There really isn't a one size fits all approach to quenching wootz steel. Though with a simple recipe of 1.5%c, low Mn and low P, I find that treating it similar to the 10xx steels works pretty well. I say similar but it is slightly different. The prescription is 780C with a holding time of 20 minutes, into parks 50 quench oil. I have tried water quenching twice with one being successful and the other cracking. An extra little bit that I do all wootz blades is a wash coat with satinite that has been mixed with graphite. This helps to prevent any decarburization or scale forming. Not exactly necessary but I think that it helps.
If you use oil and quench the entire blade, remove for a second and then submerge again, you will likely get a ghostly auto-hamon on the blade. It is very interesting but usually not defined enough to look too great. Below is an auto-hamon on a nakiri that was achieved using the aforementioned technique. In the pictures you can also see that the etch is much darker where the hamon formed. This blade had a bit higher amount of Mn which helps in hardening. Unfortunately that Mn also chokes out the wootz pattern slightly.
There really isn't a one size fits all approach to quenching wootz steel. Though with a simple recipe of 1.5%c, low Mn and low P, I find that treating it similar to the 10xx steels works pretty well. I say similar but it is slightly different. The prescription is 780C with a holding time of 20 minutes, into parks 50 quench oil. I have tried water quenching twice with one being successful and the other cracking. An extra little bit that I do all wootz blades is a wash coat with satinite that has been mixed with graphite. This helps to prevent any decarburization or scale forming. Not exactly necessary but I think that it helps.
If you use oil and quench the entire blade, remove for a second and then submerge again, you will likely get a ghostly auto-hamon on the blade. It is very interesting but usually not defined enough to look too great. Below is an auto-hamon on a nakiri that was achieved using the aforementioned technique. In the pictures you can also see that the etch is much darker where the hamon formed. This blade had a bit higher amount of Mn which helps in hardening. Unfortunately that Mn also chokes out the wootz pattern slightly.
Uploaded files:
