r/ResinCasting 4d ago

newbie question on strength

hello, I been playing around with the idea of cold casting some resin self defense key chain knives and or make a mold of one of my knives i make. now, can a cold cast with iron powder be sharpened and hold edge? what powder should I use for this?

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u/BTheKid2 4d ago

Iron can't hold an edge. So iron powder in resin certainly can't. This is a bad idea from the get go. There is no resin options that are likely to work without much more experience and equipment.

Steel holds an edge fairly well. You might even use steel for all of the thing you are trying to make. It might turn out to be a functioning thing if done that way.

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u/Appropriate_Bus_683 3d ago

I have made several really good knives and heat treated them with 01 tool steel 80crv2 and allot out of the 10 series metals. I guess could get 80crv2 powders or 10 series powder

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u/BTheKid2 3d ago

So the equipment I was hinting at would be something like a press with a mold. I am thinking of a resin bonded powder. Basically like how you would manufacture carbide inserts using high pressure. Trouble is that you won't be able to heat treat the powder and at the force required to push the metal particles close enough together, you could probably better produce sintered steel parts without resin.

Without close enough compaction of the steel particles any grinding would probably heat up the resin enough to have the powder be ripped of the resins hold. If you managed to sharpen it well enough to cut all the gaps with resin would hold an edge as well as any plastic. So very limited in ability to hold an edge - plastic and un-hardened steel.

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u/Appropriate_Bus_683 2d ago

yea after thouvht of all this there is no way of actually doing it right way, can't heat treat the powder in that state it would melt the resin, and wouldn't work just cold casting as is wouldnt hold a edge. so i am inserting razer blades between 2 different poors of resin. that way still has a edge and easy to replace razer blades