frizzen hardening

i saw on another post that one could harden their own frizzen with a torch. is this true, and how would you go about it? also, how do you know if it is too soft, it just stops sparking?

Kasenite will harden the surface of your frizzen.
Track of the Wolf, and Dixie Gun Works sells it.
One small package will harden many pieces, and it is quite inexpensive, and very easy to apply with a torch.
I hope this helps.

Best Regards

Old Ford

I posted a query about this a few months ago, here are the threads:
[url] http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/198937/[/url]
and[url] http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/199192/[/url]

Also, if you use the search function, you can find a few more threads.

I would suggest you use two propane torches at once, works better.

armymedic.2 said:

i saw on another post that one could harden their own frizzen with a torch. is this true, and how would you go about it? also, how do you know if it is too soft, it just stops sparking?

Click to expand...

First things first. Are you getting sparks? What do the sparks look like?
Are they red, or white?

How is ignition? Does the priming ignite quickly, or is there a noticable delay?

If ignition of the priming is fast, I wouldn't worry about the hardness of the frizzen...at this point.

That said, Petersoli frizzens are known to wear through the case hardening relatively quickly.

The second question is, what equipment do you have?

Heating a frizzen hot enough to harden won't happen with a single propane torch. Some folks report good results by using two torches, but IMHO, there are much better ways to deal with case hardening than trying to manipulate two small torches, the part, and the quench medium.
J.D.

How do you know if your frizzen is soft? Take a file and push the file across the face of the frizzen and see if the file will cut the face, if it catches and you can feel it cut, it's soft and needs to be hardened and properly tempered. If it skids off like its on a piece of glass, then its hard. Too hard is not good either for producing sparks. The flint actually has to scrape tiny pieces of metal off the face of the frizzen to make sparks. Heating to a non-magnetic phase( roughly 1580 deg. f) then quickly quench in transmission fluid slowly swirling it around for 30 sec. or so. Then tempering it to 375 deg.f. in an oven for about 1 hour. If you're not getting sparks, I know this is basic, but is the flint sharp? Also did this lock spark well previously? If it did, then if it doesn't now with a new sharp flint I would address the frizzen hardness issue. ...Geo.

luckily i get flash in the pan every time i pull the trigger right now, and my flints are sharp. my sparks are an amber color though, not white, so i was wondering if i was nearing softness. good advice, and i like that i can harden it mysself, great info guys thanks. I will harden it as soon as it stops giving me pfffsssttt's! :grin:

George F. said:

Heating to a non-magnetic phase( roughly 1580 deg. f) then quickly quench in transmission fluid slowly swirling it around for 30 sec. or so. Then tempering it to 375 deg.f. in an oven for about 1 hour.

Click to expand...

That works well if a frizzen is made of high carbon steel. However, in my experience, Petersoli frizzens are case hardened, mild steel.

Case hardening is a different process. Still pretty straight forward, but different.

armymedic.2 ,

I assume that you live on a military base, so you probably do not have a lot of equipment available to you.

Let me know what equipment is available to you so's I can describe the case hardening process according to equipment availability.

Equipment can be as simple as a BBQ grill, lump charcoal, a bean can, and a can of water, to an acetylene torch, case hardening compound and a can of water.
J.D.

actually i live on a farm, so i have a bunch of toys, but most likel;y i would want to use propane torches, plenty of can and buckets, turkey friers bbq's, all that stuff is readily available. i do not have a welder or cutter torch however. other than that i should be able to snag what i need. thanks

OK, here you go.
Using two propane torches, or a mapp gas torch, hold the frizzen by the tail of the frizzen. Heat to a bright red color, from the back, striking face up, and dip the th face into the Kasnit. Reheat for 20 minutes or so, sprinkling on more Kasnite as it bubbles off. Use an old spoon, or something with a long handle to sprinkle the Kasnit.

Check the temp of the frizzen with a magnet held in tongs. When the magnet refuses to stick to the metal, drop into a bucket of room temp water. Room temp water is cool to the touch, Not cold, but cool. 70-80 degrees.

Immediately clean off the scale with an old file. Th frizzen will be glass hard. Repeat the process using more heat if the file cuts into the frizzen.

Place the clean frizzen into the kitchen oven at 350-400 degrees for an hour. Let it cool in the oven.

