Buying steel

M

MarkusM

Joined
Dec 8, 2025
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16
Hello everyone,

I have been interested in making knives for a long time and have planned to start sometime this year, so in preparation I purchased some steel.
I bought some AEB-L and 80crv2 to start with, and some 3v and cruwear for when I gain enough experience to make proper use of them.
The piece of cruwear I bought was a 1/4” thick, 2” wide, and 36” long piece I plan to use about 2/3 of to make a short sword based on this one.

https://imgur.com/a/gQI1BTp

I found the bar is a little thicker than .25, closer to .29, and it has a fairly noticeable bend towards one end.
I figured I should be able to cut off the bent part, and still have enough, but I wanted to ask if that’s something I could also just grind out at the time?

Also, is there a particular finishing method from the factory I should be looking for?
 
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CPM steels (ie 3V and Cruwear) are oversized (the skin is kinda nasty and they make them thick so even after grinding through the skin and mill scale, you still have an oversized bar to fully surface grind down if needed). Some places will flat grind the steel as an option before shipping, too. I grind it clean after straightening after heat treating.

You can fix the bend before or after heat treat. Most bar I get have a slight bow to them and I straighten post HT with a carbide hammer before I grind the mill scale finish off the bars. That way if it warps or moves during heat treating, I have the excess to remove to get what I want/need after all straightening and cleaning is done.
 
I grind bevels after heat treat almost all of the time, with a few exceptions for certain steels/profiles. I find hardened steel grinds cleaner, but uses more belts and you need to make sure not to heat up the blade too much while grinding and ruin the temper.

I usually profile and drill the blade, break all sharp corners (to eliminate stress risers), chamfer the pin holes, foil wrap, heat treat and plate quench so the steel has full contact with the plates to pull the heat out quickly for air hardening steels. Oil quenched steels get similar, but ATP641 thin coat to prevent scale/decarb instead of the foil, then oil quench in the correct oil (at the correct temps). Sometimes I put them into a vise with angle iron pieces in it to keep it straight while it cools to room temp while I get ready to do the next blade, other times I don't. If I forged the steel, I do normalizing and DET anneal cycles in a foil pouch, then do the ATP641 coating for the actual austentizing/quenching step.
 
You mention you plan to start making knives this year. What equip do you have for knife making? What type of grinder do you have? Seems like you've got a pretty ambitious project for first time, but it can be done. What are you plans for making - stock removal or forging?
 
You are going to need some serious machinery to grind fully heat treated cru-wear into that 24" sword. I'm not sure it would be my first choice of steel for a sword anyway. It is a low-toughness, high wear resistance steel.

Vasco-Die-toughness-low-alloy.jpg
 
a tip to make your life easier; start with some precision ground A2. You can go about your business and make a knife, starting with a perfectly flat piece of steel and skip the whole squaring up process.

A2 is a relatively simple steel to harden well enough for a great knife. It's got some chromium carbides and not much else, so grinding it after ht is also not a major challenge.

It doesn't usually distort in heat treatment, so you can grind it to it's almost completely finished state without having to worrying about it changing. It's always easier to grind steel in its annealed state, which means you can use cheap AO belts and not spend extra on fancy ceramic ones.

practice your hand finishing skills with a reward, since A2 takes a nice finish quite easily due to the lack of the harder types of carbides. You can rub that cruwear all day before you get anywhere, and again, if you do then expect to pay more for abrasives.
 
Just for clarification, the numbers on the toughness chart above for Cru-Wear are for the ingot version (non CPM version). When I first glanced at it, I was thinking of the CPM Cru Wear, and those toughness number are reflected in the "Z-Wear" curve., which is Zapp's PM version of CPM Cru-Wear.

I don't think regular ingot Cru-Wear is a good choice at all for a sword. CPM Cru-wear or Zapp Z-wear are much better choices, but still I wouldn't recommend them as steels for a beginning knife maker to use, or for a sword, even after a few tries with 80CrV2. The grinding is nothing like a simple carbon steel, and is going to use a LOT more abrasives, and a hand rubbed finsih is going to take quite a bit of time and even more abrasives, like Lorien mentioned.

80CrV2 makes for a great knife steel AND a great sword steel. I would really hate myself if I spent all that time on a Cru-Wear sword just for it to break. Toughness numbers are quite low for ingot Cru-Wear to be used as a sword steel.
 
if I'ma make a sword, my #1 choices are 3V or 80CrV2 steel, or titanium.
 
Ken H> said:
You mention you plan to start making knives this year. What equip do you have for knife making? What type of grinder do you have? Seems like you've got a pretty ambitious project for first time, but it can be done. What are you plans for making - stock removal or forging?
Click to expand...
My plan is to start with stock removal. I haven’t purchased a grinder yet, I might wait a bit to save up some cash for a nice one.
 
