Post by Bullshop on Sept 4, 2018 16:21:47 GMT -7
It has been my good fortune to have met a local gentleman custom knife maker. He was having a yard sale and I learned he was selling some reloading equipment and supplies. Only a bullet arch distant I decided to go. There I found some real bargains and bought a bunch of stuff.
While there chatting with Clay we talked in length about how there were many similarities to our heat treating procedures mine with lead alloys and his with steel alloys. Clay confided in me that he had a secret quenching formula that had the effect of adding toughness to steel without making it too hard that it becomes brittle. He offered to mix a batch of his secret formula for me to try with heat treating lead alloy bullets just to satisfy a curiosity that we both had.
Next day after his yard sale he showed up at my house with all the remaining reloading supplies and made a gift of them to me, bless his heart ! He also brought a bucket of his secret quench formula for me to try. The next day I was working on an order and had plenty of alloy in the pot to run extra so I quenched the order as normal in water plus some extra to test for hardness then switched to Clays solution and ran another 100 + from the same pot quenched in his formula.
Today about 50 or so hours after the quench I tested half a dozen or so bullets from each batch and the results are interesting. The alloy used was lead rich with only 2% antimony to which I added about a 1/4 cup of chilled shot to be sure the alloy contained a trace of arsenic. This alloy air cooled will test between 8.5 to 9 BHN. In this test the water quenched bullets repeatedly tested BHN-14 while the bullets from the same pot of alloy quenched in Clays solution repeatedly tested BHN-22. That is a substantial gain in hardness of 8 BHN points by changing from tap water to Clays secret quench solution.
Call me silly but this to me is a very interesting development. There is still the need to do much more testing to see how this solution will effect different alloys with different percentages of constituent metals but this has me more than a little excited.
Its been going on to 20 or so years since I had a conversation with Bill Fergusson then known as THE ANTIMONY MAN. At that time China was playing the metals market and since nearly all the world supply of antimony comes from China the price had been going up dramatically. Bill told me with the antimony price situation it was likely a better idea to quench harden so I picked up that ball and ran with it.
Until now I thought I had quench hardening pretty much figured out. Now this previously unseen door has been kicked wide open and about it I am feeling much like a thorough bread race horse chomping at the bit anxious to blast through the gate. One thing for sure what ever I learn I will be sharing right here on this forum so if anyone reading of this new development in lead alloy quench hardening be patient with me and as I learn so will I share.
While there chatting with Clay we talked in length about how there were many similarities to our heat treating procedures mine with lead alloys and his with steel alloys. Clay confided in me that he had a secret quenching formula that had the effect of adding toughness to steel without making it too hard that it becomes brittle. He offered to mix a batch of his secret formula for me to try with heat treating lead alloy bullets just to satisfy a curiosity that we both had.
Next day after his yard sale he showed up at my house with all the remaining reloading supplies and made a gift of them to me, bless his heart ! He also brought a bucket of his secret quench formula for me to try. The next day I was working on an order and had plenty of alloy in the pot to run extra so I quenched the order as normal in water plus some extra to test for hardness then switched to Clays solution and ran another 100 + from the same pot quenched in his formula.
Today about 50 or so hours after the quench I tested half a dozen or so bullets from each batch and the results are interesting. The alloy used was lead rich with only 2% antimony to which I added about a 1/4 cup of chilled shot to be sure the alloy contained a trace of arsenic. This alloy air cooled will test between 8.5 to 9 BHN. In this test the water quenched bullets repeatedly tested BHN-14 while the bullets from the same pot of alloy quenched in Clays solution repeatedly tested BHN-22. That is a substantial gain in hardness of 8 BHN points by changing from tap water to Clays secret quench solution.
Call me silly but this to me is a very interesting development. There is still the need to do much more testing to see how this solution will effect different alloys with different percentages of constituent metals but this has me more than a little excited.
Its been going on to 20 or so years since I had a conversation with Bill Fergusson then known as THE ANTIMONY MAN. At that time China was playing the metals market and since nearly all the world supply of antimony comes from China the price had been going up dramatically. Bill told me with the antimony price situation it was likely a better idea to quench harden so I picked up that ball and ran with it.
Until now I thought I had quench hardening pretty much figured out. Now this previously unseen door has been kicked wide open and about it I am feeling much like a thorough bread race horse chomping at the bit anxious to blast through the gate. One thing for sure what ever I learn I will be sharing right here on this forum so if anyone reading of this new development in lead alloy quench hardening be patient with me and as I learn so will I share.
