A 74 year old smith in Council Bluffs told me to stop dunking my tongs in the slack tub after every heat
I argued with him for 10 minutes at his shop last month, then tried it his way on a batch of 8 hooks, letting them cool slow on the anvil. Zero scale flaking and the jaws still grip square, so now I want to know if anyone else quenches tongs at all or just lets them air out.