SirSpice said:
You are going to need some serious machinery to grind fully heat treated cru-wear into that 24" sword. I'm not sure it would be my first choice of steel for a sword anyway. It is a low-toughness, high wear resistance steel.

Vasco-Die-toughness-low-alloy.jpg
Click to expand...
I should have mentioned that it’s a piece of cpm cruwear. (I’m not entirely sure if you can even buy non cpm cruwear anymore.)
 
Lorien said:
a tip to make your life easier; start with some precision ground A2. You can go about your business and make a knife, starting with a perfectly flat piece of steel and skip the whole squaring up process.

A2 is a relatively simple steel to harden well enough for a great knife. It's got some chromium carbides and not much else, so grinding it after ht is also not a major challenge.

It doesn't usually distort in heat treatment, so you can grind it to it's almost completely finished state without having to worrying about it changing. It's always easier to grind steel in its annealed state, which means you can use cheap AO belts and not spend extra on fancy ceramic ones.

practice your hand finishing skills with a reward, since A2 takes a nice finish quite easily due to the lack of the harder types of carbides. You can rub that cruwear all day before you get anywhere, and again, if you do then expect to pay more for abrasives.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the advice! I think I’ll have to alter my plans a little. 😂
 
Stuart Davenport Knives said:
Just for clarification, the numbers on the toughness chart above for Cru-Wear are for the ingot version (non CPM version). When I first glanced at it, I was thinking of the CPM Cru Wear, and those toughness number are reflected in the "Z-Wear" curve., which is Zapp's PM version of CPM Cru-Wear.

I don't think regular ingot Cru-Wear is a good choice at all for a sword. CPM Cru-wear or Zapp Z-wear are much better choices, but still I wouldn't recommend them as steels for a beginning knife maker to use, or for a sword, even after a few tries with 80CrV2. The grinding is nothing like a simple carbon steel, and is going to use a LOT more abrasives, and a hand rubbed finsih is going to take quite a bit of time and even more abrasives, like Lorien mentioned.

80CrV2 makes for a great knife steel AND a great sword steel. I would really hate myself if I spent all that time on a Cru-Wear sword just for it to break. Toughness numbers are quite low for ingot Cru-Wear to be used as a sword steel.
Click to expand...
Would 80CrV2 also make a good steel for a sword with a 20”-22” blade? I was planning to make this sword like the example with a blade about 15”-16” long.
 
I guess I should also ask, how thick of a piece of steel should I be using for a short sword? Is 3/16 enough, or is it better to go thicker?
 
I'll repeat Devin's advice.
Learn to make knives before making a sword. There is a huge difference.

You can make a knife (and a sword) with no grinder. A good Magi-cut file and lots of sandpaper will make a fine knife or sword.

Another thing you need to have worked out is who is going to do the HT. Not every HTer does sword lengths.

Start with a simple steel to HT. 80CrV2 would be fine. For a sword, you can use a simple steel like 1070-1084.

Most people make a sword way too thick and heavy. You might do well to start with 3/16" for your first replica sword. Larger blades may be 1/4" (or more) at the ricasso, but the blades taper to as thin as 1/8".
 
I'm not 100% sure, but I think this was my third or fourth knife. The only powered tool I used was a hand drill, everything else was done with a hacksaw, files and sandpaper. That's more or less mirror polished S30V. If you are a masochist, this is not a bad way to go.
zlFK0Bn.jpg
 
DevinT said:
It’s best to make small knives to start.

With little or no equipment and no experience, you’re not ready to make a sword.

See if there’s someone in your area to help.

Hoss
Click to expand...
I had planned to start with making some steak knives with piece of AEB-L I bought to start, it’s just the swords that excite me the most. 😂

How many knives should I aim to make before I take on larger projects?
 
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
I'll repeat Devin's advice.
Learn to make knives before making a sword. There is a huge difference.

You can make a knife (and a sword) with no grinder. A good Magi-cut file and lots of sandpaper will make a fine knife or sword.

Another thing you need to have worked out is who is going to do the HT. Not every HTer does sword lengths.

Start with a simple steel to HT. 80CrV2 would be fine. For a sword, you can use a simple steel like 1070-1084.

Most people make a sword way too thick and heavy. You might do well to start with 3/16" for your first replica sword. Larger blades may be 1/4" (or more) at the ricasso, but the blades taper to as thin as 1/8".
Click to expand...
I’ll try to be patient.😂
Will 3/16” make a usable sword of a gladius length when I do get to the point of making one?
 
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