Subject: Identification

From: "John W. Pollins, III" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 16 Mar 1996 08:22:07 -0500 (EST)

I guess I don't want to know as much as Ray does about what I pick up at the
junk yard so my "identification" boils dow to whether there is enough carbon
to heat harden and whether it's oil or water.
        Take a snuf can of brake drum shavings with you. If the steel in the
yard is already magnetic, it's probably high carbon.
        Hold it to a grinder. If it throws off exploding sparks,it's
probably high carbon        
        Heat the test piece and hit it. If it doesn't want to move, it's
probably high carbon. If it won't move at all and blows up after heating to
bright yellow, it's air hardening and will be wonderful for hot cut work
(but not worth the extreme effort to forge (slow under a press or heavy
hammer at dark red))
        Bring it to critical (Won't attract a magnet anymore) and quench in
oil. If a file won't cut it, paint "O" on the end and store it with oil
hardening tool steels.
        If it failed the oil hardening test, bring it up again and quench in
saltwater. If a file won't cut it, paint"W" on the end and store it with you
water hardening tool steels.
        If it fails all the foregoing rack it in the general forging steel pile.
                       
                        Pollins

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From: Will Ezell <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 17 Mar 1996 02:03:39 -0600

John W. Pollins, III wrote:
> 
>        Bring it to critical (Won't attract a magnet anymore)Hi fellow smiths,
	 A method that works for me in identifying tool steel for knives:
Draw piece out to 1/4 inch rod.  Heat till a magnet will no longer stick
(about 1475 degrees, critical temp.).  Quench in warm oil.  Clamp in vise.
Flex piece.
	If it bends, odds are that it does not contain enough carbon to harden.
If it snaps like glass, well, go ahead and use for tools/knives, but work out 
it's tempering cycle.  
	I have a question: What's the largest piece of pattern-welded/Damascus
steel you've worked up by hand?  Biggest I've tryed yet was 4"x1"x1/2", and it
was tricky.
	Wayne Goddard wrote of this method of testing in Blade magazine, and
gets all the credit...
Happy hammering!
	George Ezell