soak ?

We should expect a chemistry within a range specified for the alloy it is claimed to be, and we can reasonably expect it to be annealed, probably spheroidized, especially if described as such. Not much beyond that.

I personally believe that if we all were more insistent on being provide spec and data sheets with our material, what we could expect could greatly increase, until then, we get whatever we are given and have to just trust that it is what we were told it is. If it is my tool steel stock, or if I am doing research with it, it must come with spec sheets and papers of origin, or I go elsewhere.

As for optimizing our heat treatments, based upon that initial condition- that is sort of tough because the supplier wants to provide you with material that is annealed to provide the easiest of machining, and this is often in direct opposition to what we want for quick and easy heat treating. Easy machining often means coarse and widely separated carbides, which requires more effort with time and temperature to put into solution.

So, in light of this, you are very much correct that, with proper forging methods, a forged blade will be much more responsive to a quick heat treatment than a stock removed blade, unless that blade is also normalized. I have, on the other hand seen forged blades that were even more difficult to put into solution after improperly low forging heats, which only exacerbated the as received condition.

So, is near-optimum heat treatment a reasonable expectation with more coarsely spheroidized steel by a simple increase of time and temp? (And to be clear, I would consider a "simple increase" in time or temp to be in increments < 5 minutes and 25F.)

On a side note, I consistently see 1550F-1575F for 80CrV2. I get 60HRC + at 1500F/10 min and 400F temper with no issues. Am I missing something?
 
I have seen even higher temps for 80CrV2, like crazy high, that left me scratching my head. This would be a case of recommending a sledge hammer for engraving because the material was too hard with a chasing hammer. As I said before... when in doubt, normalize!

There is a condition in spheroidized steel that I call "carbon locked" (my term, not theirs), where the operation has been overdone and the carbon is so tightly bound into carbide that HRC suffers under normal heat treatments. If this happens extending the soak time will normally not make much of a difference (the fine tuning is just not powerful enough). For me, as a general rule, if 20 minutes hasn't moved the needle there is no point in going any longer, you have carbon lock. This is where many will reach for the nuclear option in coarse adjustment, and crank up the temperature. This doesn't correct the initial problem it blasts it into submission at the possible expense of the steel. This is when I quickly heat it to 1,600°F - 1,700°F and let it air cool before proceeding as normal. When in doubt…

We focus on hardening or annealing but normalizing is really the most power and handy of all heat treatments.
 
I would like to add that I blamed spheroidizing a little too exclusively for carbon lock in that last post. I have carbon locked my own steel by getting a little too creative with my normalizing operations before doing the same standard speroidizing that I have always done. We really need to remember that all these heat treatments are connected and dependent on each other, and view it as one big overall treatment that will give us our end results.
 
You are the man Kevin. Thanks for sharing your earned knowledge so freely.
What use is gained knowledge if it is not helping the craft?

On 80CrV2; it is a European alloy so you may have to look under the material number designation 1.2235 for more in-depth information. I have connections in Europe that help me get different literature so that I can look things up. The recommendations from the suppliers there has the austenitizing hardening temp as from 1475°F to 1525°F, with the lower end being for toughness and the higher end being for greater strength and hardness.
 
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