doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Color Case Hardening - 2

I live in cattle country, and have a few horses. I have tried hooves, raw bone, leather, etc; they will all work, …. Just some thoughts:
One of the issues with using raw products is the fats, oils and waxes that can cause havoc during CCH.
Hooves have a lot of crap in them…literally. Also imbedded grit, sand stones etc.
Burning raw materials will smoke and stink to high heaven. A smell that you will not likely enjoy nor forget so do it outside, downwind.
As I stated earlier, I talked with quite a few folks with lots of ideas/opinions: leather, horn, use only pig bone, urine, peach pits, …eye of newt etc. I could go on and on. Bottom line is that they were either clueless or were leading me on a wild goose chase.
In my humble opinion, the material needs to be well charred to remove any of the fats, oils, waxes etc, at that point the material is charred enough, and it becomes charcoal, and is basic carbon.
Again, I’ve been doing this for about 10 years, the conclusion that I have come to is that, you can get acceptable repeatable results with just bone & wood charcoal by varying the bone to wood ratio, quench temp, blocking and quench water temp.

Hello Tony, nice background music!!

tunes

Mike, I've had pretty good luck with hoof material as a 'supplement', it does indeed stink because it is a natural carbon material....I didn't find the smell that radical though....(not like Auschwitz or anything).... I did clean it, saw it and place it properly against the outside walls of the crucible.....JMO.....

The leather and horn are old recipes like the hoof material, the other stuff you mention are all over the top I think.....

Best,

Mr.Hunter is correct about carbonising natural materials for CC Hardening.

Preparing hoof and horn parings, leather and bone for colour case hardening can really make you very unpopular with the neighbours. The stench can be abominable.

I have managed to get around this by packing the material into a short (6-8 inch long) length of steel pipe threaded both ends and fitted with cap ends, one of which has a 1/16" hole drilled in it's end. A Plumbers Supply Co, should have varying diametres of pipe nipples and cap ends readily available.

The loaded pipe(s) are put into a hot woodburning stove (or an old modified caravan sized gas bottle (usually available at the local dump) fitted with a door, a tall vent pipe and air holes near the base) a fire is kindled and permitted to get burning well. Soon the volatile gasses are being given off and pass out of the pipe(s) via the small hole. The flames ignite the gasses which burn freely. The stove pipe carries the burnt gasses mixed with those of the burnt wood into the atmosphere.

If you use a sweet scented wood like pine for the fire, no one knows there is anything untoward going on. When the fire has burnt out remove the pipe and let cool, or better, leave it in the stove until the following morning, then empty the pipes contents into whatever metal container you are using to store the carbonised material. If your using a none metalic storage container, make very sure the carbonised components are stone cold.

Use the largest diam. pipe you can get(that will fit easily into the stove). It's surprising how little carbon there is after the carbonising process is complete. The larger the pipe the more material you can process at any one time.

Harry.

Interesting chaps. Are you saying one should burn/heat the hoof material prior to putting it in with charcoal. These ideas are definately for my testing actions first off

T

Hello T.

The idea is to soak the parts you want to colour case harden in an rich Carbon Dioxide gas. Heating previously prepared carbonised items such as wood, bone, leather, horn and hoof material will provide such a carbon rich gas.

Using unprepared or none carbonised components in the crucible, will upon heating, produce a great many different gasses, some of these may be beneficial to the CC hardening process, BUT, some will not.

Perhaps it's best to go with the traditional methods of CC Hardening.

Having said that, as the Bard said, 'You pays your money and takes your chances'

If you want to experiment, by all means do so.

Harry

Interesting Harry. Will give this a try...live in the middle of nowhere with no neighbors so will just burn it:)