Heat treating ak ejector

[Domingo]

I want to ask about heat treating the ejector thats the part of a build the lives me second guessing if it was done right is their a way to test the hardness of the metal.
what about just heating it one time to red hot and dumping it in a water soap and salt solution, I have try google to see if a ejector has ever shater from been to brittle and have not found any.
some say to use straight water, others oil, some water & soap,.
I have a spare ejector, tomorrow Im going to try to heat to red orange & dump in water soap solution, then I going to take a hammer to it and see if it shaters or brakes I'll up date tomorrow with my findings. has any one done this for S#*! and giggles
thanks

[7,62x39]

Heat until bright orange/demagnetized, dunk in water immediately while still orange, keep it there until it stops making noise/is cool. After that, anneal with a torch. Do it until the first hint of color change, as in touch the torch to it, pull away, touch the torch to it, pull away, etc. it should be a brown color with a touch of blue at the tip, and then it will not peen or be too hard. The color change should happen as you pull the torch away, not while its under the torch, otherwise it will likely be too soft. Do NOT dunk on the anneal, just let it cool slowly. Also you should sand the scale off before annealing so that you can see the color change better.

[ElvenSoul]

Not as simple as it seems....get some spare metal and practice a few times.

[ott1]

I think Domingo wants to heat treat and not anneal to test if the ejector would fail or not.

[tujungatoes]

You guys make too much fuss.

Torch till orange 1600f. If you're color blind use a magnet as 7,62x39 said. Quench immediately in your coolant of choice. Oil is good water/brine is fine too. The material is soo thin that as I understand it it really doesn't matter. At this point your ejector is hard and brittle. It won't shatter, but it might crack.

Next you're going to temper(not anneal...annealing is a completely different process) the steel. Remove all the scale/discoloration from the quench. Clean metal will help you see the color change to get the correct temper. This time you're trying to get 750-800f this will yeild a gray/purple color. With a mapp torch this usually takes about 5 seconds. Heating it only to brown(~500f) may leave your ejector too hard still. This will open you up to the possibility of cracking.

As far as coolants and why some people use one over another...IMO it's all about convinence. I use oil because it's something I usually have several gallons of sitting around. At our BP's we've taken to using a soap/brine solution because it's less messy, and there is less contamination of blast media and park solution. We've found that some builders are less than thorough about cleaning their receivers before refinishing. The brine just eliminates much of that headache.

Just follow the colors and you'll do fine. The reality is thousands of these have been done by total noobs. Many of them probably did it wrong. Most of their rifles still work.

[Domingo]

Ok I just got done with a ejector test.
I heat it to orange red held it their for 30 seconds or more then I drop the ejector in the water solution pull it out then I started hitting it with a hammer nothing no cracks or any signs of stress, the I grabed a punch and the hammer again nothing I wanted to see when the ejector was going to brake,
last thing I grab to vise grips and started twisting it and guess what it broke but not in the tip actually in well I'll put a picture up.

[NorCalK9.com]

Lol, I use water, I heat to orange/yellow dunk, clean sute off, and heat to blye/purple, done get too shooting tons of corrosive dont clean and you got yourself a shooter

[SideWinder11]

Ok I just got done with a ejector test.
I heat it to orange red held it their for 30 seconds or more then I drop the ejector in the water solution pull it out then I started hitting it with a hammer nothing no cracks or any signs of stress, the I grabed a punch and the hammer again nothing I wanted to see when the ejector was going to brake,
last thing I grab to vise grips and started twisting it and guess what it broke but not in the tip actually in well I'll put a picture up.

I think you missed a step.

Orange
dunk
clean
re-heat to blue/purple

[Domingo]

I think you missed a step.

Orange
dunk
clean
re-heat to blue/purple

no I did not miss a step I just wanted to see if the ejector would brake

[tujungatoes]

Ok I just got done with a ejector test.
I heat it to orange red held it their for 30 seconds or more then I drop the ejector in the water solution pull it out then I started hitting it with a hammer nothing no cracks or any signs of stress, the I grabed a punch and the hammer again nothing I wanted to see when the ejector was going to brake,
last thing I grab to vise grips and started twisting it and guess what it broke but not in the tip actually in well I'll put a picture up.

Like I said, many of these have been done wrong and still function. One could argue that the single heat and quench is all that's needed, but I figure if you're going to do something you might as well do it right.