Doug;
I guess I just don't "Treat" the "Heat Treatment" of structural parts of a gun quite as casually as many do. I certainly have not "Claimed" to have all the answers. I personally do not consider "Myself" qualified enough to attempt to re-color harden a gun frame of my own. Questions I have raised are simply things I would like to know answers to prior to allowing anyone to do one of mine. I thought perhaps You had some of these answers, definitely appears I was Wrong Big Time on that.
Machinery's Handbook recommends a higher temp for for hardening than many today are using for color hardening, so again I ask;
What affect does this have on the hardening of the case?? I assume you do understand that when the part is carburized via heating in the carbon atmosphere to a temp above its critical temp, the deeper into the metal you go the lower the % of carbon added is. Charts are readily available, Done by Metalurgists which state the critical temp for carbon steels of varying carbon content, this is nothing I did or imagined. So I ask again "IF" you have carburized a part to a total depth of .010" & you subsequently heat & quench from a temp that has only reached the critical temp of the first .002" of that carburized depth, what portion of it will be hardened? Also what affect does this have on the integrity of the part.
My own personal knowledge is simply not enough to answer all this, So I "ASK" & then all I get for my troubles is a Personal Attack for asking. I guess essentially that tells me what I need to know, "You Don't Have a Clue" or you would have answered rather than attack the asker.
