I bought a Chef Knife from I believe K-Mart probably 35 years ago and up until now I could never ever put a descent edge on it even using my Sharpmaker. Recently I acquired some tools e.g. Dual Sharp (F & EF) from DMT and a Combo Stone from 1000/6000 and a 400/1000gr Combo Stone both from Sharp Pebble. I'll tell you what. I was able to put a descent edge on my 440 - A Stainless and what is remarkable is the edge retention, it stays very sharp after a week or two in the kitchen. The only thing that I do to it is run it across my steel honing rod. Is this typical or unique to Stainless?
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440 -A Super Stainless
- Thread starter Rhodies
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440A is generally considered to be almost as low-end as you can get for stainless cutlery steel, with 420J taking the cake. However, when properly heat treated it can have a very fine grain and take and hold quite a decent edge. Kershaw used to put out a lot of knives in 440A that performed quite well.
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I don't think he specified anywhere that it was 440a. The language is confusing because at one time he goes "440 - A stainless steel......." but if you read it closely that dash mark "-" should be read as a period "." I believe.
Either way 440 series steels are often looked down on because many chinese knives with shoddy mystery steel mark their blades 440 or 440c. Even if it is a Chinese equivelent to 440 series steels the heat treatment is likely way off or nonexistant.
When HT'd properly 440 series, even 440a can be decent. Personally I find the difference between 440a and 440c to be quite impressive, but then again my only experience with 440a is with one of said terrible cinese knives.
Yes, low end I agree with since I did read up a bit about it's characteristics. Appearently, due to it's resistance to staining, it was used a lot in display's, and in lower quality cutlery. I have a ground carbon Faberware (also a lower quality) Chef Knife you can easily put a wicked edge on it but won't hold the edge like the mentioned stainless. Each would serve a purpose in the kitchen, that's for sure.
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When done right it can take and hold an edge comparable with simple carbon steels. It's just rarely done right since often the steel is selected as a cost-cutting measure so they cut corners everywhere else, too. It's not often you see it in truly nice knives, but when you do it's nothing to look down on.
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If used exclusively for kitchen duty, and on a non-wearing (to the blade's edge) cutting surface, most run-of-the-mill stainless made for such knives can actually do pretty well. It's a textbook example of steel made to meet a specific application, and to do it well. More so, if the edges have been thinned to geometry at/below 30° inclusive (15°/side). I've noticed good performance & retention with pretty much all of my 'inexpensive' stainless kitchen knives. Most of the magic is in the thinner geometry, which cuts much more efficiently, with lower pressures exerted against the edge. And most food, like fruits, vegetables, meat & such (excluding bones) aren't much of a challenge for these knives, or any others, anyway. Again, the steel handles pretty well what it was specifically designed to handle.
It's no surprise that the vast majority of kitchen stainless cutlery falls into the same wheelhouse, composition-wise and heat-treat-wise (mid-to-high 50s HRC). All with around 0.5-0.6% carbon and ~ 12-18% chromium, which gives them enough edge-holding (carbon content + heat treat) and corrosion resistance (chromium) to fit perfectly into kitchen work. Steels like 420HC, 440A, AUS-6/6A, 6CR, 7CR, Sandvik 12C27 & it's 'mod' variant' made exclusively for kitchen use, and those from Victorinox, Wusthof, etc., all fall within that range, composition-wise. The basic recipe has been time-tested for kitchen knives, and manufacturers know it. They don't mess too much with what has been proven to do the job, for decades.
These steels are also perfectly suited to maintenance on the 'steel honing rod', BTW, which is due to the easy ductility of the steel, allowing the edge to be realigned many, many times, if/when the edge rolls a bit. Again, made-to-order for the application.
David
It's no surprise that the vast majority of kitchen stainless cutlery falls into the same wheelhouse, composition-wise and heat-treat-wise (mid-to-high 50s HRC). All with around 0.5-0.6% carbon and ~ 12-18% chromium, which gives them enough edge-holding (carbon content + heat treat) and corrosion resistance (chromium) to fit perfectly into kitchen work. Steels like 420HC, 440A, AUS-6/6A, 6CR, 7CR, Sandvik 12C27 & it's 'mod' variant' made exclusively for kitchen use, and those from Victorinox, Wusthof, etc., all fall within that range, composition-wise. The basic recipe has been time-tested for kitchen knives, and manufacturers know it. They don't mess too much with what has been proven to do the job, for decades.
These steels are also perfectly suited to maintenance on the 'steel honing rod', BTW, which is due to the easy ductility of the steel, allowing the edge to be realigned many, many times, if/when the edge rolls a bit. Again, made-to-order for the application.
