8670M from admiral??

Bailey Knives

Bailey Knives

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Oct 18, 2004
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I thought I would order some more L6 from admiral steel, and when I looked at the price list, it listed 8670M as an L6 alternative. Does anyone have any experience with it?
 
I'm using 8670 modified. It moves slowly under a hammer, stock removes well, needs a cryo cycle for heat treat, and is a tough steel. It's been explained as a super L6.

Gene
 
Phillip Patton has a good amount of experience with the 8670m from Admiral. You should consider emailing him for info.
Matt Doyle
 
The 8670 will heat treat a little differently than L6, it will be easier to anneal and normalize, if I had to guess I would say that its I-T curve would look more like 5160 than L6, and I would be willing to say that if you are already working with 5160 your equipment and proceedures would need no adjustments. It will reach a higher hardness however and should make a very good blade. If used in damascus it welds very nicely to 10XX and forges well. It will not produce as striking a contrast as L6 in damascus, but it will be close enough to work well.
 
Kevin R. Cashen said:
The 8670 will heat treat a little differently than L6, it will be easier to anneal and normalize, if I had to guess I would say that its I-T curve would look more like 5160 than L6, and I would be willing to say that if you are already working with 5160 your equipment and proceedures would need no adjustments. It will reach a higher hardness however and should make a very good blade. If used in damascus it welds very nicely to 10XX and forges well. It will not produce as striking a contrast as L6 in damascus, but it will be close enough to work well.
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Interesting. I would eventually like to try to make some damscus that does NOT have that stricking contrast that you sometimes see with 10xx/15n20. What would be a good steel to go with the 8670 that doesn't turn as "black"?
 
jdm61 said:
Interesting. I would eventually like to try to make some damscus that does NOT have that stricking contrast that you sometimes see with 10xx/15n20. What would be a good steel to go with the 8670 that doesn't turn as "black"?
Click to expand...

Try 1095 (or W2) and 8670. I've stopped using that mix because it doesn't have the contrast I would like.
 
Thanks all... I emailed Mr. Patton and he gave me some good information on it. I guess I have been using it for a while now because I had bought some "L6" from admiral a while ago. I have tested some of my knives and have been pretty pleased with the result.

Here is what Mr. Patton wrote if you are interested.

Hi Matt,
Well, I'm no expert, and I can't say my experience with 8670 has been
totally positive, but here goes. :-)
First off, Admiral never sold L6, as far as I know. What it was is
this
8670 stuff, which had somehow been mis-labeled as L6. The chemistry of
the
two is similar, but the level of nickel in 8670 is about half what L6
should
have, and the carbon is lower also. Someone (okay, it was me :-) got
suspicious about things, and had a sample tested (by Matt Doyle, mdoyle
on
the forums) and when shown the facts, Admiral did a little digging and
found
out what they were selling was 8670, not L6. So now they call it "L6
alternative". Whatever. It's really not close to L6, in my opinion.
But
I'm not saying it's a bad steel, just that it's not L6.
As far as my experience with the material itself, I haven't made all
that
many knives out of it, by itself. I made one for my brother, and it's
the
best knife he's ever used. But then, he's used to
made-in-China-soft-as-a-noodle-stainless kitchen knives. :-)
When I made some large chopping knives from it, I had problems with the
edge
rolling. That's why I no longer use it by itself for knives. I prefer

steel with higher carbon content, and thus higher hardness and
deformation
resistance. I still buy it, and use it for damascus, combined with W2,

1095, or 1084, all of which will increase the carbon, and thus, the
attainable hardness.
But, others have used it and been very happy, so maybe it's just me.
???
Give it a try, and let me know how it goes. If you'd like, I could
make a
test sample, and see what tempering temps would be needed for whatever
hardness you want. That's something haven't seen anywhere.

Hope my ramblings were helpful,
Phillip

P.S. You can copy this to the thread you started, if you want.

I love having access to people who know their stuff!
 
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