Working with dry ice questions

BobbyD

Well-Known Member
Getting ready to to HT my first batch of Abel. I have never worked with dry ice so have a couple of ?? The closet place that sells it is about 35 mins from me. It will be close to two hrs probably before I can use it. Will it keep in a cooler for that long? They sell it in one pound blocks. How many pounds will I need for 5 knives? Any other tips would be appreciated. Thanks
 
It will hold. Just put it in a cooler, the smaller the better. I’d get two pounds because you will lose some before you use it.
 
I had 4lbs of dry ice in rice form so very small pellets and that lasted over 24hours in a cooler. I'd agree that two 1lb blocks with whichever liquid you use should be fine for 5 knives just start heat treating when you get home.
 
Put your alcohol in a refrigerator, as soon as you pour it in the ice starts to sublimate, and fast in my opinion.
I use 1/4" aluminum plates with AEBL in dry ice because I've found they'll warp in the ice too. being I use plates, my container is pretty big so I end up using 4-5 pounds but where I buy it I can't really find it packaged in just 2-3 pounds.
I try to have at least 4-6 blades to do in succession to offset the cost.

I made a foam filled container for the bath, here in Fl. I'm fighting the heat year round so this thing helps and surprisingly acetone doesn't affect the foam at all.
I would recommend wearing safety glasses when pouring the alcohol on the ice. good luck and hopefully they'll come out straight.
on thin blades they were warping on me.
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I got some 1/2"x2"x12" aluminum plates and drilled a hole in each end for a 5/16" bolt.
I sandwich each blade between two of these immediately after the plate quench, and they stay in there through cryo ( I use LN ) and during tempering. I haven't had warps since I started doing this.
I suppose you could put more than one blade in each "sandwich" but I haven't tried that.
 
With smaller blades, yes I can get two between my plates and like Owl, their in plates when I temper them too.
I got fed up with the warping and do everything I can with AEBL to prevent it. I've used thicker and never had problems it just seems to be .100 and thinner for the most part. AEBL is a real head scratcher when it come to warping.
 
I use RV Antifreeze as suggested by Boss Dog in the video he did. I am gonna try the plates for cryo. I have been having problems with warping on my fillets so I'm gonna give that a shot. I have some extruded aluminum angle I think will work?
 
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