Carboquartz for handle material and comparing to others for super strength/weather

H

HouseBuilder328

Joined
Feb 28, 2018
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What are your guys' thoughts on using Carboquartz for a knife handle? It is strong and weatherproof? Would it be more expensive than black canvas? I'm trying to build a knife using carboquartz handles and zircuti bolsters and wondering about the look. The carboquartz material really intrigues me.

Most people using Zircuti or Darkti bolsters use black canvas or marble carbon fiber for the handle which provides a nice contrast. Would carboquartz provide the same great contrast?
 
Nobody knows what it's actually made from, and it's expensive as sin, so who's ever going to find out how it performs under use? Just seems like another thing for the IG trust fund crowd to spend on, and the "grail" dealers to make a buck on. There are plenty of proven, non-proprietary materials, at lower prices, with well-understood robustness, and nice contrast.
 
Nobody seems to know what it is, precisely. To me, it looks like a layered composite made of polymer with some shiny textile reinforcement.

I don't think anybody using it cares about its performance, but rather how it looks. I would imagine it's plenty stiff and strong enough for knife handle, especially for one seeing little to no use. It will also probably be water proof or very water resistant, if it's anything like glass fiber or carbon fiber reinforced polymers.

I say just go for it if you like it. Let us know how it works out!
 
It's gonna be expensive and the person buying it is not gonna use it.

Carbo quartz I assume would crack if dropped. As far as I know it would work fine in weather. It's also hard on tools. So you may need to buy more bits or belts.

Very few have got to handle this material let alone use it in a hard use scenario. Almost every knife made with it, is a safe knife.
 
Thanks guys - in that case, what knife material should I build instead of expensive carboquartz if it's just to say I have it? How is it compared to marble carbon fiber? How about black linen canvas? Seems like they all have similar looks. How about toughness and waterproof qualities?

I'm trying to create a nice contrast between the Zircuti bolster and the handle.
 
HouseBuilder328 said:
what knife material should I build instead of expensive carboquartz if it's just to say I have it? How is it compared to marble carbon fiber? How about black linen canvas?
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Sorry, I don't understand what "if it's just to say I have it" means.

There are a lot of proven composite materials available, but I don't think you can make quality comparisons to carboquartz unless you're going to perform your own destructive testing.
 
vanadium said:
Sorry, I don't understand what "if it's just to say I have it" means.
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I just blurted that out because apparently, nobody thinks carboquartz is worth it. I'm not going to make a knife handle out of carboquartz just to "say that I have it." What other material would provide a nice contrast to Zircuti or Darkti bolsters? Maybe marble carbon fiber? How about black linen canvas? Need something that is very tough, waterproof and will not discolor after many years.
 
HouseBuilder328 said:
I just blurted that out because apparently, nobody thinks carboquartz is worth it. I'm not going to make a knife handle out of carboquartz just to "say that I have it." What other material would provide a nice contrast to Zircuti or Darkti bolsters? Maybe marble carbon fiber? How about black linen canvas? Need something that is very tough, waterproof and will not discolor after many years.
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Smart move. Nobody can answer you on performance figures because they don't exist; the material is too rare, expensive, and recent to justify it.
I don't like dressy knives in the first place but if for some reason I had to have something match timascus bolsters then I'd use marbled CF.
 
Are you going to commission a maker to make a knife for you, or are you making the knife??
 
This is what I found out about it... from a Jim Skelton video. If it really is built this way, I really doubt it would crack easily or at all. They layer a bunch of thin ply's alternately it should be really quite super strong. I have not tested it or had any... but I think I would like to: )

"TPT, which stands for thin ply technology, is a method for making ultra-thin unidirectional strand sheets of carbon fibers. The sheets aren’t just fibers however, they are “tapes” that are pre-impregnated (“prepreg”) with resin for more accurate and controllable application in use.

The resin is the material that works like a glue to hold the carbon fibers together; when placed under heat and pressure the resin flows between all the fibers and finally hardens to create the solid carbon fiber material we are familiar with.