Remove the frizzen and run the flame of the torch over the tail until it turns blue. let the color run to the pan cover and the screw hole. Keep the flame on the tail of the frizzen and let the color run on its own. Heat the tail slowly so it doesn't overheat. It should not turn red.

Let the color run to the base of the face of the frizzen and quench in cool water to stop the heat from traveling to the face of the frizzen.

Case hardening with Kasnit puts a .010 thick case on the part. The problem is, a .010 thick case is pretty thin and will wear through in several months of hard use.

For a thick case that will wear much longer. Use a bean can or small metal box large enough to hold the part with about an inch of charcoal all around it.

Build a hot fire in a shady place in the yard, or in a BBQ grill. A wood fire works great. Get a good hot fire going and let it burn down to coals.

While the fire is burning down. Break up enough lump charcoal into about 1/2 dimaeter lumps. The size isn't important other than there be no gaps to trap air. The gaps can be filled with finer charcoal.

Charcoal briquettes won't work for hardening the frizzen, or for the fire. Briquettes contain too many contaminanents to work for hardening. The binders also restrict the amount of heat they will produce. So's ya gotta use real lump charcoal.

Fill the can about 1/3, or so full of charcoal and insert the frizzen into the middle. Cover the frizzen with charcoal. Don't let the frizzen touch the sides of the can.

Place a metal lid on the can. The lid doesn't have to fit tight. It can just sit on top, but don't let it fall off. Using tongs, place the can in the fire and use some of that lump charcoal to build up the fire. Keep a hot fire going all around and on top the can for at least an hour. Longer is better.

The fire needs a natural draft, so it wouldn't hurt to build the fire over a coupla firebricks or flat rocks. Set the can on the rocks.

The can needs to remain RED hot for at least an hour.

When you think the proper time has passed, pick the can out of the fire using tongs and dump the contents into a bucket of room temp water.

Do this outside, away from any flamable buildings. Hot coals, sparks, hot water and steam, and no telling what else will erupt from the can and water bucket. Wear old clothes, a hat, and DO NOT stand over the water bucket when you turn that can upside down.


When the frizzen has cooled, clean off any scale and place it in the kitchen oven at 350-400 degrees for an hour.

Using a torch, heat the tail as explained earlier.

Though "pack hardening" is more time consuming, it will yield a deeper case hardening that will last for years.

J.D.

J.D., got a question. How do you tell what steel a manufacture used? Meaning high carbon steel or mild steel.

Regards,

Steve

what is the purpose of heating the tail after you have already tempered it in the oven?

armymedic.2 said:

what is the purpose of heating the tail after you have already tempered it in the oven?

Click to expand...

The tail and the screw hole take a LOT of abuse, so they need to be a little softer to prevent breakage.

Since the area around the screw hole is relatively thin, it may absorb carbon to the full depth of the steel, so the area around that screw MAY, or may not, become 1095 steel to full depth. Most breakage on frizzens seems to occur around the screw, so that area needs to be a little softer.

Steve,
Sometimes one needs to work from experience. And in my experience, frizzens made by Petersoli are of mild steel.

Frizzens on quality American made locks are made of 1095, high carbon steel, as reported by the manufacturers.

The tempering of the tail and area around the screw is even more important on a frizzen made of 1095, than one made of case hardened mild steel.

Determining what steel Frizzens are made of on foreign made locks is a manure shoot. One never really knows what he may be working with, though most appear to be made of low or medium carbon steels.

The best way for someone with no access to a lab to get an idea of the carbon content of a part is the spark test. Hit the part on a grinder and look at the sparks. Dull red sparks indicate a low carbon steel. Amber or white sparks, especially those that sparkle on the end indicate high carbon steel.

Generally speaking, the whiter the spark, and the more intense the sparkles, the higher the carbon content.

When in doubt, harden and temper as if you have a part made of high carbon steel.

If the frizzen is still too soft after the "normal" heat treating, case harden.

J.D.

In thinking about my last post, I realized that I didn't expain things all that well.

Even after tempering, the face of the frizzen will be so hard that a dull file will not cut it.

Hard equates to brittle. If the tail and the area round the screw hole is left as hard and brittle as the face of the frizzen, they would break in a short time, due to the thinner profiles of those areas and the great stress placed on them.

One more thought. Since carbon is burned out of the surface of parts cast of high carbon steel, frizzens made of 1095 can benefit from a light case hardening followed by a quench in transmission fluid and tempering as mentioned above.

