• Friends, our 2nd Amendment rights are always under attack and the NRA has been a constant for decades in helping fight that fight.

    We have partnered with the NRA to offer you a discount on membership and Muzzleloading Forum gets a small percentage too of each membership, so you are supporting both the NRA and us.

    Use this link to sign up please; https://membership.nra.org/recruiters/join/XR045103

Rehardening my frizzen

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
There’s more than one way to harden a frizzen, I generally just hit with a propane torch and dip it in Track’s Surface Hardening Compound, their instructions says to quench in water, I’ve tried both water and oil, the water works better with a propane torch, oil works better with an acetylene torch. Getting the frizzen too hot (where it is non magnetic, 1800-2000 F, bright orange to yellow glow) could cause cracks. Propane torches tend to only get steel up to 1300-1500 hot.
That will add a thin case less than 0.002” deep. It works, but not for long.
 
Some times frizzes that have been softened )like for engraving) can have the carbon driven out of the top layer. When that happens I take the face to a drum sander and try to get down through it
 
Check and see how a file cuts the face. If truly as hard as it should be, a file should just barely scratch it, if not at all. If the file easily cuts it, it needs to be re-hardened. If it is original as you believe, it may have been forged of soft or wrought iron, and pack hardened ( deeply case hardened), and the case is worn through.
 
FlinterNick said:
"There’s more than one way to harden a frizzen, I generally just hit with a propane torch and dip it in Track’s Surface Hardening Compound, their instructions says to quench in water, I’ve tried both water and oil, the water works better with a propane torch, oil works better with an acetylene torch. Getting the frizzen too hot (where it is non magnetic, 1800-2000 F, bright orange to yellow glow) could cause cracks. Propane torches tend to only get steel up to 1300-1500 hot."
Click to expand...
What Rich said is correct. The hardening will be shallow, and need to be re-done often. FYI, non-magnetic is a consistent 1414°f. If your steel is cracking when you quench at at non-magnetic, it is not the heat causing it. It would be the type of quenchant.
 
FlinterNick said:
"There’s more than one way to harden a frizzen, I generally just hit with a propane torch and dip it in Track’s Surface Hardening Compound, their instructions says to quench in water, I’ve tried both water and oil, the water works better with a propane torch, oil works better with an acetylene torch. Getting the frizzen too hot (where it is non magnetic, 1800-2000 F, bright orange to yellow glow) could cause cracks. Propane torches tend to only get steel up to 1300-1500 hot."
Click to expand...
What Rich said is correct. The hardening will be shallow, and need to be re-done often. FYI, non-magnetic is a consistent 1414°f. If your steel is cracking when you quench at at non-magnetic, it is not the heat causing it. It would be the type of quenchant.

I was tempted to try a pack hardening method with bone charcoal. Saw a guy do it on YouTube. I just bought an oven with a burnout vent.
 
I have just learned a lot from this four year old post. Shows to go you that one can learn from old discussions.

Since this discuss, I’ve since changed up my methods.

I pack harden my frizzens in steel with a mixture of compound and charcoal from Peach Pitts, peach Pitts are high in natural cyanide. Temp at 1600, and then I draw back at 400 for 45 min.

I quench the pack in room temperature water.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top