EdCaffreyMS
"The Montana Bladesmith"
Recently I purchased a new batch of steel. Replenished my supply of 1084, and decided to purchase enough 80CRV2 to experiment with, and see if it's something I wanna go with.
A couple of days ago, I forge out 4 test blades that will be used to experiment with heat treat, temper, and various geometries. My first surprise was how shockingly easy it is to forge.... moves like butter under the hammer. I did some thermal cycle testing too.... it has a better then average grain size from the factory, and thermal cycling makes it very fine grained.
Last night I rough ground the blades in prep for heat treat....again, pleasantly surprised at how easily it grinds when annealed. Less then an hour to rough grind 4 blades to 120 grit!
I'm going to run a couple of different heat treats to see what washes out, as well as some different grind geometries. I suspect the most difficult part will be finding the correct tempering temp to match the grind geometries. This is the part of Bladesmithing I love.... testing and tweaking to find a steel's "sweet spot".
If anyone has used 80CRV2, I'd be interested to hear you thoughts on this steel, and the methods you use/used to achieve. It's no secret that I'm not a fan of "soaking" during heat treat, but I'm going to experiment with one of these test blades and give it a 5 min soak to determine the outcome.
A couple of days ago, I forge out 4 test blades that will be used to experiment with heat treat, temper, and various geometries. My first surprise was how shockingly easy it is to forge.... moves like butter under the hammer. I did some thermal cycle testing too.... it has a better then average grain size from the factory, and thermal cycling makes it very fine grained.
Last night I rough ground the blades in prep for heat treat....again, pleasantly surprised at how easily it grinds when annealed. Less then an hour to rough grind 4 blades to 120 grit!
I'm going to run a couple of different heat treats to see what washes out, as well as some different grind geometries. I suspect the most difficult part will be finding the correct tempering temp to match the grind geometries. This is the part of Bladesmithing I love.... testing and tweaking to find a steel's "sweet spot".
If anyone has used 80CRV2, I'd be interested to hear you thoughts on this steel, and the methods you use/used to achieve. It's no secret that I'm not a fan of "soaking" during heat treat, but I'm going to experiment with one of these test blades and give it a 5 min soak to determine the outcome.