Subject: Re:railroad spike

From: "Brian V. Street" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 5 Sep 1996 16:48:57 -0000

According to Howard Clark, the railroad spikes marked "HC" are 1045 steel.

Brian Street
Creamery Hill Forge

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From: George Ezell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 05 Sep 1996 18:59:06 -0500

> According to Howard Clark, the railroad spikes marked "HC" are 1045 steel.

All this talk of railroad spikes as knives, I figure I'll put in
my 2 cents worth...
Sold a spike knife a few months ago to a guy, and he told me the other
day that it's the best knife he's ever owned, except for the weight.
It had the "HC" marking, hardened hard enough to slide a file,
and showed a beautiful temper line after etching.  I think I tempered
it at around 330 degrees.  
I'm going to make some more of them...I don't consider them to
be "high preformance" knives, or "high art" by any means,
but I can make them quick (and not spend 6 hours polishing them!),
and people seem to like them.  And they're as close to indestructable
as a knife gets.  Dish-washer safe, too!

George Ezell