| When all else fails, destruct test |
[Jun. 19th, 2013|11:01 pm]
Doug Ayen
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When all else fails, destruct test.
I took the smallest, thinnest wheel, one I'd not bother to much with anyway, put it in a vice, and bent it. It bent, no cracks. Thinking it might have been tempered too soft somehow, I tried to re-harden with the heat treat furnace, slapping on a thick layer of furnace cement, heating, quenching -- and again it bent without cracks. I pounded it out on the anvil, clayed it up again, fired up the forge, and heated until it was at the temperature I'm used to seeing. I heard it crack in the water, forgoing the uber-expensive quenching oil, and when I pulled it, I saw it had warped under the stresses. Back to the vice, on a bend it cracked about a quarter inch in from the edge, but the middle was still soft. I ground off the refractory, gave it a quick polish in a few spots, and etched in hot vinegar.
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