I have made a handful of high carbon steel knives and heat-treated them in a propane forge per online tutorials. They are demonstrably harder after the heat-treat, but how hard exactly?
So today I treated myself to some hardness testing files and scoured YT for best practice in their usage. The clip below looks to be on the money. If any knife makers out there have more wisdom, please chime in.
The slender wooden handled knife in this image is 1080, theother two are 1095.
As near as possible, all were heated to about 815°C before vertical quench in room temp rye oil. The two wooden handle knives sit somewhere between 55Hrc and 60Hrc, whereas the box cutter is above 60Hrc 
. Since the forge temp was about same, the difference must have been in the tempering. All blades have been tempered for one hour at 200°C. IIRC, the box cutter was not tempered immediately. I did that a day later. Which is not the recommended method. Perhaps the delay played a part?
Corroboration that the files are up to spec and that I am using them correctly was verified by testing a Sauer knife with a declared 60Hrc. The files agree that that knife sits between 60Hrc and 65Hrc
So today I treated myself to some hardness testing files and scoured YT for best practice in their usage. The clip below looks to be on the money. If any knife makers out there have more wisdom, please chime in.
The slender wooden handled knife in this image is 1080, theother two are 1095.
As near as possible, all were heated to about 815°C before vertical quench in room temp rye oil. The two wooden handle knives sit somewhere between 55Hrc and 60Hrc, whereas the box cutter is above 60Hrc . Since the forge temp was about same, the difference must have been in the tempering. All blades have been tempered for one hour at 200°C. IIRC, the box cutter was not tempered immediately. I did that a day later. Which is not the recommended method. Perhaps the delay played a part?Corroboration that the files are up to spec and that I am using them correctly was verified by testing a Sauer knife with a declared 60Hrc. The files agree that that knife sits between 60Hrc and 65Hrc
