Rant: My grandpa's old file taught me more about heat treating than any YouTube video ever did

Last month I was at my uncle's farm outside of Topeka going through my grandpa's old tool chest. Found this beat up Nicholson file he must have used for 40 years. The thing was dull as a brick but the tang had this weird rainbow discoloration on it. I got curious and asked my uncle about it and he said grandpa used to heat up his homemade knife blanks in the wood stove and quench them in a bucket of his own used motor oil. No temperature control, no fancy kiln, just a guess and a prayer. I took that old file home and tried to cut it with a new file I bought last week. The new one just skated right off the surface like glass. So grandpa's trash can heat treat was actually harder than whatever factory process this new file went through. It really made me stop and think about all the hype around controlled soak times and cryo treatments. Has anyone else found something from the old days that just works better than what they tell you to buy now?

2 comments

2 Comments

kai5647d ago

That "guess and a prayer" line really hits home. My dad used to heat up old lawnmower blades in a grill and quench them in a bucket of water he'd been using to wash his truck. The blades turned out brittle as heck but they'd slice through a cardboard box like butter. Meanwhile I spent $200 on a fancy kiln and my first batch of knives came out looking like a melted crayon. Makes you wonder if all this expensive gear is just for people who can't trust their own gut. Guess grandpa's secret was being too stubborn to know he was supposed to fail.

jakeperry6d ago

Man I've got a $600 Evenheat sitting in my shop right now and my best blade so far this year was a file I forged in my fire pit and quenched in a rusty old brake rotor I filled with canola oil I stole from the kitchen. Something about grandpa's method just clicks. Maybe it's the fact that he didn't overthink it, he just did it and called it good enough. We've gotten so caught up in perfect temperatures and digital readouts that we forgot old man stubbornness is its own kind of science. I bet my grandpa would look at my failed $200 batch and just laugh while he shaved hair off his arm with a leaf spring he found in a ditch.