Kasenit Unavailability and Bob Roller

[flatsguide]

Below is a PDF on 8620 steel. It is the steel that Jim Chambers locks are made of. After reading this paper my thoughts are that using Ron Longs method of hardening the frizzen would work but quenching in oil instead of water, then tempering the whole frizzen at 300 degrees F. For one hour. 8620 still retains a very hard surface even after the tempering. It appears 8620 is a very tough and strong steel, and ideal for frizzens or any other parts that you wish to case harden for wear, color or both
I would appreciate hearing from Davec2 on this and his take on the paper.
Cheers Richard
http://files.engineering.com/download.aspx?folder=c3fece06-0ef1-4df1-954e-36a2fdab1670&file=Mechanical_Properties_and_Hardenability.pdf

[davec2]

Richard,

I think either Jim Chambers or Jim Kibler could provide better information about the use of 8620 steel for lock parts.  8620 has excellent properties and can be hardened in and of itself (without any additional "case" diffusion of carbon into the surface).  However, I have mentioned in other posts, that when attempting to re-harden frizzens that I had annealed to engrave (and that I believe some were cast out of 8620), I have never been successful following the instructions, as an example, provided by Jim Chambers.  I am not questioning their correctness, it's just that despite my best efforts they have never worked for me.  I have used every available option for heating.....torch, forge, electric furnace with carbon pack, etc.....but a quench in even the correct heat treating oil (as recommended) has never resulted in a frizzen hard enough to produce sparks.  The only way I have been able to get an annealed frizzen back in commission has been to torch heat to a bright red, apply Kasenit to the face, and then quench in brine.  I know that there is a risk of cracking the part with a quench that fast, but I have never broken one yet and it works every time.  Part of the problem may be that in following the recommended procedure I am somehow depleting the surface of the part of carbon and it takes the Kasenit treatment to restore it.  I'm not sure but would welcome any information about how to do this better.

As I said, Jim and Jim, are undoubtedly in a much better position to comment since they are in the business of making locks professionally and I have never had a lock from either that was not top notch.  Jim Kibler's frizzens are cast of 1095 steel.  Jim Chamber's may be of 8620.  Will see if either one can add a comment.

[Bob Roller]

The Chet Shoults locks had 8620 for all the parts and I have made a lot of them and  Kasenit
was used on all the frizzens.I made my own mechanisms from 1144-01 and 1075 and about a year
ago I reconditioned a frizzen on a lock that was obviously used hard.
Later and for reasons I forget I had enough parts made for 100 Nock style locks and had the frizzens cast
from 52-100 which is a ball and roller bearing material.I examined Helmut Mohr's personal target pistol
about 3 years ago and it had been shot for 40 years in European competition and the frizzen was still in
good shape.I used Kasenit on all of these and quenched in oil and so far after all these years no problems reported
Bill Cox at L&R told me he started using 52-100 and wished he had done it sooner.I am no longer making locks
of any kind and care not about who uses what and can only tell what I know from long experience.
Bob Roller

[flatsguide]

Dave, Jim Chambers told me directly that his parts are cast from 8620. Did you anneal then harden both Jim’s frizzens? Doing some homework on the two steels mentioned, what follows are just thoughts...As you say brine quenching is pretty severe. I think that quenching a 1095 steel part in a 10%. Solution brine at room temp would produce a very hard steel by itself without the need for Kasenit, the downside would be its prone to crack in a brine quench because of its high carbon content, additionally all parts except the frizzen proper would need to be drawn back to prevent cracking and failure in use.  On the other hand 8620 would need the addition of carbon, ( as it does not have as much carbon as 1095...i.e. ..20 to ..95)  to reach the hardness needed for a frizzen. Quenching in brine like Dave mentioned may work very well as it is a tough steel and the core is not as hard as the surface. It may be for 8620 you might not need to draw any part of the frizzen back because of the relatively soft core and no addition of Kasenit to other than the face of the frizzen
.

[jerrywh]

8620 will not harden sufficiently for use as a frizzen  It only contains .18% carbon and is basically the same as 1018 mild steel with the addition of other additives. it also contains chrome which is not good for producing sparks.  see -     https://www.suppliersonline.com/propertypages/8620.asp#Spec
it is an excellent steel for case hardening. and is used for many of the parts in reproduction sharps rifles.
  I don't think chambers uses it for frizzens.

