Bought my first ATS34 knife.

C

carbonsteelfan

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May 29, 2014
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My Close friend ; Recently gifted me a custom made D'Alton Holder Bowie knife with Stag Handles. I loved the knife. Then l noticed that the Blade is ATS 34. I have never owned a ATS34 knife. How is it in terms.of ease of sharpening ; edge retention and rust resistance? Is it better than 440 c ? I knew that D'Holder makes.great knives but l was reading an article about Master knife Maker Robert Parrish who stated that ATS34 was worse than 154CM and 440c for.field.use.
I.really appreciate the help.
 
154cm and ats34 are basically the same thing. They should overall make a better large knife than 440c in terms of toughness, and edge retention.
 
ATS34 is a great steel. By choice, my one hunting knife is ATS34. A custom from Tom Mayo. Odd that anyone would say ATS34 is worse than 154CM, for any application, when the two steels are so similar.

Steel compositions:
http://www.knifeart.com/tabofdifstee.html

It comes down to the heat treatment and not the insignificant differences in composition of ATS34 and 154CM.
 
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I love ATS34. I have it on two old Apache folders.

I like it as much as CPM 154.
It is easy to sharpen, but it is more uniform throughout. It is very easy to get a disgusting sharp edge and it takes a nice edge with the strop. I also see that it cuts harder materials without chipping like 154 can.
 
So definitely better than 440c ? Until today my hunting knife was always a Robert Parrish 8 inch Hollow Handle Combat survivor in 440c. ATS34 holds a better edge ?
 
Properly heat treated ATS34 holds an edge great and can be sharpened in the field just as easily as when seating on the couch (which is where I sharpen most of my knives).

DSCN0210.JPG
 
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I know Mr. Holder and have visited with him at shows numerous times. He is a legend in custom knife making. Somebody must Really like you to have gifted you a D' Holder knife. All the 3 steels you mention are very close to one another. I'm surprised you don't own a blade of ATS-34. I wouldn't say one of those steels is better than the other. 440C has the most chromuim the others more moly. ATS-34 is a Japanese made Hitachi steel. It was a cleaner melted steel than 154 back in the late 80's. Then the American firm responded with a cleaner melting process (remelt) for 154 and now this steel is cleaner mfg.. Much depends on heat treat and what is desired from the steel. ATS-34 and 154 steel can be heat treated to a higher hardness than 440C without any brittleness ( because of 440C's higher chromium). If the heat treater did that then yes, you'd notice greater edge retention. Still, with a good cryogenic soak these steel will give first class performance. DM
 
David Martin said:
I know Mr. Holder and have visited with him at shows numerous times. He is a legend in custom knife making. Somebody must Really like you to have gifted you a D' Holder knife. All the 3 steels you mention are very close to one another. I'm surprised you don't own a blade of ATS-34. I wouldn't say one of those steels is better than the other. 440C has the most chromuim the others more moly. ATS-34 is a Japanese made Hitachi steel. It was a cleaner melted steel than 154 back in the late 80's. Then the American firm responded with a cleaner melting process (remelt) for 154 and now this steel is cleaner mfg.. Much depends on heat treat and what is desired from the steel. ATS-34 and 154 steel can be heat treated to a higher hardness than 440C without any brittleness ( because of 440C's higher chromium). If the heat treater did that then yes, you'd notice greater edge retention. Still, with a good cryogenic soak these steel will give first class performance. DM
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The person who gifted me the knife is a close friend for 5 years. She wanted to gift me after l.helped her medicate a snake bite injury she suffered last year. Since l had experience with getting snake venom out of a persons system ; l was able to remove the poison in time. This was during a fishing trip in Kentucky. After l medicated the injury and got her to the hospital ; l had to leave to Turkey next day. Yesterday; we met up again . Now.we live in.the same.town. She said she had some thing for me. It was an ATS34 D'Holder Bowie knife. She is a knife fanatic too. Back in Kentucky; we often.discussed Blade steels and her favourite for Fixed blades was ATS34. Mine was 440c . I told.her that l never used ATS34 before. So that's why the knife was in ATS34. I wonder if mr. Holder makes Hollow handle.knives
 
It all started with 440c. That was improved to 154cm, and ATS-34, They were in turn improved to CPM-154 and RWL-34 . The last two are very NICE !
 
I could never bring myself to use my D'Holder's.
Sounds like an awesome knife she has given you. He is a master at his craft.

I like ATS-34 though, and a River Knife in ATS-34 by Sean O'Hare is one of my favorite users. Holds an edge good enough, and is easy to sharpen.
 
EChoil said:
That's some reward. Where was the bite?
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She was bitten in the right palm. I was right next to her with 6 other of my friends. Till this date she believes that the bite might have been fatal unless lhad sucked it out and spat it away. I keep saying that l just got lucky and that it was a fluke. You guys wouldn't happen to know an ATS34 hollow handle knife would you ?
 
Normally, people who purchase a D Holder don't use it. A Bob Dozier gets used. Both legends in custom knife making. They do grinds very well. To my knowledge I've not seen a hollow handle made by Mr. Holder.
If you two can get along--- hang on to that girl... As Mr. Holder's knives are 'high end'. DM
 
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We get along very well. She introduced me to ATS34. I introduced her to D2. Seems like a fair trade. Only place where our views differ is her utter dislike of 440c while 440c was ; until very recently my favourite. I had the chance to carve a bit of cherry wood into a door handle with that ATS34 knife today. You guys were right. I absolutely idolize it. I will go as far to say that it is Sharper than any 440c knife l ever used.
 
NOthing wrong with 440C. As it comes very close to ATS-34 in edge retention and it's stainless abilities. Sounds like she got some poorly heat treated 440C. Both can get very sharp. DM
 
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