Best steel AUS6 or 440C

patrickjames said:
Joe
Really.If that the case,my SOG'S are going bye,bye.Can you link me to one source?
PJ
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Alas, I cannot, these stories all showed up just after the military finished the tests, years ago. Again, can't vouch for the veracity, but this story showed up in both magazines and on the internet.

Why would you get rid of yours SOGs for this, if they're performing well for you?

Joe
 
Why would I get rid of my SOG'S? well I don't like being deceived.One of the primary reasons I bought the Seal 2000 is the military tests.I wanted what I thought was the best.When I bought my SOG'S I knew very little about knives(I don't know much more now) I relied on their advertisment. Fortunately, it just sounds like a rumer started by somebody that don't like SOG'S, or poor loser's.
I'm happy now.
PJ
 
Were the SOGs really made from 440A or just labeled as such?

I thought I read that the earlier incarnations of the SEAL etc. were always AUS6 but initially labeled as 440A "to avoid confusion." Their argument being that the public at the time didn't know what the AUS steels were. I'm pretty sure that was posted by the SOG moderator in the BF SOG forum...

Also, even when the SOG Seal was first produced (in 2000?) their operation was out of Seki, Japan like today. Why would they use American steel? More likely they would use the local AUS steels...

This would explain why the domestic prototype was made with American 440c.


BTW, patrickjames, I remember a lot of people were angered at this deception too.
 
Waco Kid said:
I thought I read that the earlier incarnations of the SEAL etc. were always AUS6 but initially labeled as 440A "to avoid confusion." Their argument being that the public at the time didn't know what the AUS steels were.
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Knifemakers take heed: this is NOT cool. Most people don't know what an I5 is either, but GM doesn't call it a V6 to "avoid confusion."

I do see the parallels between AUS6 and 440A. They are functionally similar enough. But this, to me, is just like marking a blade "USA" when it is made of Japanese steel. Call a spade a spade.
 
Quiet Storm said:
As Joe pointed out, they're not the same. They are, however, so similar that you'll barely notice a difference between the respective "equivalents" (6&A, 8&B, 10&C).
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This has become so commonly repeated it is accepted fact however these steels are not similar. Because the chroimum levels are so much smaller it has a massive effect on the corrosion resistance, hardenability, and volume fraction of primary carbides. In some detail, AUS-6A lines on the tie-line at 1100F which intersects 440C not 440A. This means when so hardened it will have a similar hardness and corrosion resistance as 440C. It will also have a much finer grain due to the vanadium.

It however has a much lower fraction of primary carbides than 440A. Even AUS-8A has a lower primary carbide fraction than 440A, let alone 440C. The primary carbide fraction is critically important in the ability of a knife to function at low angles. So much so for example that Roman Landes has described 440A as a superior knife steel than 440C. Similar for Verhoeven and his comments on the Sandvik steels vs the 440 series.

-Cliff
 
patrickjames said:
Not to stir the pot,but I went to the SOG web site and this is what they say about there Seal 2000 that uses AUS6 steel."winner of the most extensive testing ever under taken by the US goverment" and the reason the SOG won out over other knives is 1.tip breaking strenght 2.blade toughness 3.sharpness and edge retention 4.chopping,hammering and prying. 440c is better than this?
thank you PJ
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well, it's not that aus6 is better than 400c, but it is better in certain areas. 440c is better in edge retention but lacking the toughness of aus6. You are also usually looking at 57-58Hrc on the 400c and 55-57Hrc on the aus6 so it's really a trade-off between different uses of each steel.
 
440C, no question.

440C has better resistance, holds a much better edge (far exceeds aus-6), when properly heat treated can be just as rust resistant.

Ive used it in over 24 years of knife making. Im not a fan of aus-6 in the least, especially those coming from taiwan.

440C was the "higher end" of steel in custom knife making in the 60's.

There was nothing wrong with it then, or now. The problem some use to run into, was that the buck knives made in 440C, years ago, did have a pretty hard temper. So they were hard to sharpen for many who did not have much experience sharpening knives. Then there were some knives coming from the "orient" that were 440C (or were suppose to be years back), that the qualtiy was awful, both in steel and temper.

The heat treat does have allot to do with how the steel will perform also. This has to be taken into consideration as to the maker of the the knife.
 
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