Favorite Blade Steel?

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Permalink Reply by Bob Yosco on January 6, 2010 at 1:15

440 C is what I'm most familiar with and like a great deal for various reasons; I've two knives in CPM S30V and am appreciating this steel more and more; but so far, CPM S110V has to be my personal champ as far as having a blade with an 18 degree inclusive edge that treetops and lasts one helluva long time. One thing I'll add is thank the heavens for diamond stones. Difficult to keep the super steels sharp without 'em.

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Permalink Reply by David Higgs on January 8, 2010 at 19:17

If you are making a knife with most of the tool steels it needs to be sent to a heat treat specalist as most needs to be in a vacume furnace to become hard. Has any one tried M4? I'm a tool maker and we have started to make most of our punches from M4, replacing D2. You make some shear punches with S7 and CPM10v with high RC of about 58-60

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Permalink Reply by D ale on April 14, 2010 at 11:44

I'm enjoying the D2 Queen (http://www.queencutlery.com/catalog.html) had tempered by Peter's Heat Treating http://www.petersheattreat.com/ Take's an edge & holds it well !!

IMO...quite a bit depends on the tempering process.

ex: I've some 440C in an early 70's vintage Browning folding hunter that's downright impressive. I've also some 440C that's okay.

A little metallurgical research will provide steel characteristics ..

... chem analysis
... max attainable hardness (AUS6 only gets so hard .. period !!)
... required tempering procedure (air cool/quench/??)
... suggested uses (if memory serves..there was a ball bearing steel developed for aerospace applications .. somebody discovered it made durable knife blades .. ??Boker?? offers this commercially

Here's a starting point:
http://www.bladedepot.com/page/page/3942786.htm

Tempering is also used to optimize a steel's characteristics relative to the intended purpose.
... I've an old Cattaraugus 225Q that's chipped .. holds an edge great though ..
... in some applications .. shudder~prying the computer case open~shudder ..I'd rather have the steel bend
... other applications .. skinning a deer .. I want it to hold an edge .. to the point of being "straight razor" brittle
... different tempers can make the same steel perform in either manner (w/i the physical limits of the steel type)

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Permalink Reply by D ale on April 14, 2010 at 21:26

Nice link !!!

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Permalink Reply by Shlomo ben Maved on August 21, 2011 at 5:29

I am very partial to D2 and the majority of my custom(and some commercial) knives are made in it.

While I completely agree that INFI is great steel but it isn't the cat's meow as there are other steels with nearly the same Ni content and some with even more so it isn't unique in that respect but in the way he heat treats it...My beef with him is his marketing--I have no use for a Busse Combat Co 6.25" Boss Jack that he's making and the only blade he will make for that year and is never repeated, the following year he'll make a different knife...His other two companies (Scrapyard and Swamp Rat) do about the same thing but they use SR-101 steel and none of them come with a sheath--$50 -$175 extra depending on maker...They call themselves "Custom Makers" but all they offer is a choice of colour for the blades and scales.

 

Excellent Steel Review at Alligator's (Joe Talmadge's) Steel Info Site

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Permalink Reply by Bob Miskovic on August 22, 2011 at 2:22

i remember reading from a custom knife makers site (cannot remember who) that there's no point in making a knife out of a certain high end steel if you dont take advantage of its strenghts. for example better steels will allow you to make a more steeper blade egde angle which will make it a better cutter.  

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Permalink Reply by Alexander Noot on August 22, 2011 at 8:17

I don't seem to have any favourites. As long as the geometry, heat treat and cutting edge are ok then I don't really care anymore.

 

I've found that for a well made knife the steel type isn't as important (for me) as all of the other factors. As long as the steel type is of a decent type I'm happy with it.

 

Tried

AUS-8

8Cr13Mov

12C27

440C

440A

ZDP-189

S30v

O1

O2

 

and a host of others. As long as it's a decent steel type, the edge is sharpened well, and the grind on the blade is right for the job along with a proper heat treat...

 

I couldn't give a darn.

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Permalink Reply by Pat ChoKo on March 21, 2012 at 17:09

I like 1095 and 5160 carbon steel.

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