Chapter 500 Steel Dagger
Heat for the final time.
When Bifang took the steel bars out of the blast furnace, he was shaking all over.
Exhausted or excited?
Or is it both?
It’s hard to explain, but at the moment of harvest, all the suffering turns into the sweetest fruit, with all kinds of flavors in it.
The dazzling metal before my eyes can no be called iron, but steel!
Harder, stronger, sharper!!!
Taking a deep breath, Bifang relieved the dizziness caused by excessive fatigue. The familiar wooden handle was firmly grasped in his hand. The force started from one point, fell from high up, and hit the steel bar heavily.
No more black iron sheets fall off, and all impurities are reaching the limit of manual removal.
Under the pressure, the bright orange steel was squeezed and deformed little by little, becoming flat and long and narrow .
The prototype of the dagger has gradually appeared.
But steel is not as easy to forge as iron.
Whether in terms of hardness, toughness, or ultimate sharpness, steel is far superior to iron. The same is true in hammering. Bifang is very careful, fearing that if the hammer goes astray, he will have to start all over again.
There was not enough time for Bifang to do this. The sun was rising high, around nine o'clock. If he went out to eat and rest, the time left for forging might be less than six hours.
I really feel the tension of participating in the Broken Sword Competition.
"In order to make a usable dagger today, I am not going to sharpen the blade. Without a sharpening machine, I have to use a whetstone to sharpen the blade, and who knows how long it will take."
"So I plan to make a double-edged dagger. It doesn't need to be sharpened, but the tip can be used for stabbing, which is also practical. Besides, our steel is just the most common steel after all, and no one knows how strong it is. Without a sharp edge, the thickness can make up for the strength."
Sharpening the blade will inevitably cause the edge to become thinner. Bifang does not have much confidence in the strength of the blade he has made and is worried that it will easily cause cracks.
Heat, forge, heat, forge.
The sun rises in the east, moves to the south, and has a tendency to move to the west.
After eating the mushroom and rabbit soup, Bifang soaked his hands in a puddle for a while , regained some strength, and took out the red dagger.
Yes, a dagger.
After nearly six days of hard work, at noon on the last day, the prototype of the dagger finally appeared.
The slender iron handle was finally used to glue and wooden handle. The blade was more than 20 centimeters long and narrow, like a bayonet, but too thin, with a thick spine, and obviously not fully unfolded.
Bifang replaced the big hammer with a smaller one, which he could better control the force of, and started hammering it densely and evenly.
The dazzling fire made Bifang's face red. From early yesterday morning till now, the charcoal in the blast furnace has never stopped burning, adding a touch of frenzy to the sweltering rainforest.
【Swordsmith! 】
[When will LOL release a hero for Lao Fang, a wild hunter, a part-time swordsmith, preferably a jungler! ]
[I think it’s OK]
[I call this muscle the sexiest man, is that okay? ]
[I think so too]
[Ten thousand people petition! I will buy as many skins as possible! ]
The hard steel bar was stretched again, from being long and thin to being long and narrow, extending from the spine of the blade to both sides, and the top became sharper and sharper. Everyone had no doubt that this blow was enough to pierce the entire human body.
This is metal steel!
Wooden spears, bone spears, they are all weak compared to metal steel!
At three o'clock in the afternoon, the light was still good, and the dagger had changed again, now truly looking like a knife.
Bifang held the dagger upright and squatted down to check the lines on each side.
There is nothing exaggerated about the shape, just like any ordinary double-edged dagger, but this was made completely by hand with nothing!
Viewed from any side, the lines of Bifang have reached the limit of what can be achieved by handcrafts. The spine of the blade is straight and even, the blade that opens to both sides is even and smooth, and the tip of the blade is sharp and stylish. Anyone who sees it will have to praise it as a sharp blade.
[Damn, I haven't watched it for only two hours, and there has been a big change]
[It seems like it, woooooooo]
[Unlock Achievement: Hard Way]
[Unlock Achievement: Kirin Arm]
[Alas, the live broadcast will end in three hours. I don’t know how long I will have to wait next time.]
[It’s mid-June now, so it must be at least July, right? ]
Bifang clamped the steel dagger with wooden pliers and heated it for the final time. At the same time, he added a large amount of sand and soil under the furnace bridge. This step was so quick that the audience did not see it clearly. They just thought that Bifang stuffed a handful of strange ash in.
Next comes the final step.
Quenching.
This time Bifang removed the blower, otherwise the heating temperature would be too high.
"There are four basic processes for steel heat treatment: annealing, normalizing, quenching and tempering. These are also the 'four steps' in overall heat treatment. Quenching and tempering are closely related and are often used together. Neither of them can be missing."
"I won't go into detail about annealing and normalizing, as they won't be used in the following. The main ones are tempering and quenching. Perhaps more people have heard of quenching. Usually, you see the newly heated metal being put into water and smoking."
