Can You Harden a Saw Blade? 

That's great to hear! Good luck!

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Glad it was helpful. Its always best to do a test piece of on each blade to make sure it can be hardened.

Thanks Bernie! Glad it was helpful.

Glad it was helpful.

Thanks, I've been meaning to make this video for a while now.

After hardening and quenching, the baking part is called "tempering" which is actually softening to something in the middle between hard and soft steel so it can be sharpened and still hold an edge well without chipping easily. Too hard - difficult to sharpen and easy to chip. Too soft - dulls easily.

Glad I could help. Making a knife or any tool really is extremely satisfying.

Glad it was helpful!

Glad you found it helpful.

That's great to hear good luck with your project!

That's great to hear thanks for the comment!

Thanks bro!

Glad you found it helpful.

400 degrees is kind of the rule of thumb. As you said getting that straw brown color is what you are after. If you have spare pieces I would do a test in the oven. Set it to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and leave it in the for an hour and see if you get a straw color. If its too dark then turn down the temp 15-20 degrees and try again. Or if you have a laser thermometer or a reliable oven thermometer you can put a piece of the steel in the oven at 400 degrees and then check the temp to confirm your oven is reliable.

Well, it depends on your definition of "good". If it's your first knife and you just want to give it try without spending any money on steel, then I say go for it. If you have an extra $25 you can buy 3 pcs of 12"x1.5"x3/16" 1095 steel off of Amazon and use that instead.

@@danthemakerman I made a few blades out of 6150 spring steel but I wanted to experiment a bit. As long as it doesn't snap from slightest pressure and somewhat holds an edge then I'm happy. PS is saw steel weldable? I want to make a Freddy Krueger glove from stainless and am wondering if the saw knife'll weld to stainless.

@@MarvinConman I don't know much about welding, I have only dabbled in it so I can't help you there.

Thanks for the information.

I made industrial blades , for cutting paper by exemple , in my job , this a common heat treatment . It works with all kind of tempered steel . Making the blade slightly harder .

Thanks glad you liked it.

The quenching oil i use is old peanut cooking oil. I use a magnet to check the temperature of the metal when heat treating. Basically heat the metal up to a red color and then I use a magnet to see if it is still magnetic. I'd the magnet sticks it needs to get hotter. Once the magnet stops sticking I heat it a couple more minutes to make sure the metal is heated evenly. Once its nonmagnetic I quickly quench it in the oil. I leave the metal submerged in the oil for a couple of minutes until it cools enough to handle. Then I use a file to make sure the edge is hardened. If the metal has hardened then the file will not bite in to the metal it will just glide off. If the file removes material from the quenched metal then it did not harden.

Awesome that's always good to hear!

You are welcome.

Safety glasses.

@@danthemakerman Good to hear that, thank you for answering. Now I feel better. 🙂

Ideally if you can afford it buying actual quench oil is preferred, something like Parks 50 Quench oil. But the cheap route is to use cooking oil or even used motor oil. I use old peanut oil. It's a good idea to heat it slightly, I never do and have never had any problems but my quench oil never gets below 70 degrees in my garage. If you want to heat treat properly there "heat treating schedules" online you can Google. They are specific to the steel you are using. This saw blade is a mystery steel, as I don't know the actual carbon content so usually it's best to quench in oil. There are some steels you can water quench but I have zero experience with any of those.

Thanks brother.

That's tricky because it depends one what kind of steel they are made from, some tool steels need to be quenched in water instead of oil. Some steels only in oil. If they are cheap, find your least favorite one and give it a shot. Not sure how you sharpen them, by hand or with a machine, but if the cutting tip turns blue then you have 'ruined' the temper and now the area that turned blue is softer than before.

I appreciate the comment thanks!

Wm. Walker Co. I did watch it and at the time thought it was smart on your part to make sure you covered all those points.

Potentially, the problem though is that you will have to cut, shape and sharpen it without causing it to overheat and ruin the temper. Once you heat an already hardened and tempered blade past a certain point you can ruin the temper and make it soft. Also working on a hardened steel, it a lot more work because it is already hardened. Cutting it with a hacksaw will be a lot of work and will probably require several hacksaw blades as they will go dull a lot faster since the metal is already hardened, that is if a hacksaw blade will even cut it. Using an angle grinder to cut the metal will be tricky without overheating the material while you cut it.

This is a great example of why I made this video. I think most people getting in to this hobby are trying to do it with out breaking the bank. Using a saw blade to get started in my opinion is a great starting point.

