440A performance...

A

Angelus1781

Joined
Feb 22, 2003
Messages
702
Reading the steel faq, it seems 440a is an okay steel, being the most rust resistant of the 440 series, but it doesn't perform as well as 440c. My question is, if schrade plus steel is 440a how did their knives become so popular? I mean if tons of people bought their knives and used them...their steel couldn't have sucked. So where does 440a stand on the performance factor?
 
440A can perform great depending on the heat treatment. The question being is how do you determine the heat treatment? Perhaps Cliff can provide some assistance here?
 
Your best clue to heat treatment, as to so much else about a knife, is the reliability of the manufacturer. If you browse a website like www.cutlerytogo.com/ you will see many Europeans use 440A routinely and have learned to do so very well over the years. There is an advantage to developing a skill and sticking to it, rather than trying to "improve" your work beyond the needs of your customers.
 
440A (1.4034) is a rather good steel. It is fine grained in terms of carbidesize and distribution.
Employing the right heattreatment it can get to 60 HRC working hardness at a haigh level of toughness.
Before we go into details some things aside:
The steel ist commonly used in all kinds of tool applications as well as in knivemaking therefore the quality in production can vary quiet allot.
It is degigned to be tool steel and for a tool steel this is allright, but also one could do better.
Since the steel was also used in industrial production knives one could call it also a knifesteel.
The factories using the stuff for knives want to be cost efficent and customer driven.
This gives some guidlines for them, buying and working the steel. Unfortunately, the factories will not use the full potential the steel offers, because the need to be costefficent and they also have to expect a customer that abuses the knife.

So based on the quality of the raw material, which can vary very much pending on where you buy it, the heattreatment is done so there is just enough corrosions resistance in the blade, by the same way the blade is soft enough to get a easy resharpening by a untrained user and toughness is fair so it will not breake easily abusing the knife.
And not to end, costeffective production with CNC maschines will leave a rather thick geometry, because super thin fine working is not possible with this maschines (Konvexgrind to 0)

The wide range of how the factorys do so, formes the opinion that the steel is nothing special or even junk.

Now if you really want to use the potential the steel offers there are some things to obey.

Buy from a trader of trust so you are sure you have the alloy content written on the datasheet.
Make a really thin blade pending on the size of the blade. 2,5mm on the back are enough for a big chefsknife with a cutting angle beween 20-25°

If you dont make it thin there is no real gain in cutting performance, look at top chefs kichenknives, yours can be thinner!

Heattretment:
Furnace: Vakuum, protective gas, or Saltbath
Preheat 1: 450-600°C equalize 3-5 min
Preheat 2: 850-950°C equalize 3-5 min
Austennize: 1040°C eqalize 3-5min, hold 8min
Quench: oil preheatet to 60°-80°C; N2 4bar
Cryo1: immediately after quench min. -70°C or lower, hold 1h
Temper1: 150°C for 1h, then quench in Water
Cryo2: immediately after quench min. -70°C or lower, hold 1h
Temper2: 150°-180°C for 1h, then quench in Water
Result will be 59-60 HRC

If you skip Cryo or do it to late, you end up between 55-57HRC and a shitload of retained austenit lowering your performance

RGDS Roman
 
Esav Benyamin said:
There is an advantage to developing a skill and sticking to it, rather than trying to "improve" your work beyond the needs of your customers.
Click to expand...
AMEN BROTHER!:cool:
 
440A is a good enough steel for a casual knife user. There's definitely "better" steels out there, but 440A is good for light use. It sharpens very easily and is fine grained so it can get a wicked sharp edge. For Shrade's general customer base, it does fine.

It's also cheap to use, and thus cheaper for the customer. Mind you, "cheap" doesn't necessarily only refer to material cost. Even if 440A and 440C had the same cost for materials, 440C is significantly more difficult to machine. That means added labor and tooling costs along with slower production.
 
Everything is realitive, and if you spend much time on here it would be easy to look down upon a steel such as 440 A. While it won't win any contests with the more expensive "super steels" it is totally fine for most.

Keep in mind that most folks on here only use their knives for two things. One is to open mail, and the other is to count the number of times it will slice through rope before dulling, and compare it to others. They buy them for "perceived needs" reasons.

And that is fine, and not a put down to anyone.

Don't be affraid to buy a $20.00-$40.00 dollar knife and use it for your real world purposes. It will either, and more than likely be fine, or you will decide something better is for you.

Schrades etc. became so popular and sold "tons of knives" because for most of the world of knife users the price vs. performance is fine.
 
Well, I have a Kershaw blur w' 440a and it is a decent user. But it did need to be sharpened weekly, as it would dull easily after any hard use. As well, my girlfriend used it to clean out the vacuum cleaner(hair and such) and just destroyed the tip! But I reprofiled and put a new tip on with a diamond stone in less than 5min, so it seems to be a pretty soft steel, but easy to work with. Just my two cents,-Mike
 
The reason Schrade sold so many knives to people you know is they are typical "what $22.00 for a knife are you crazy!" kind of people. Cheep knives sell great volume to the general public and they can be found in every store and gas station cost to cost. But I as well as most real knife users prefer a blade that doesn't bend when light prying is employed or curl the edge over from cutting plastic. :barf:
Really any knife will serve the general public. they care more about how they look than how they preform. I recently showed a guy I work with a $250.00 hand made I recived that day and he turned up his nose to show me a $10.00 master knife he got at the mall; go figure. :rolleyes:
 
440A is fine for those who don't frequent the knife forums. It does the job. The forumites here are a more discriminating crowd. This is a hobby/passion for a lot of us, and we as a group are more willing to spend money on knives than the average person. That means that in addition to spending money on supersteels we are also more likely to spend money on maintenance items like waterstones, diamond-impregnated bench stones, strops, you name it. I bet for a lot of people, blades of s30v are more trouble than they're worth. You can sharpen 440A on an arkansas stone easily, but be prepared for a lot of frustration if you try to use that same stone on an s30v blade.
 