[David R. Pennington]

 I have a local chemical supply company that likely has the potassium forro cyanide.  I will have to check. Thats where I get my “aqua fortis”. You have to show them a business license to purchase. I was too dense the first time to understand what the salesman was trying to do to help me on price. He kept asking if I was going to transport my purchase in a motor vehicle. I said of course. Then I have to package it for hazardous material he said. The cost of the packaging was more than the chemicals.

[flatsguide]

Jerry, you missed this sentence written earlier. “...Jim Chambers told me directly that his parts are cast from 8620. ”
Richard

[jerrywh]

Jerry, you missed this sentence written earlier. “...Jim Chambers told me directly that his parts are cast from 8620. ”
Richard

   That may be for some parts but not all. For example [the springs] also maybe the frizzens. I have mad a hindred or so locks cast out of mild steel but the springs and the frizzens were 1095.  It doesn't make sense to have frizzens cast from 8620 when they need to be hardened.  Not saying your wrong just saying maybe not all.

[flatsguide]

Jerry, wouldn’t any frizzen need to be hardened no matter what alloy it was made from? Or am I missing something?
Cheers Richard

[44-henry]

Last I heard Chambers was using 1095 for their frizzens.

[Bob Roller]

Jerry, you missed this sentence written earlier. “...Jim Chambers told me directly that his parts are cast from 8620. ”
Richard

   That may be for some parts but not all. For example [the springs] also maybe the frizzens. I have mad a hindred or so locks cast out of mild steel but the springs and the frizzens were 1095.  It doesn't make sense to have frizzens cast from 8620 when they need to be hardened.  Not saying your wrong just saying maybe not all.

In the late 1950's when cast steel parts started to become available there was little or
no discussion of alloys or anything else.A flintlock wasn't popular then and a number of
muzzle loaders were made from whatever parts as might be found.Old locks,some new
old stock.One of the first flintlocks was the Shoults** made in Lapeer Michigan and it used
investment cast parts for everything except the screws and the alloy was advertised as 8620.
After Chet Shoults lost control of the moulds in 1962 I made a number of these and case hardened
the frizzens,Some of these locks are still in service and I reconditioned one recently by light
grinding with a 5" wheel and then recase hardening it.The rest of the lock was still OK but
those parts were my own shop made ones and not castings.
As earlier stated the locks I made for Helmut Mohr in Germany were 52-100 and they seem to
be still working and the only one I repaced was from a pistol that was accidently dropped on
a concrete floor and landed upside down and it broke.I looked at Helmut;s personal pistol and
after 40 years it was still working well.
**Chet's lock was a Ketland without the double throated cock.I don't know about parts now
because Jerry Devaudreuil ownd the dies for this lock and other items we used for so long.
It appears that he is now in an adult dementia situation and I have no idea as to the final
fate and outcome of these dies.If anyone has any info please let all of us know.
Bob Roller

[okawbow]

I am glad this thread came up. I have a mostly full gallon can of Kasenit in my garage. I just went out to look at it, and the can was rotted away from the inside!
I was able to transfer the compound to a plastic container. Hope it still works ok. Last time I used it it worked great.

[jerrywh]

Jerry, wouldn’t any frizzen need to be hardened no matter what alloy it was made from? Or am I missing something?
Cheers Richard

  Yes, Any frizzen must be hardened to work properly and it must also contain a sufficient amount of carbon. It is the carbon in the steel that burns to make the sparks. Carbon is the fuel.  That is why I always pack harden my frizzens even if they were made from 1095. A little extra carbon helps to promote sparks.  At least that is my theory.  A few years back one maker of locks cast their frizzens out of 6150. That is a medium carbon chrome steel. They didn't harden very well and did not spark very well no matter what you did to them. 8620 has chrome in it as well.   The producers of 8620 say it will harden but how much is the question. It doesn't have sufficient carbon to harden. How it hardens is a mystery to me. A lot of materials are hard but will not spark. I think it must be case hardened first.

[flatsguide]

Jerry,
I received an email from Jim Chambers, but before I posted it I cleared it with Jim. In reply to my question about frizzens he wrote this initially,“We make the steel parts out of 8620 steel.  It will color case harden just fine.  I don't know what alloy they use for breech plugs.  I would guess it is the same as the barrel - 12L14.”
When I asked him if he minded me posting it he clarified with,
“Richard,
If they are talking about lock parts we use several different steels.  Non-hardening parts like plates, cocks, pans, etc. are 8620.  Springs are 6150, frizzens 1095, tumblers, sears, flys are 01.  Hope this helps.  Feel free to pass this on.
Jim”
I see some crows I need to shoot for supper!
Cheers Richard

[davec2]

Ok....the orders came in and i am ready to start the experiment I mentioned at the beginning of this thread.  Here is the Brownells case hardening material and the sodium ferrocyanide.....



