Old timer said to quench in water at dusk, I laughed at him for 2 years

Met this retired smith at a hammer-in over in Lancaster, PA. He watched me pull a leaf spring blade out of the oil and said the oil is for beginners, water at dusk is how you get the real edge. I brushed him off, figured he was stuck in the 1800s. Last month I tried his method on some 1095 scrap, heating to nonmagnetic and dropping it in a bucket of well water right as the sun went down. Cracked two blades in a row, but the third one came out with a hardness I never got from oil, even after 3 temper cycles. Now I'm wondering if the trick is actually the water temp dropping as the air cools, or if I just got lucky. Anyone else play with water quenches on simple carbon steel, or is this mostly a disaster waiting to happen?

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karen_martin1mo ago

Man, I feel for you on those two cracked blades. Water is unforgiving like that and there is no shame in losing a couple while you figure out the timing. The dusk thing might not be magic, could just be that the air is cooler and your water bucket sits at a lower temp than it would at noon. I have messed with warm water on 1084 and got a nice hard edge, but I had to move fast from the fire to the quench or she would ping on me. Losing a blade hurts, but that third one sounds like it taught you more than two years of oil ever did.

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