Brittleness of knife steel in relation to cold temperatures??

7

72jroberts

Joined
Mar 16, 2012
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I have heard people from youtube talk about knives becoming brittle in cold weather lending to the knife breaking. It seems as though knife steel could withstand quite a range of temperature before either losing its temper ( 350 deg. F and up ) or becoming so cold that it becomes brittle- to me even -50 deg F seems not cold enough for something so strong as alloyed steel to succumb to a condition that usage would snap it.
I wish I knew proper metallurgical vocab, but I think that you guys know what I mean.
Is there any tests that show how cold knife steel can get before it does get brittle? I know there are lots of variables, but I would like to hear any reliable information about this.
And if you have theories or conjectures, or even anecdotes, that's fine. I would like to perhaps hear something more empirical, though.
Thanks,
John
 
My step-dad was a convoy commander on the AlCan Highway project during WWII. He related that in the -40f and worse temps, leaf springs broke at a troublesome rate. Some have posted here in the past that such a thing could not happen. I think he would have replied that they were not there.
 
There is a "brittle transition temperature " in steel ! One of the problems that the Titanic had . That temperature may be rather high ,as much as 60 F !! Much work has been done with this and it's much better understood so it's no longer a problem.It's mainly dependant on composition.
 
I think one thing that needs to be taken into account is what stressful conditions will the knife be facing? Brittleness will certainly be a factor if one is using a knife to baton through frozen hardwood in sub-zero temperatures (the infamous broken SRK comes to mind here) whereas using the same knife to butcher game under the same conditions may not pose any issues at all.
 
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