And here is the standard, Kasenit:



Here are two other types that I have collected along the way, Herter's Case Hardener and a 1991 Brownells version called "Hard-N-Tough"





Here is what each looks like....notice that the current stuff from Brownells and the old Kasenit look similar.  The Herters is all white and the old Brownells Hard-N-Tough is a dark green....?





At any rate, I will work on this and report back results as soon as I am able.  It will be about 107 here in So Cal today, so I may not even need a torch to do this...

[Bob Roller]

I now have most of the Kasenit that Okawbow had and it looks good and it
will be tested this week.This is a big help to me and I am thankful for this
man and his willingness to sell this material.

Bob Roller

[Daryl]

At any rate, I will work on this and report back results as soon as I am able.  It will be about 107 here in So Cal today, so I may not even need a torch to do this...

Understandable, Dave. It almost got up to about 18 here today - that's 64F, but it's raining - again.

[davec2]

Working on some of the chemistry issues.  As noted previously, I don't have much in the way of chemical analysis capability but I did take a 2.0 gram sample of Kasenit and dissolve it in water and then filtered out anything that wasn't water soluble. 



Everything in it dissolved except this......0.145 grams of what looks to be carbon powder.  Makes sense.  So, carbon = ~7.2%, MSDS says the sodium ferrocyanide is ~ 47%, that covers ~54% of the total.  Will try to sort out what the other 46% is...

[JCKelly]

Do not mix Kasenit in with Brownells or Cherry Red. The couple percent potassium nitrate in Brownells/Cherry Red will react with the charcoal (all that black stuff) in Kasenit to make carbon dioxide & carbon monoxide. Whatever else might be in these two “hardening compounds Lord only knows. Betcha they’re not so compatible with sodium ferrocyanide.
One MUST get carbon into the surface of the hot steel in order to “case-harden” it. Complete waste to burn up all that carbon.
The Kasenit Material Safety Data Sheet says it is 46% Sodium ferrocyanide. A.k.a. yellow Prussiate of Soda; Na4Fe(CN)6 . Don’t worry about the “decahydrate” part, that just means that ten molecules of water are kinda bound to the ferroyanide.
I did once make up my own “Kasenit”, using about half sodium ferrocyanide mixed with some manner of real charcoal. Not charcoal briquettes, they contain pitch coke, i.e., sulfur. I probably added a pinch or so of salt just to clean up the steel (at red heat, mind you).  This is not for color case hardening, that is another subject.
As the metallurgist at a specialty metals (high temperature stuff) supplier, I got to spend some time with the guys at Nicholson File, in Ancient Times when they actually made their own files in the U.S.A. Until recent decades when our EPA became overly concerned, Nicholson’s practice was to coat high carbon steel files with a mixture roughly similar to Kasenite before hardening from a protective molten lead bath. They called it “cyanide loaf”. It was potassium ferrocyanide, K4Fe(CN)6, mixed with flour and bone black, and all are boiled together in salt water.
 On a positive note in this election year. Our Gov’t allows “yellow prussiate of soda” to be used as an anti-caking agent in that nice, healthy sea-salt Mom picks up from the grocery store. However, Nicholson File was forbidden to use it in file making because it is dangerous.

I just wonder how many of you ever sprinkled Kasenit on your baked potato?

Anyway, in my personal experience, this sort of Wisdom from Our Gov’t is common to both parties. Whichever Fine Man wins in Nov, we’ll all get to put up with the same level of competence out of DC.

I learned chemistry in my early teens, trying to make black gunpowder using my new chemistry set. Thanks, Mom & Dad. Ended up getting the ingredients at the drug store. In those Bad Old Days one could get drug store stuff to blow one’s hand clear off.
Black powder goes BOOM basically because it contains 75% potassium nitrate (a.k.a. salt peter, KNO3) which turns the charcoal into hot gas, carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide. Hot gas takes up a lot more space than does cold gas, which = BOOM  I learned more in college, and more through a few decades as a metallurgist, working in nasty high temperature (loved it) environments.

Get thee some sodium ferrocyanide decahydrate, and real wood charcoal, or bone charcoal if you prefer, and go to it. I still think a pinch of salt does a more thorough job. It will not be pretty and colored, though. Just hard.

