AEB-L for non kitchen knives

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Drew.Haynes

Joined
Oct 16, 2012
Messages
37
What types of knives would this steel work well for outside the typical kitchen uses? What pros and cons would you expect to see under different types of use?
 
I have made fillet knives out of it, others have made hunters, razors, almost anything. It's an easy to sharpen,fine grained, stainless steel. If you like carbon steel,but want some rust resistance, this would be a good choice.
 
I have made drop point hunters, Kwaikens and kiradashis.

I just bought some more and have concealment blades planned and some more Kwaikens and hunters.

It is a great stainless
 
Interesting! Am I right in thinking "low abrasion resistance"? How does that translate into real world use?
 
At Rc62, aeb-l has better wear resistance than you might expect. There is no reason to go softer than that. I use it for skinners and edc's. I suspect it would make a pretty darned good folder. Aeb-l is one of my favorite steels.

If you need a pry bar type knife, it's probably not your best choice. Aeb-l has great edge stability, good wear resistance, and incredible ability to take the finest edge you have the skill to put on a knife.
 
Willie71 said everything I think about AEB-L, I think it's a great all around stainless.
 
AEB-L performs!

It is very wear resistant and will stand up to hard use even with a thin edge. I think it may be the most under-rated steel. I've been testing it a ton and making lots of knives along the way, AEB-L my be my go-to steel. I'm making my next run of flippers with it...
 
From Devin Thomas's webpage....

"Roman Landes and John Verhoeven have both done different tests with AEB-L. In CATRA testing Dr. Verhoeven found AEB-L to outcut 52100, 1086, and Wootz damascus. He also found AEB-L to be able to take a smaller edge radius than 52100 in controlled sharpening tests. Roman Landes found AEB-L to have greater edge stability, toughness, and wear resistance than 52100. Edge stability is a property that describes a steel's ability to hold a finely sharpened edge. 52100 is one of the most well respected carbon steels, and is well known for its small carbides, high toughness, and high edge stability, so it's impressive that AEB-L was able to beat it in these categories, while also having greater wear resistance and being a stainless steel. Many users have reported that AEB-L sharpens as easily as any other carbon steel they have used."
 
Drew its a great steel for lots of different applications. I've used it for kitchen knives, steak knives, small to larger edc types, hunters, bird and trouts and even a bowie. As far as toughness goes here's the lawnmower test. The guy was carrying his knife in the sheath, in his pocket. Somehow it fell out and he ran over it with the lawnmower. You can see in this pic where the blade of the lawmower impacted the blade of the knife. This little edc (6" oal with a 2.5" blade at 62RC), survived quite well. The edge deflected a little from the impact and a little judicious tapping on the anvil got er back to about 98%. Had to build a new sheath though.

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As far as edge holding goes I've been using it some time to make specialty leather working knives both roundknives and skivvers. These are at 63RC and are designed to cut leather for long periods of time without resharpening.Here's some roundknives (most of these went to fellow BF guys).

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I expect these roundknives to cut through even heavy leather in one pass. In fact as a sharpness test each roundknife above cut out its own sheath. My own personal ones maybe see a stone every six months. I will buff the edge occasionally when using any time I feel a drag but they cut and cut and cut. I work in batches so when I'm making sheaths I will be working on 40-50 (behind my left shoulder you can see a batch of knives and I'm cutting out some sheaths) at a time as a norm. I will be cutting leather for hours at a time. Many professional saddle makers that I know will stop and sharpen knives 3 or 4 times a day. Not with these.


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Besides making knives I've been a professional leather crafter for well over 25 years. I have used many commercially available roundknives. NOTHING I've used has ever remotely even become to come close to this kind of performance from AEB-L at 63RC. As one pro chef that I made a knife for said:"this is past scary sharp into ugly sharp".
 
This is far from an end all be all destructive test, but I would say it's not a frail steel by any means.

[video=youtube;MKoTDpxSsYg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKoTDpxSsYg[/video]

Not sure if you are familiar with a Spyderco Sharpmaker or not but if you go to the end of this video you can see how easy it is to bring the edge back to shaving sharp after approx 225 cuts through 1/4" sisal rope. Same knife in both tests.

[video=youtube;sUmzIsXGCWM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUmzIsXGCWM[/video]
 
I also agree that aeb-l is a bad ass steel. Ive used it alot from kitchen lazers to camping knives. Its just awesome with 62RC and the cryo treatment. Last year a took an aebl blade with me on a road trip all over new england, camping/ hiking/ cooking all kinds of stuff and it worked great. Once you perfect your geometry for the task i think its hard to beat and by far the best value.
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