Care and Feeding of D-2 Steel?

I'd like to give you a warning...
Reshaping the point of a D2 knife is a bear to handle.
I had dropped my D2 BM211 and lost about 1mm of the tip. Spent hours restoring the tip and sharpen it.
But, D2 is good steel and doesn't rust easily as others pointed out. It is worth the effort.
If you are going to reshape the tip, I would suggest some coarser stones. I tried my arkansas stones and it took hours... An india benchstone may work better. I tried one at the shop and it took only a fraction of time to reprofile a blade comparing to my arkansas stones.

Sharpening system works fine for sharpening and reprofiling, I think, but to reshape the tip, I would prefer a plain benchstone. Less expensive ones would work fine.
 
If your fairly uneasy about fixing it yourself send it in to Benchmade they will charpen it up for you.
 
Would a cheap $5 diamond stone be the ticket? Does anyone know exactly what angle the 710 comes with? Article on tip reshaping? I love this thing so much, I don't want to hurt it.
 
I use a product called Cutting Edge Majic. I won't give a link for it because last time I posted to a similar comment and got kicked off for advertising. If you do a yahoo search for it, it will come up. I use this stuff on all my knives, and it works excellent.
 
Zero_Time said:
Would a cheap $5 diamond stone be the ticket? Does anyone know exactly what angle the 710 comes with? Article on tip reshaping? I love this thing so much, I don't want to hurt it.
Click to expand...

Yes a cheap stone would work, with diamonds don't press too hard, as generally this knocks off the diamonds. The initial angle on the knife really doesn't matter much because odds are low it is the optimal angle for you anyway. Even if you did know it exactly, it would be very difficult to match the angle with some kind of jig/clamp as most initial angles at 16 or 21 degrees so you will end up freehanding or resetting the edge anyway.

To reshape the tip, just take a marker and color in the part you need to remove to form the tip. Usually this isn't a large amount of metal and it just works as a guideline. Just grind the knife into the stone until the tip has the right shape. The metal removal will be very rapid at first because you are grinding a small amount of metal. It will slow down rapidly as you move into thicker steel. Once the curvature is correct you then have to form the bevels and this is done just as you would when you sharpen.

It is actually really simple, the above probably makes it sound far more complicated.

-Cliff
 
I normally don't put in my "two cents worth" because I often do things quite different than so many other knife makers. I don't want to sound like I am promoting or advertising this particular product so I am going to just give you the basic facts...

Cutting Edge Majic is an oil based, silicone nitrate that will penetrate the steel of your blade. It will help maintain the edge life and will thwart rust. I use it on my razor and it lasts up to three times longer.

As a knife maker, I would not let a single knife go out of my shop without first treating it with CEM and I work with nothing BUT high carbon tool steel blades.

D-2 steel, with the high chromium content, is a tool steel but it is the closest you will get to stainless steels without using stainless steel. That doesn't mean that it won't rust... Stainless means just that, stainless.
 
I have a 710 D2 and it has become my EDC knife. I keep it "pushcutting" sharp on the Spyderco Sharpmaker. It holds an edge forever, and only requires a slight "touch up" on the Sharpmaker after heavy use.

I've never used any kind of oil or other preservative on it, and it's never rusted. (I do, however, live in a dry climate.)
 
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