Butter Knives...18/8 + 18/10 Stainless?

18/8 and 18/10 refer to the percentages of chromium and nickel in the stainless steel alloy. The "18" refers to the chromium content, which gives flatware its strength, and the "8" or "10" refers to the nickel content, which gives it its shine and rust-resistance.

These numbers are merely "nicknames" for the lay person to use, and are only used for marketing efforts by flatware manufacturers. When a manufacturer purchases stainless steel from a steel mill, they all purchase stainless steel Grade 304, which has a range of 18-20% chromium, and 8-10% nickel content. Grade 304 in flatware is usually at the lower end of that range. To keep the cost down, steel manufacturers will make grade 304 with 8.2% nickel, which clears the legal hurdle of calling it 18/10.

What does all this mean? It means that there is no difference between 18/8 and 18/10 stainless steel in flatware. The difference between the two is purely a marketing effort.


First of all: No, I'm not that intelligent. I got the info here: http://www.silversuperstore.com/stainless_quality.html

Second: I'm curious as to why you want to know. Are you planning on pilfering your mother's/wife's cutlery and doing something creative?


Hope it's helpful,
TheSurvivalist
 
Well, the paragraph that the survivalist posted explains essentially that 18/8 is the same as 304. I don't know about 316L, but 420 is quite different: it contains no nickel. Large amounts of nickel makes AFAIK the austenite phase stable at room temperature. That means you can not form martensite by rapid cool down from elevated tempertures (just a rough and tumble explanation. Maybe on of the knifemakers here will add to it). In other words steels with large amounts of Nickel aren't hardnenable, your flatware is as soft as steel without any heat treat (about 48 Rc?).
 
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