Glad it was helpful!

Thanks, yeah there is always a risk when dealing with fire and especially oil. I've never had any flare ups but that's mostly due to me not lifting the blade out of the oil until its cooled way down. With that said I do always have a fire extinguisher at the ready just in case.

@@danthemakerman thank you for the fast reply!

Peanut oil.

Yeah that's why it is a good idea to always do a test piece before committing to making a knife, especially with mystery steel. Good luck next time.

My pleasure thanks for watching!

Anna B Workshop Glad you liked it.

Glad it was helpful.👍

There isn't enough carbon content in the mild steel.

I used peanut oil.

No problem.

Great to hear good luck with your project.

@@danthemakerman okay first problem, I can't drill holes in the saw blade steel. HSS Drill bits is all I got, they don't work obviously? Is there a way to soften the material? I don't want to buy fancy new drill bits just for 3 holes

T Erha You need to anneal the steel. Basically you heat the steel up until it’s no longer magnetic then set aside on some bricks or something that won’t burn, to cool down slowly to room temperature. This should remove some of the hardness.

Thanks for watching! Files are usually harden, those you have to anneal otherwise they are too brittle. Chainsaw files are round right? That might limit what you can make with them. Anyhow here is a knife I made from a broken file. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-3RbsKznQFak.html

Yup!

My pleasure

Thanks!

Let me preface this by saying I am by no means an expert. Ultimately it comes down to how you shaped the blade or what tools you used and if in doing so you ended up altering the original temper. What I mean is if you used an angle grinder to cut the steel and if got hot enough to ruin the temper then the blade would have to be re-heat treated. If you were careful and kept the steel cool, as in no color change on the steel while you worked it, then you shouldn't have to do anything to it, it should still be hard. If it were my blade I would just heat treat the blade again, and by that I mean I would heat it up to non-magnetic and then quench it. Then check it with a file to make sure its hardened then temper it in the oven. This way I would be 100% sure the blade had a good heat treat.

Dan The Maker Man Thanks for the advice. I made sure I kept the steel from getting too hot during the whole process but I may just fire up the Forge and heat treated for good measure.

When I first started doing research on this the general consensus was that new or rather modern saw blades were constructed from cheap un-hardenable metal. Many stated that only the carbide tips on the edges where hard and that the metal itself was worthless. I was doubtful so I did my own testing. Which is actually the point when ever dealing with mystery steel. Always test it. Store bought steel is the best steel but if you are just starting off and want to try making a knife then a sawblade will probably work just fine.

Thanks for the comment!

No problem 👍

Thank you for watching.

What knife? I didn't make a knife in this video.

The point is that it snapped and didn't bend like the mild steel. If the saw blade was not harden-able it would have bent and not snapped in two. The point of this video was to show that you can indeed harden a saw blade in this case a inexpensive one which is what the test shows. The file test also confirms that the saw blade was indeed hardened.

I didn't time I just get it to were it looks reddish in color then check it with a magnet. If the magnet sticks to the metal then it goes back in the heat until the magnet doesn't stick anymore. I only quench it once. I did not bake it, the point of this video was to see if the saw blade was hardenable. If I had planned to use the steel to make a knife then I would of tempered it in the oven which would have made it more bendable/flexible.

@@danthemakerman how long would you put It in the oven? And would you only quench once if making a knife? Or twice

@@whatsgrowingon only quench once then use a file, like I did in the video to make sure it hardened. Then put it in the oven at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for an hour. When it comes out of the oven you are looking for it to have a dark straw color almost like bronze but not quite. For more info look at my video of marking a knife from a saw blade with limited tools.

@@danthemakerman link the video

@@whatsgrowingon Here you go. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-_1zyBQ4-iGw.html

Ok

A saw blade is way too thick for a fillet knife.

People aren't usually making knives to save money. It's for the accomplishment of making your own tools. Also, you should do a quick search of all the saw blade knives on RU-vid. Some of them are pretty thin, and others come from much bigger saw blades that are thicker. It's all just info to show what's possible.

Thanks for the comment.

I use old worn out saw blades.

My feelings exactly. Thanks for the comment.

A lot of people on Reddit.

@@danthemakerman It is tempered so its a waste of time to start over to harden and temper again.

@@nikolajc7617 Ok

Hahahjahahahahahaha!!!

Now is the perfect opportunity lol

"Let's say, hypothetically, we could harden a sawblade"

I think so too I just need to get way better at grinding in bevels.