Blade steel, easily sharpened

gull wing

gull wing

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May 4, 2002
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A steel that sharpens fairly easily and takes a very sharp edge.
Now, I know VG10 does that for me, but what others do you suggest.
Some of the super steels are great but looking for something simple now.
 
I've got a few blades in 1095 and Aus8 and find them pretty easy to sharpen. They certainly dull easier than some of my other blades but they are so easy to bring a great edge back.
 
gull wing said:
A steel that sharpens fairly easily and takes a very sharp edge.
Now, I know VG10 does that for me, but what others do you suggest.
Some of the super steels are great but looking for something simple now.
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I know; I'm a broken record :
Any alloy (that I have found) is easy to sharpen given the right stones and a guided sharpener.
I find S110V no big deal with diamond stones in the guided sharpener, even reprofiling it as long as I have my big DMT extra coarse bench stone.

Edge Pro Apex for ever !
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I would say the most PITA sharpening alloys are the lesser "easy to sharpen" stainless steels because I have to fart around with a durable wire edge.
Forget that crap.

My favorite to sharpen ? = plain high carbon such as 1095 or White Paper steel on water stones.

The easiest to sharpen ? = M4 . . . as someone said here to me "Oh stop bragging about sharpening M4 and how sharp it gets . . . M4 WANTS TO GET SHARP". They were absolutely correct.

For the M4 I like the Edge Pro Shapton Glass with a Spyderco Ultra Fine Triangle Rod for between guided sharpener hand held touch ups.
As I always say : You know when an edge is pretty sharp because when you hold the edge NEAR your arm all the hairs pull themselves out and jump off your arm.
well
M4 gets sharp practically by holding the Triangle Rod near by. YMMV
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I would say hands down the best steel for edge retention and ease of sharpening is CTS-XHP. 14c28n is also very very easy to sharpen.
 
Call me crazy, but I really like 440C, VG-10 and similar. AUS-8A and CTS-BD1 as well.

They may not hold an edge for a super extended time, but they take just seconds of casual effort to get back to crazy sharp.

I have two guided sharpening systems and have sharpened (and sometimes re-profiled) knives in sexy "super" steels, but give me anything even slightly abrasive and I can turn my 440C Spyderco Cat back into a razor in a jiffy.
 
52100, super blue, blue steel 1 or 2, white steel no.1. any of those sharpen easily and take a fine edge. White steel No.1 from masters like Shiraki or Murray Carter are at the top of the list for ease of sharpening and getting a super fine edge that will hold. Takeda for super blue.
 
White 1 & 2, 1095
But really, your simple allows are all pretty easy to sharpen.
Depends on what your threshold is. Unless a steel is tricky, the right stones with patience/discipline aren't too bad.
 
Any good 420J and probably its HC variant is certainly what you want... In Carbon I am partial to 5160 for ease of sharpening as well, but all Carbons sharpen easy. 420J as a stainless is in a class of its own for ease of sharpening (and impacting wood it is somewhere among the best in initial edge holding -within 100-200 hits on Maple-, if not the most enduring at finer than 20 dps angles to maintain a 90% plus edge -but not in -30 C freezing weather-).

Gaston
 
Gaston444 said:
Any good 420J and probably its HC variant is certainly what you want... In Carbon I am partial to 5160 for ease of sharpening as well, but all Carbons sharpen easy. 420J as a stainless is in a class of its own for ease of sharpening (and impacting wood it is somewhere among the best in initial edge holding -within 100-200 hits on Maple-, if not the most enduring at finer than 20 dps angles to maintain a 90% plus edge -but not in -30 C freezing weather-).

Gaston
Click to expand...

5160 sharpens 10% more nicely but performs ±18% less poorly on pulp wood, generally speaking?

Eta: Unless brown rot is factored in.
 
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gull wing said:
A steel that sharpens fairly easily and takes a very sharp edge.
Now, I know VG10 does that for me, but what others do you suggest.
Some of the super steels are great but looking for something simple now.
Click to expand...

Honestly, VG-10 is one of my favorites for the same reasons. Edge holding is always a concern, but I like a knife that I can spend 2-5 minutes at most when I get home getting it back to shaving sharp freehanding with some ceramic rods. I tend to prefer it to S30V - at least the S30V that I've used - because I can touch it up a lot quicker and easier than S30V. Sure, S30V lasts a bit longer, but it takes longer to sharpen. I also seem to be able to get VG-10 sharper than almost any other steel I've used.

154CM has done well for me too, and I'm really liking the CPM-154 that I've used, limited though my use has been (a slipjoint custom and a carbon fiber Leek). I wouldn't hesitate to recommend CPM-154 to anybody looking for a great EDC knife steel.

Keep in mind though that I use my knives for fairly normal, every day tasks. I don't chop frozen logs, for example.
 
I think a lot of times, especially free-hand sharpeners can get better results from the "lower end" steels because you can get to the apex, and know you got it before you get any sort of fatigue , or any mistakes get in your way. Sure you could get there with a very abrasion resistant steel, but its only one steep pass, or a stone that starts burnishing instead of cutting, and before you know it, you've spent a bunch of effort and frustration. I've got a chief's knife in what I think is O1, and three or four passes on my ceramic 800 stone will have a nice shiny edge back, and under 10 to get a nice bevel back. I've got a lot more strokes than that on my Para 3, and I can still see the factory marks. I think there is always a good middle ground, and for most guys who sharpen, I think the best steel is the best one you can sharpen, whatever method you use and the skill level you have is going to be where that line gets drawn.
 
LC200N and CTS-XHP for me.
M390 is also easy to be sharpened.

To be honest, with good silicon carbide and diamond stones, I can sharpen most of steels with ease.
Polishing is a bit different, though.
 
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