Not only Schrade but many others have used 440A, and similar steels like 420HC or AUS6. They have performed fine in the field (and in the battlefield), tough, rust resistant, easy to touch-up with a simple stone, not expensive, can be stamped (cheaper than laser cut) and less expensive to machine.

By the way, Schrade+ was changed from 440A to 420HC some time ago.

Blade geometry and thickness also count, many Schrade folders have thin blades, try cutting some thick cardboard with a thick blade, most of the resistance is on the sides of the knife, not on the edge, a simple thin blade works fine for many people, like box cutters don't use or need a fancy steel.

Luis
 
Esav Benyamin said:
Your best clue to heat treatment, as to so much else about a knife, is the reliability of the manufacturer. If you browse a website like www.cutlerytogo.com/ you will see many Europeans use 440A routinely and have learned to do so very well over the years. There is an advantage to developing a skill and sticking to it, rather than trying to "improve" your work beyond the needs of your customers.
Click to expand...


Amen brother!
 
I don't think that 440A is all that great when compared to stuff like VG-10 and 154CM and AUS-8.
It just does'nt hold an edge very long when used hard.
And overall, it tends to be a softer steel.

I think the "stainless steel" Schrades (like the Uncle Henry Schrade+ line) were so popular because they were rather affordable and were as good as about any other stainless pocket-knife being produced at the time.
Even so, the non-stainless Schrade Old Timer knives were more popular around here.

But all of that changed when companies like Spyderco and Benchmade came along.
They started offering knives with better steel at an affordable price.

And the knife-world has never been the same since.

Allen.
 
Angelus1781 said:
So where does 440a stand on the performance factor?
Click to expand...
It is in the same class as AUS-6, high in regards to corrosion resistance and toughness for a stainless, low for hardness and edge retention on most materials as the hardness and wear resistance will be low.

-Cliff
 
It is in the same class as AUS-6, high in regards to corrosion resistance and toughness for a stainless, low for hardness and edge retention on most materials as the hardness and wear resistance will be low.
Click to expand...

I agree but not to low hardness and edge retention.

The hardness you get is still 59-60 if you do you job right (see above), i doubt that anny of the factorys named, has done a heattreatment that can offer this hardness.

Of course the wear resistance is less compared to say 440C, simply not so many monster carbides.

But this also gives it an advantage compared to the hyper alloyed steels.

The stability of the cuttingedge is much higher than the others at the same hardness, this also means you can use much finer and sharper edge angles (around 20°) than on 440C and of course much finer cross sections on the blade itself, whereas 440C would chip or break easily.

Only when you do so, you find the real potential the steel offers.
If the blades look geometrically the same like 440C/ D2 you name it, blades than steels like 440C win, because his moderate sharp and rough edge, will stay of course at this level much longer than the 440A.

So the Potential that the steel offers, are

very fine and sharp edges, (around 20° w.o secondary bevel, and easy to touch up)

very thin crossections (less wedge effect, for an easy cut)

and by 59-60 HRC a rather good working hardness

good corrosion resistance

Try the difference!

RGDS Roman
 
The Gerber BMF in the '80s was made out of 440A, and I think Gerber felt it was the best steel available for a survival knife. Gerber thought toughness was the key virtue of a big survival knife, and the sheath came with a diamond sharpening stone which could restore sharpness quickly to 440A.
 
allenC said:
I don't think that 440A is all that great when compared to stuff like VG-10 and 154CM and AUS-8.
Click to expand...

I don't understand why people dump on a average steel just because there are supersteels available.

That is like saying a family sedan SUCKS because it is not a sports car.

It is not that 440 is bad, it is that VG-10 is so good.

Here is a copy of a post I read not too long ago.

http://www.britishblades.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1190.html
British Blades :: Custom Knife Making > British Blades Forums > Testing & Reviews... > A question of steel and coatings
[snip]
154cm/ats34 (Microtech LCC D/A , Benchmade 750, 851, Puma Cougar Gerber ez-out, Gator and many many more) :The perenial favourite! Edge holding superiour to all above by a noticable margin. Passes the fuzz stick test with aplome! Prone to rust spots if you are wearing close to skin in summer or do not wipe right away after getting wet etc. Not difficult to sharpen, but not for the average novice. I have stated in the past that I was not over impressed with this steel (lets call ATS34 and CPM154 the same for simplicity) allow me to quantify this. In my no BS test, this steel passes the test no problems, however I have been using this steel for many years and have without realising set this as my minimum edge holding benchmark in smaller blades. Thus the large performance increase over lower end steels line 440a has simply been forgotten by myself! I have now reaquanted myself with just how improved this steel is!
Click to expand...

If it is that easy to call the first supersteel, 154cm, "not over impressed" how easy is it to call average steels "junk"?

The 440 and AUS steels work just fine.
 
Well a discussion about a steel should alwas have the discussion of the geometry of the blade and the edge, as well as the heattreament aside.

This three factors, which build the technical capabilities of a tool, need to be guided by the task the knife has to do and the average behavior of the user.
All together build the complete capabilities of the tool.

W.O setting this relations, you never get clear statements of things like performance (edgholding, toughness, cutting ability, and stuff...)

RGDS Roman
 
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