The TPT carbon tapes used in Richard Mille cases have layers that are, on average, around 45 microns thin, or just under two-thousandths of an inch (.002”). Moving on to TPT Quartz, the construction is the same, only it is composed not of carbon fibers, but of fused quartz fibers. These fibers start out life as purified ground quartz crystals. These crystals are fused with heat and pressure to create fused quartz rods. These rods are then drawn (pulled and squished) under an oxy-hydrogen flame to create extremely long continuous fibers of fused quartz."
 
dirc said:
fused quartz fibers
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Nice to know, if true. Thanks for doing the research. I still can't really grasp why someone would pay a premium for it, but that's subjective.

HouseBuilder328 said:
What other material would provide a nice contrast to Zircuti or Darkti bolsters?
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Ivory linen micarta might be nice:
hXLRFLJ.png

Here's an example from Richard Rogers:
D3AyQw6.jpg
 
dirc said:
it seems to have won the 2016 'innovation award' from a composites material non-profit promo group, JEC:
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I can't see any mention of Carboquartz on this page, but the video won't play for me. Which award did it win? Best decorative countertop? :rolleyes:
 
I had to update my link, it's good now - (and sadly uses flash video :( - but the award was for: (which then became to be used in knife scales afterwards)
Luxury: North Thin Ply Technology (NTPT) (Switzerland), Richard Mille (Switzerland)
Development of unique thin ply quartz composite watch case for Richard Mille timepiece
 
dirc said:
This is what I found out about it... from a Jim Skelton video. If it really is built this way, I really doubt it would crack easily or at all. They layer a bunch of thin ply's alternately it should be really quite super strong. I have not tested it or had any... but I think I would like to: )

"TPT, which stands for thin ply technology, is a method for making ultra-thin unidirectional strand sheets of carbon fibers. The sheets aren’t just fibers however, they are “tapes” that are pre-impregnated (“prepreg”) with resin for more accurate and controllable application in use.

The resin is the material that works like a glue to hold the carbon fibers together; when placed under heat and pressure the resin flows between all the fibers and finally hardens to create the solid carbon fiber material we are familiar with.

The TPT carbon tapes used in Richard Mille cases have layers that are, on average, around 45 microns thin, or just under two-thousandths of an inch (.002”). Moving on to TPT Quartz, the construction is the same, only it is composed not of carbon fibers, but of fused quartz fibers. These fibers start out life as purified ground quartz crystals. These crystals are fused with heat and pressure to create fused quartz rods. These rods are then drawn (pulled and squished) under an oxy-hydrogen flame to create extremely long continuous fibers of fused quartz."
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So it's just unidirectional quartz plies layered together with a resin?
 
marrenmiller said:
So it's just unidirectional quartz plies layered together with a resin?
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Yeah, or alternating with layers of CF.

For those who don't know, "mineral wool" composites are not a new thing, and include Dupont Corian and also (some of?) the original Micarta used on pool cues etc. Beautiful and brittle.
 
the original use, (and award), was for for super thin alternating layers of carbon and quartz...
the knife application of this material seems to be not nearly so intricate or advanced, they seem to use much much thicker layers of it - so it's not really the same thing that the award was for

at least that's my take on it after reviewing a bunch of info... if any knife makers are using the actual stuff from richard mille watch cases, then the prices would make rocksteads look cheap
 
I did a little bit of digging, and found that quartz fiber composites are a real structural product category. A composite called AstroQuartz is an established aerospace material with some history (data sheet here). There's also some data on quartz textiles here, the type which would be the basis for any composite. All in all, CarboQuartz could be a strong material — but if you really want a strong material, it's probably best to buy one with a data sheet and some documented testing, rather than one with a 'secret' formula and an award for luxury. YMMV.
 
A few knifemakers I've spoken to about it essentially said the same thing. WAY too expensive for what it is. When the fad cools off the prices should drop.
 
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