 
Thanks Ed. Looks like I'll just have to try it and see what happens.

EdCaffreyMS said:
Although my shop is heated, the thermostat stays set on 55F year round (hot water heat in the floor). Even when it's that cold I still don't pre-heat Parks 50....because one small drop point hunter will bring the heat up to 70F....even in the 4 gallon quench tank that I use. If it's really cold, then yes, I would bring the Parks to the 70-90 range....but unless we're talking below zero temps, and the Parks thickens up, I don't think it will make a lot of difference.

Since my shop is heated, I can't say that from experience, since my Parks has never seen below 55F....... just making an educated guess based on my experiences with various quenchants.
Click to expand...
 
Thats good info Ed. I just bought some Parks 50 for 1084 and was planning on doing the ammo can with heater also. I'm in Colorado and my shop is not heated. My thinking was if I kept the oil at a consistent temp I would have more consistent HT results.
I'm thinking now that I might still do the ammo can because it has a sealing lid and bring the oil into the basement in the winter when I'm not using it then take it out to the shop directly before quench. Hopefully this will also prolong the life of the oil instead of having huge temp swings. Any thoughts? (Dont mean to hijack the thread)
 
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