I have some mower blades for the same reason. I figured mower blades probably had decent steel? Free to any knife maker, or if anyone knows they aren't good, they go to the scrap pile.
There is a gent in Harrah that teaches for free to anyone on making knifes. I know he could use such steel. I plan on taking him some broken leaf springs.
I seriously doubt it. All the mower blades I ever touched were soft plain carbon steel. Really good ones might have some manganese in them, but I don't think they are going to make a decent blade.
That's the kind of person I kept this for. It's free obviously.
All the ones I ever had were hardened . Couldn't straighten a bent one or drill through it.
I'll put one on the drill press tomorrow and give it the test. I can also pretty much tell hardness by running on a grinder. The sparks are different for a redneck method.
Also how easy it grinds. If it rings like a bell it might be hard. You can definitely tell the difference between hard and soft by whacking it on something like an anvil. You can feel it when you do it, it just doesn't tell you how hard it might be, but heat treated alloy steel sure has a different sound and feel than soft does.
I have an anvil and the old redneck test of using a buck knife with a rockwell hardness of 60 to see if it scratches the metal or leaves a mark. That's actually a pretty good test.
I would really like to know about this person that teaches for free.
