Best knife steel in use today

BePrepared

BePrepared

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Aug 26, 2010
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I'm sure this has been done, but i'd like to rehash it

so

What is (in your opinion) the best steel being used to make knives. Criteria include, but are not limited to

Abrasion resistence
Edge retention
Resistance to bending
general durability

Feel free to add important criteria as i am not an expert
 
Like Ankerson said, "Best for what?"

Do you want stain resistance or not?
How important is abrasion resistance to you?
How about edge stability? Will there be large lateral forces?
Abuse-tolerance will come at the expense of other virtues.

There is no panacea in steel for the enormous variety of needs a blade may be called upon to fulfill.
 
In general IMO....
Fixed blade cpm3v...cpm m4...l6...just to name a few..
Folders Zdp-189...cpm s90v...m390.....just to name a few..

There are many other options and variations...depending on what your cutting ect...
 
Ankerson said:
Best for what?
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What Jim said.

There is no best steel. Every alloy has a blend of properties. The properties are in opposition to one another. To get more of one, you have to have less of another. Even if you stated a purpose for the blade, there is no one alloy which is best for that use.
 
I recently spoke to a maker that said if he had one choice of stainless to work with for the rest of his career, it would be S110V even though it's a pain in the butt to work with.

That's not saying it's the best, but it is what he said.
 
The steel should be chosen for the intended use and terrain. I love L6 or 5160 to make knives, but that stuff rusts like crazy and takes quite a bit of mantenence. INFI, Sr101, Sr77 and 3v are tough and better corrosion resistant. But most of these are not used for folders...that's a whole other list.
 
Abrasion resistence - what does this even mean? You plan on dragging your blade over rocks?
Edge retention - Simple. The best edge retention is on a knife you never use.
Resistance to bending - the more resistant to bending, the more likelihood you will have of the steel snapping.
general durability - from what? From abrading against rocks and bending?

Then again, as has been pointed out in EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THESE "What is the best" postings, what is your application?
 
Hey, everyone stop ribbing him. Everyone here knows the answer but hasn't given it yet. In all seriousness it's Surgical stainless steel with 420J2 trailing slightly.
 
Every steel will have a trade off of some qualities for other qualities. A "weaker" steel will therefore bend more easily, but also be less likely to chip. Super tough steel is more brittle. Additionally, how you sharpen matters. Treating every knife and every steel the same won't be an effective strategy. A higher "quality" steel - say - one that is tougher/stronger - benefits more from a lower degree sharpening because it has the properties to retain that edge. A lower quality steel may take a higher degree sharpening, and therefore be less sharp, but you need to do that in order to maintain strength in the cutting edge.

Cutting different materials requires different properties. There is no true answer.
 
cpmsteel said:
Hey, everyone stop ribbing him. Everyone here knows the answer but hasn't given it yet. In all seriousness it's Surgical stainless steel with 420J2 trailing slightly.
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I was waiting for a clarification on what he had in mind as far as use was concerned.

Then we could narrow it down to a respectable number of steels.
 
Ankerson said:
I was waiting for a clarification on what he had in mind as far as use was concerned.

Then we could narrow it down to a respectable number of steels.
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Oh I know. I used to think I needed the best steel be it INFI, CPM S30V, whatever. But now If it's a folder 154CM is fine starting point for me. I like CPM 3V for fixed. I still haven't tried M390 yet, although I have a AFCK with it.
 
cpmsteel said:
Hey, everyone stop ribbing him. Everyone here knows the answer but hasn't given it yet. In all seriousness it's Surgical stainless steel with 420J2 trailing slightly.
Click to expand...

Those are my two favorite steels for ninja swords with etched hamons. F'n awesome.
 
Stainless
For high wear resistance where toughness is not as important I think M390 is the winner for steel thats actually used in production knives. S110V or 125V is probably much better but we haven't really seen them in anything except a few very limited runs.
Where high toughness is important Elmax wins.

Non Stainless
For pure edge retention where tougness is not as important
CPM 121 is the king of all steel but its not really used. Next is 15V but its not really used either.
K390 will be used in a spyderco mule and thats probably the best steel out there that people are actually using.

Where toughness is more important than edge holding (6inch +knife)
Id say M4 is a great steel for bigger knives that need to be tough
3V is great for choppers and 4V should be a great steel but its not really very available yet.
 
Like I said before perfection (bestness :p) requires high specialization and probably simplicity. Steel has many attributes that cancel each other out in various degrees. The hardest steel is gonna give you the trade off of making it more vulnerable to breaking. It's about putting as much focus on the most desired attribute as you are willing to trade the others off for. Different steels focus on different attributes. I red that if resistance to breaking is of out most importance you should use pure unhardened iron. :D If you're gonna cut only soft stuff like fruits and you want the edge to stay sharp as long as possible then a ceramic knife I think would be the ultimate. I hear they can break if you drop them though! :O

CWL said:
Abrasion resistence - what does this even mean? You plan on dragging your blade over rocks?
Edge retention - Simple. The best edge retention is on a knife you never use.
Resistance to bending - the more resistant to bending, the more likelihood you will have of the steel snapping.
general durability - from what? From abrading against rocks and bending?

Then again, as has been pointed out in EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THESE "What is the best" postings, what is your application?
Click to expand...
Made me giggle. :D I love when people here steps out of their nuttyness a little and admit that having super high degree of a certain attribute might not be that necessary. Especially the dragging on rock thing.
 
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