One of the reasons I like Chambers locks so much is that Chambers replaces the surface carbon lost in casting. IMHO, His locks spark better out of the box than other brands do after tuning and re hardening.
J.D.

awesome explanatin JD, thanks. i fully understand the concept now. all i gotta do now is try it out soon as squerril season is over and i can deal without flinty for a moment. i took one shot this morning and downed a gray from 60 yards. there is just nothing like shooting black powder! nice and still today too, so the smoke cloud lingered as i watched him fall out of the tree. too much fun!

JD. Do you know anything about case hardening with acetylene please.

justmike said:

JD. Do you know anything about case hardening with acetylene please.

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I assume that you mean using a reducing flame of an acetylene torch to carburize a part?

Though I have not tried using a reducing flame for case hardening, I have it on good authority that it works pretty well.

Chambers uses the reducing flame technique to replace the lost surface carbon on their frizzens.

The longer the part is heated in a carbon rich environment, the deeper the case hardening.

I suspect that the frizzen face of a part made of low carbon steel will need to be heated for at least 20 minutes to produce a case that will be deep enough for longevity. Like Kasnit, I suspect that the depth of case hardening on mild steel parts using this technique will not be all that deep.

Its my understanding that applying more carbon to the surface of a high carbon steel frizzen will cause it to produce a shower of white hot sparks, and the use of a reducing flame is probably the best way to accomplish this.

I want to repeat, every lock made by Chambers, to include the Chambers Siler, is trated this way, so don't experiment on a Chambers lock. The learning curve is not all that steep, but it's easier to crack a frizzen made of high carbon steel than you might think.

The key to producing a good sparking frizzen without cracks is the use of a light quenching oil, as opposed to water, AND tempering as soon as possible. Any part made of high carbon steel with as many differnt dimentions and cross sections as a frizzen will crack like a spiderweb in short order if not tempered right away.

Try it. It may work out well for you.
J.D.

Thanks JD. Could you explain the term "reducing flame" please

A reducing flame is carbon rich. Once the torch is lit, adjust the valves on the handle until you see two cones within the flame. The short cone will be visible at the tip, a longer cone and then the large part of the flame.

You obviously want to adjust the torch for less O2 to get a reducing flame. There should not be any visible smoke, BTW.

Go to Winkpedia, or one of the other online encyclopedias and search for reducing, or carburizing flame. There should be a photo somewhere on the web.
J.D.

Thanks , tried Winkpedia and didnt come up with anything. I understand about setting the O2 and Acet to do normal welding, just not sure about what a carburizing flame looks like.

Try this page; [url] http://www.fortunecity.com/village/lind/247/weld_book/Ch11.htm[/url]

This page had a LOT of good information on gas welding, brazing and soldering. Put this one in you bookmarks.

scroll down to the drawings of the various flames just above this text;

(b) The carburizing flame has excess acetylene, the inner cone has a feathery edge extending beyond it. This white feather is called the acetylene feather. If the acetylene feather is twice as long as the inner cone it is known as a 2X flame, which is a way of expressing the amount of excess acetylene. The carburizing flame may add carbon to the weld metal.

(3) Reducing or carburizing flame.

(a) The reducing or carburizing flame is obtained when slightly less than one volume of oxygen is mixed with one volume of acetylene. This flame is obtained by first adjusting to neutral and then slowly opening the acetylene valve until an acetylene streamer or "feather" is at the end of the inner cone. The length of this excess
streamer indicates the degree of flame carburization. For most welding operations, this streamer should be no more than half the length of the inner cone.

(b) The reducing or carburizing flame can always be recognized by the presence of three distinct flame zones. There is a clearly defined bluish-white inner cone, white intermediate cone indicating the amount of excess acetylene, and a light blue outer flare envelope. This type of flare burns with a coarse rushing sound. It has a temperature of approximately 5700°F (3149°C) at the inner cone tips.

(c) When a strongly carburizing flame is used for welding, the metal boils and is not clear. The steel, which is absorbing carbon from the flame, gives off heat. This causes the metal to boil. When cold, the weld has the properties of high carbon steel, being brittle and subject to cracking.

(d) A slight feather flame of acetylene is sometimes used for back-hand welding. A carburizing flame is advantageous for welding high carbon steel and hard facing such nonferrous alloys as nickel and Monel. When used in silver solder and soft solder operations, only the intermediate and outer flame cones are used. They impart a low temperature soaking heat to the parts being soldered.