Bainite?

[Alberta Ed]

What is this stuff? You see references to it from time to time, often about very tough high carbon steel blades for swords. Would it be good for knives in general? How do you create it? Special heat treat? What are its downsides? Thanks in advance to all the experts.

 

[severedthumbs]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bainite

 

[Keith Montgomery]

http://www.cashenblades.com/Info/Bainite.html

Bainite is sometimes used for choppers, because of its toughness.

 

[Rob6852]

There is a knife/swordsmith by the name of Howard Clark that makes
japanese style katana out of this metal. From my understainding they are
very durable and after given the dual temper treatment that traditional
japanese style katana recieve, it is extreemely tough.
Here is a link to his website...
http://www.mvforge.com/

 

[Alberta Ed]

Thanks, all. Appears to be tough stuff. It appears to require a custom heat treat. I haven't seen any manufacturers refer to bainite.

 

[hardheart]

Busse probably has bainite in their Infi blades. Supposedly an 80 hour process for their HT, and Infi is an air-hardening steel. A2 requires about 100 hours for bainite. The reported toughness of Infi and the # of hours seems to fit.