David
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Actually, the "440-A Super Stainless" is verbatim that is engraved / stamped on the side of the blade along with the hyphen. My original post I left out "Super" so I screwed up and sorry to mislead, or confuse anybody, was not my intent. The name on the knife itself is HOMETOWN, I believe a brand that K-Mart carried long time ago 35/40 years ago.
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Sounds about right. 440-grade stainless was all the rage back in the 1970s at least, maybe back to the '60s as well. Queen Cutlery used 440C in their knives way back to post-WWII (late '40s onward) and called it 'Queen Steel' because nobody wanted or liked stainless steels much back then. Buck Knives made 440C famous in their knives in the '60s & '70s (to early '80s). Camillus Cutlery made very heavy use of 440A (maybe some 440C too) in the '80s and '90s at least, and those were pretty decent as well. They also manufactured some knives for Buck, utilizing 440A in some of Buck's 300-series folders. By the '80s and '90s, many imported 'cheap' knives took advantage of the steel's notoriety and stamped '440' on most anything they made or sold, whether it was actually 440-grade or not.
David
Thanks for sharing the history of the 440, very interesting. I bought that knife back in the winter of 79, I got out of the Navy, that's how I know... I am a work in progress trying to learn as much as I can, that's for sure.
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The perception that stainless steel were "bad" came about because proper heat treatment methods hadn't been developed as the earlier knives were being built from the stainless steels. Most likely that some of the steels used at first were not very good for knife blades too. Once something gets a poor reputation it can be difficult to convince the public that past perception doesn't always remain true.
Most knives 35 years ago had a much thinner bevel width.That wasn't really the problem but on a thicker edge adding wider angle and alloyed steels? stubborn to work with.Honing a narrower edge and widening the bevel by hand fixes the problem.That's the main reason I stopped buying Camillus blades in stainless steel back then...a lot of fine-tuning required out of the box.
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Oh so you did, mean it in the sense "440A" steel rather than 440 (unspecified) a (as in one of) steel. Sorry the way it was written it could be read in two ways.
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I have small hunting knife from kabar made in 440a and is not bad at all.doesn't rust,holds decent edge and is easy to sharpen.
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Well 440 anything will certainly cut and be fine for kitchen duty. But it's debatable how long it lasts in edge retention until you test it. Seems like cutting food would not be too abrasive like twisted ciceal rope or cardboard etc.
You can do this test yourself or send it to Australia and have Peter test it for you.
Here is some 440 tests peter has done.
As you can see these are not great in edge retention but they do cut. And you can see the difference in retention vs other higher end steel is far lower. So when people say those ganzos are great its totally bs. And this is why people need to do a test to validate it. If your just cutting soft stuff on a wood cutting board you don't really need any higher end stainless steel but their big differences between them and any 440. The heat treatment between the lionsteel vs the ganzo is an improvement but not anything to big a deal. But you see just how much the heat treatment matters.
A good heat treatment with cryo around 60hrc give or take will be a really decent knife overall but as said above people don't use 440 unless they are cutting corners.
Also note a lot of super steel is based off of 440c. They take the main composition of 440c and add or substitute other elements to it. So it's good enough to be a base for many of super steel options.
Anyways I don't think your knife is as super as you think it is. But there are tests you can do to find out.
The steel hone you use does not sharpen the blade, it's just used to straighten the edge from any bent edges/deflecting. You could touch it up with any kind of strop with some compound on it.
You can do this test yourself or send it to Australia and have Peter test it for you.
Here is some 440 tests peter has done.
As you can see these are not great in edge retention but they do cut. And you can see the difference in retention vs other higher end steel is far lower. So when people say those ganzos are great its totally bs. And this is why people need to do a test to validate it. If your just cutting soft stuff on a wood cutting board you don't really need any higher end stainless steel but their big differences between them and any 440. The heat treatment between the lionsteel vs the ganzo is an improvement but not anything to big a deal. But you see just how much the heat treatment matters.
A good heat treatment with cryo around 60hrc give or take will be a really decent knife overall but as said above people don't use 440 unless they are cutting corners.
Also note a lot of super steel is based off of 440c. They take the main composition of 440c and add or substitute other elements to it. So it's good enough to be a base for many of super steel options.
Anyways I don't think your knife is as super as you think it is. But there are tests you can do to find out.
The steel hone you use does not sharpen the blade, it's just used to straighten the edge from any bent edges/deflecting. You could touch it up with any kind of strop with some compound on it.