[Often seen on TV]
I have seen
[Engineering materials are tearful, this course is too difficult, iron-carbon phase diagram and alloy phase diagram]
[I don’t want to listen anymore, I’m going crazy]
"Hahaha, engineering materials are indeed difficult." Bifang himself had a headache studying them. Not everything he knew was given by the system. A lot of the knowledge was taught by Bifang himself.
"The heat treatment process of heating the metal, austenitizing it and then cooling it in an appropriate manner to obtain a martensite or bainite structure is called quenching. The most common methods are water cooling, oil cooling, and air cooling. Water cooling is what you just said, putting it in water and cooling it rapidly."
"We don't have that much oil, so the only options are water cooling and air cooling. Different cooling materials will have different properties."
"In order to reduce the brittleness of steel parts, the quenched steel parts are kept at an appropriate temperature above room temperature and below 710°C for a long time, and then cooled, which is called tempering."
Bifang opened the stove cover and carefully observed the color of the dagger.
"This is the last step in making the dagger. We must first heat the dagger until it turns red. Remember, it can only turn red, and never turn white, which is the orange-yellow stage. A white knife is very easy to deform and is too brittle. You can look up the steel heating color chart on the Internet for the specific temperature."
Seeing the right moment, he took the red-hot dagger out of the furnace, clamped it on the blade, and brought it to the basin of water. He did not stuff it in at full speed, but put the blade in. When the high temperature came into contact with the cold water, flames burst out instantly.
[Fuck, it can catch fire? ]
[Can water catch fire?]
[Water will decompose under high temperature to produce hydrogen and oxygen, which will then burn under high temperature. This is why sprinkling some water on a burning stove can actually help the fire.]
[What the hell are you talking about? Sprinkling water to help with combustion? The heat consumed is less than the heat generated, right? ]
[Wrong, delete it. Quenching causes combustion because what is quenched is oil, not water. Water droplets burn in a furnace because water and carbon generate hydrogen and carbon monoxide under high temperature conditions, which is called water gas. Read more books and don't pretend to be stupid.]
[Where did this first-level number come from? Look carefully, this is fucking oil? ]
【Why not ask the amazing old man? 】
Bi Fangke had no time to answer. The quenching process and rhythm had to be controlled well. The blade was only immersed in water for two or three seconds before he changed sides and burst into flames again.
Under the drone photography, the audience saw that a layer of oxide film had fallen off the surface of the blade, which was a brownish yellow color.
"In addition to water quenching, you can also use oil cooling, just use waste engine oil. I don't think any warriors would use diesel and gasoline for quenching, right?"
"As for the oil quenching process, it is basically the same as water quenching. Heat it until it turns red and immerse it directly. Wait until the waste oil stops bubbling. Use a stone or sandpaper to grind off the iron oxide on the quenched knife, and then you can temper it."
After that, Bifang repeats this process until it no longer fades, and then it is sent into the furnace for insulation and tempering.
This time, the audience discovered that Bifang no longer put the knife into the flames, but opened the fire pit, put a dry leaf into the sand pit, and when it turned scorched yellow but not black or burning, he directly put the dagger into the sand under the furnace bridge.
Then some water was sprinkled on the charcoal fire on the furnace bridge to extinguish it, and billowing steam came out.
What the hell?
At this time, Bi Fang saw the audience's quarrel, flipped through the comments, and laughed, "It's true that hydrogen is burning, but what you said is wrong. It's not that high temperatures can directly decompose water. It's the high temperature vaporization of water that reacts with red-hot iron to produce ferroferric oxide and hydrogen. When the high-temperature hydrogen comes into contact with oxygen in the air, it immediately ignites."
"Didn't you see a layer of film falling off just now? That's ferroferric oxide."
audience:"……"
So we argued for nothing?
[I said that high temperature cannot directly decompose water! ]
[Forget it, it’s hindsight]
【Bullshit! 】
[So what did Lao Fang do just now? He turned off the stove like this? ]
"Tempering. No matter which quenching method is used, tempering is required afterwards to make the steel more stable and tough. I use the sand-burning method."
Bifang sat on the ground and used a stick to stir the sand under the Luqiao.
"The tempering temperature doesn't need to be that high, but it's hard to confirm. The best way is to heat the sand until you feel it's about right. You can then heat a leaf that's not too dry, or a piece of paper. When the paper turns brown but not black or burning, the temperature is the right tempering temperature."
Bifang picked up the leaves he had just thrown in, and sure enough, the surface was brownish-yellow, but not black or even burning.
"At this point, bury the knife in the sand and let the sand and the blade cool together. The tempering is complete and we have a final dagger. Of course, it still needs to be sharpened a little bit."
After saying this, Bifang felt relaxed all over. He collapsed to the ground, and every muscle groaned.
Too tired.
But, it's finally done.
Steel dagger!
