Holding onto small pieces while you sand is a problem, this is a tip from Bowie
maker, Alex Daniels, Town Creek, Alabama. Take a piece of tape, stick it to one
end of your work piece and loop it up in the middle before sticking it to the
other end. The loop gives you something to hang onto and makes it easy to slide
the object back and forth. That was a forehead smacking idea. I will retire my
Super glue.
The filing jig,
made and sold by Don Hethcoat, Clovis, NM 1-505-762-5721 can be used to file the
shoulders in the blade, but it also can be used to file the slot in the guard.
If you lay out your lines carefully, you can use the jig to file square and
straight across the slot. Makes fit up of the guard much easier and more
precise.
Neutral salts used for austenitizing steel become contaminated with soluble
oxides and dissolved metals during use. As the buildup of these oxides and
dissolved metals renders the bath oxidizing and decarburizing toward steel,
it is necessary to periodically rectify the bath. In the case of salt bath
furnaces with immersed electrodes, daily rectification of the bath is
required. For the recommended barium chloride-based salts (Salt# 1,2,3 in
Table II) rectification should be done by adding 125 gm of boric acid (for
each 100 kg of salt) and inserting a 3-inch graphite rod for one hour for
every 4 hours of operation. Tip provided by Vance Burns and refers to an
article published in Industrial Heating
Tip from Chuck Robinson
When the stencil is used for the first time the mark is clean and sharp. The
more times you use it, the muddier the etched mark becomes. The more
intricate the stencil, the faster this happens.
I started to experiment with several methods of mechanically cleaning the
stencil. After looking at the stencils with my microscope at 60X, It
became obvious that rubbing the stencil with my fingers or paper towel
wetted with stencil fluid or detergents, wasn't doing squat. The plastic
micro screen of the stencil remained clogged with detritus from the etching
process.
Using my old ultrasonic pen cleaner and cleaning solution, I tried it on the old
stencils.
After cleaning the stencils for a few minutes, microscopic examination
showed them to be as good as new. I even tried cleaning some old stencils
that had been clogged up and set aside for several months. They take a
little longer, but they came clean with flying colors.
The cleaning process is also much easier on the stencil so they should last
a lot longer.