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Dave Osborne Dave Osborne is offline
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Default Blueing/oil quenching of mild steel

When I was a lad, if memory serves correctly, we used to dip hot ferrous
parts into a bucket of old engine oil. This gave them a blue/black
finish and I'm pretty sure we called it "blueing".

Anyway, I've been Googling and I'm a bit confused, cos blueing seems to
be a rust-proofing process which does not involve oil and oil-quenching
is a hardening process, not a rust-proofing process.

Can anyone put me straight? I was idly thinking about DIY oil quenching
to achieve moderate rust-resistance.

Do I need to use old engine oil, or will new be good/better/safer?

ISTR we heated the parts up to a dull red before quenching. Does this
sound right?


Cheers,

Rumble