A tweaked version of Delta 3V, Magnacut. or Cruwear ...

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Sid Post

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I'm probably out of the next sale as the Basic Field knives in 3V are apparently sold out. šŸ™

So, "... in a tweaked version of Delta 3V at HRC62 and a few in Magnacut. Also some in Cruwear now." is posted in past sale threads, but a basic contrast of why to choose one steel over the other is missing.

So, I get that Magnacut is the new steel nerd darling of the knife trade, and Cruwear was one that had a run in folders and smaller fixed blades in my experience, and 3V is well known for larger fixed blades. So, why choose one of these over the other two in a "work" knife? In my case, I'm not a soldier in some far-off land, or a hardcore explorer living for months at a time in remote villages in various parts of the world. I live on a farm/ranch in East Texas, so more than a chairborne ranger, but not a Soldier of Fortune either! I'm sort of Bushcrafty, but don't consider myself a Bushcrafter. I Overland a lot and do a lot of general land maintenance on my property with cattle, for context, of where I come from and the usage I expect from a good knife.

What factors should people in general use to select their "best" CPK Field Knife experience? šŸ™‚
 
I doubt there's a real world difference in any of those steels in every day cutting tasks. If you need to baton with it, choose 3V. If you want extreme corrosion resistance, choose Magnacut. If you want to try out Cruwear, now is as good a time as any.

I like 3V in larger knives. I like Magnacut in blades smaller than 4".
 
I'd probably go with 3V then, for the reason that, from my experience, it sharpens much easier than MagnaCut and CruWear.I'm generally one of those people who actually doesn't care much of a about stainless properties in steels.

And 3V, in reality ā€” at least in the CPK knives I own ā€” no matter how much I carry it in humid climate, or even accidentally forget to wipe/wash the knife after long sessions in the woods or butchering meat, it has literally never rusted or gotten damaged from bones.

Delta 3V is still an incredibly tough steel, seriously ā€” from my own experience, Iā€™ve never been able to cause even microscopic damage to it unless I was deliberately trying to ruin it, you know.
 
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Let's say, during prolonged use of the Medium Chopper.I was chopping for a solid 4 hours (this is only the time of actual hard strikes on wood, counting only the time I was hitting).And this is 3V steel ā€” I was hitting it 'not normally' on purpose, making sure the cutting edge didn't land perfectly, it slipped, bounced off, and all that , specifically on hard wood, against the grain, just to get impacts.Just like in the photo.

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And here's what I'll tell you: specifically under microscopy on the Medium Chopper in 3V, it looks something like this.These are the biggest damages I could find under the microscope.This is at something like 400x magnification or closer, I don't remember exactly.

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But here's the catch.There are really very few 3V steels out there that hold up at the same level, seriously.A ton of other steels hyped for 'toughness' fail exactly in prolonged toughness testing.Sure, you can chop something hard, beat the blade against a rock for, say, 5 minutes.But I've always been curious: what if you keep chopping non-stop for 4 hours, on super dry, super hard wood, against the grain?CPK 3V looks like this after that.

For example, this is how other steels that are supposedly optimized for toughness and impact resistance look in the exact same test.

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^^

CruWear is actually a pretty cool steel, by the way.Itā€™s basically like CPM 3V, just with a bit more carbon and some tungsten added.Itā€™s simply harder ā€” or at least it has more potential in that direction.


If I had to choose between Magnacut and CruWear, Iā€™d go with CruWear.That said, Magnacut is perfectly reasonable for kitchen use, dishwasher-safe and all that.


Still, Iā€™d have zero problem using something like a kitchen knife made from CPM 3V.Honestly, even when I accidentally forgot to wipe it down or properly clean it after cutting meat/blood, it just didnā€™t rust.


Carbon steels give you that edge performance that no stainless steel can ever match, no matter what.And Magnacut is stainless.


But that only matters if you really care and can actually feel the difference.Most people donā€™t really obsess over itā€¦?


I sharpened a Magnacut blade once ā€” not the crazy high version, just around 62 HRC.Because of its very fine carbide structure, it made sense to take it down to like 1 micron, and the cutting performance ended up excellent with really good edge retention.Still ā€” in reality, itā€™s not carbon steel.
 
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But, there's actually this thingā€”not so much about edge retention right at the very tip, but in the context of holding initial sharpness, mid-edge sharpness, and sharpness at the very end of its lifeā€”CruWear will most likely beat CPM-3V here.(60-61 HRC 3V,not sure about 62-63HRC 3V)


But then you also have the context of how well the geometry itself holds up under different kinds of stressā€”on impact/breaking, or under pressure, accidentally hitting a bone in meat, or just some non-standard, even very light abuse (like cutting through a staple in cardboard).


And in that department, CPK D3V is my choise
 
I generally donā€™t like it when people evaluate some knife characteristic purely in ā€œsyntheticā€ tests where we just throw around numbers for a property.
Although I do respect those tests.

For example, I have a knife made of 15V hardened to 65.5ā€“66 HRC.
Its edge retention is longer-lasting than a good Rex-121 (longer than a good one, but not longer than the very best examples).

But hereā€™s what you pay for that hardness and that level of edge retention.

This is what the steel looks like after cutting cardboard (fairly soft cardboard, not the really tough, nasty kind).

In other words ā€” your edge is micro-chipping / chipping out.

It holds sharpness extremely long and can literally keep cutting thanks to those aggressive carbides.
But the ability to hold the actual geometry is essentially so poor that every time you re-sharpen it, youā€™re forced to create a completely new edge.

Best-in-class (or one of the best) edge retention is not always the same thing as geometry retention.
The same goes for toughness, by the way.

šŸ™„

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Your choices are:

Tweaked D3V in a Signature FK3 which is as good as it gets. Plus if you really want to pound on the knife, it's the one you want.

Basic Magnacut which is only superior if all your knives rust on you.

Basic Cruwear which is probably the best bang for the buck being both tough and having decent edge holding. Keep it dry and clean and it will be fine.

You might just say "whatever's still available" if the sale is going fast. All three flavors will do the job for you.
 
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Nathan chooses optimal heat treats for any steel he uses, so no worries there. Magnacut was my close second choice when I got my Basic. I know for my use cases, I won't need the extreme toughness of the D3V. I like having it, but I cannot make an honest statement that I needed it. MC or CW would have worked just as well for me. Heck, crappy 1095 gets used by many for the same role.
 
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