[davec2]

JCKelly,

Thanks for the post.  Yes "hard" is all I'm after in this particular case.  I think the sodium or potassium ferrocyanide will do the job alone (as JerryWH does) with the required carbon and nitrogen coming from the included C-N triple bond.  And in keeping with your thought about salt in the mix, I know that some of the other case hardening compounds include ammonium chloride rather than sodium chloride.  Will keep you posted.....

[JCKelly]

davec2 - I'd still add the charcoal, as in Kasenit and "Cyanide Loaf"

You will want carbon in the steel.

Nitrogen is good to resist sliding wear, at the expense of ductility.

I would say that carbon is definitely preferred for a frizzen. Frizzen steel needs to be reasonably hard, but also ductile enough for the flint to shave off a little curly ribbon - "frizzle" of steel.

You really want to reinvent the process?

[Stophel]

I have never been successful following the instructions, as an example, provided by Jim Chambers.  I am not questioning their correctness, it's just that despite my best efforts they have never worked for me.  I have used every available option for heating.....torch, forge, electric furnace with carbon pack, etc.....but a quench in even the correct heat treating oil (as recommended) has never resulted in a frizzen hard enough to produce sparks.  The only way I have been able to get an annealed frizzen back in commission has been to torch heat to a bright red, apply Kasenit to the face, and then quench in brine.  I know that there is a risk of cracking the part with a quench that fast, but I have never broken one yet and it works every time.

I have never been able to get anything sufficiently hard with any kind of oil quench either.

Kasenit, globbed on heavy, held at heat for as long as I can stand it, quench in dirty shop water.  POP!   And pull out a nicely hardened frizzen.  No cracks.  No problems.  And no nasty oily goo to have to clean off of it.  Draw down the temper and it's good to go.

[davec2]

I finally felt well enough to try a few experiments with case hardening compounds.  This is not all that scientific, but represents the way I usually harden the heads of lock bolts, top jaw screws, butt plate screw heads, etc.  I started off with a few 16 penny common nails.



I heated each nail head in a propane torch flame until it was bright red





I then dipped the nail head once in each hardening compound followed by a short re-heat and a second dip.  Once the nail head was thickly coated with the compound, I heated the head continuously for exactly one minute (on a timer).



After a full 60 seconds of heating, I quenched the head in room temperature salt water.  After a quick run against a wire wheel, all the nail heads came out looking like this....







Results:  After hardening the heads on all 5 nails, I did a quick clean up on the wire wheels and then a quick file test on the edge of the head.  I started with an unhardened nail and, as you would expect, the file bit easily.  The hardened nails responded as follows

#1.  Kasenit:  As the compound is heated it melts and forms a viscus, molten ball of compound around the nail head.  After the quench, the head is glass hard and a file skips off the surface leaving no mark.

#2.  Brownells Hardening Compound:  As the compound is heated it melts and forms a very runny thin layer of compound around the nail head.  After the quench, the head is harder than it was before hardening but a file can still cut into the surface.  It might get harder if you kept coating and heating, but it certainly did not harden the nail like the Kasenit did.

#3.  A 50/50 mix of brownells and Sodium Ferrocyanide:  As the compound is heated, it melts but forms globs that will drip off the part.  After the brine quench, again, it was harder than the unhardened nail, and perhaps slightly harder than the Brownells alone, but the file bit easily and it was not as hard as the Kasenit nail.

#4.  Sodium Ferrocyanide alone:  As the ferrocyanide is heated it behaved differently than the others.  It charred rather than melted but did form a complete, bulky coating on the nail head as it was being heated.  After being quenched in the brine, it was every bit as hard as the Kasenit nail.  The file test skipped over the surface without leaving a mark.

#5.  Sodium Ferrocyanide + table salt, 50/50:  I tried this just to see if the salt would allow the compound to melt more than the ferrocyanide alone.  It did, but after the quench, the head of the nail was very hard in some spots and softer in others.

Conclusion:  In the absence of being able to purchase the old Kasenit, sodium ferrocyanide seems to be a perfectly acceptable substitute.  JerryWH reports that he uses potassium ferrocyanide with good success as well.  I will push this a little further as I get a chance, as I would like to replicate the old Kasenit exactly, but the sodium ferrocyanide works great....and you can buy it from almost any chemical supplier.

[Curtis]

Great test!  Thanks for sharing the results, looking forward to any new tests you perform.


Curtis

[jerrywh]

https://www.911metallurgist.com/blog/ferrocyanides-usage-applications#case-hardening-and-heat-treating
This stuff has been used fro at least 150 years.