Convince me that stainless is OK for traditionals.

I remember back in the 1960s when the guys down at the local hardware store would argue about stainless vs carbon steel knives. I don’t think any of them realized there were several different varieties of both. I think ignorance is to blame for much of the confusion and misinformation that still exists today. There isn’t really any bad about carbon or stainless only in application and there are reasons and purposes for both.

Almost all of my knives are stainless mostly because I’ve had some bad experiences with carbon steels and the stainless varieties that are available now are outstanding and perform well above anything years past providing they have proper heat treatment and design.

I do have some carbon steel knives and I have used them much in my younger years and they perform well enough for the purpose but in my lifestyle and environment I prefer to use stainless especially since diamond sharperers are available for the high hardness of the newer variety. I just glad we have the choices we have now.
 
Here is an oldie from the dawn of stainless knives....
LF&C Universal Stainless Boy Trooper from the early 1920s....
C7LNlJS.jpg
 
You're being ridiculous, and that stainless steel is just fine for a traditional pocket knife.

There was a lot of Stainless-bashing in the 70s and 80s. I remember reading an article about Bo Randall talking about not liking Stainless because it was so hard on grinding wheels. Once the industry discovered belt grinders a lot of them changed their minds. It was a change, and you probably know how resistant to change some old codgers can be.

Here's the best argument I can think of: I work in a plant that cuts 52,000 lineal feet of paper a day, and we're a small plant. We use Stainless blades everywhere that I can think of, and we use a lot of Stainless in places where we are guiding paper over or around various things because of its abrasion resistance. The steels are all alloys that any knife guy would recognize as every-day cutlery steels.
 
I also believe that 60+ years ago times were simpler and the technology and research just wasn’t developed yet. But with the technology, research and knowledge of present times it has advanced by leaps and bounds and the powdered stainless steels are far above in performance and what it can do. In more recent time the traditional pocket knives have been dipping the toe into the new premium stainless steels but mostly they have been using the more affordable varieties for about 100 years now. So my personal opinion is that stainless is considered a traditional steel.

Yes carbon steel is still useful and has the nostalgia, patina and in certain applications is necessary but it has a limit to how it can perform. For some people carbon steel it is sufficient and that’s good for them, I have nothing against their choice.
 
Just Tom. said:
Convince me that I’m being ridiculous, and that stainless steel is just fine for a traditional pocket knife.
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dsutton24 said:
You're being ridiculous, and that stainless steel is just fine for a traditional pocket knife.
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I think your confident delivery has convinced me 🤣:thumbsup:

Now I can be content with my old Camillus-made Buck 301, and save myself the $80 I was considering spending on a Case CV stockman…
 
Just Tom. said:
I think your confident delivery has convinced me 🤣:thumbsup:

Now I can be content with my old Camillus-made Buck 301, and save myself the $80 I was considering spending on a Case CV stockman…
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I've got a large CS (Case's current designation for carbon steel) Case Stockman and the dye job and jigging are beautiful - but the blades have play, the sheepsfoot rubs the main blade, the edges definitely weren't as refined as I like, the pull on the main clip blade is awfully light (for a big knife) and none of the blades are very snappy.

Sample group of one, so do with that info what you will, but on my example the type of steel used is, for me, of the least concern.

If they could resolve those issues, while I'd still prefer carbon, I'd take one in stainless.
 
What a strange question, it first appeared to me. But of course, it depends where and when your own starting point with knives commenced.

Personally, I cannot abide a carbon blade - I can smell it, and it makes me feel it’s dirty, and, the very last thing I’d use to cut up and eat an apple with, for example. There are many though, who are more than happy to use a heavily patina’d blade for cooking preparation and the like.

Even if I go back to when I was a kid, many years ago, kitchen knives were stainless and the ‘cheaper’ steels were used for garden tools etc.

For very many years, medical instruments have always been stainless steel, for obvious good reason.

Today, we have high carbon and stainless steels of all sorts - steels to pick and choose whatever task you’d like them for, with particular thanks to powdered steel technology.

We’re lucky in this respect, are we not, we can choose what steel we wish, and it’s not wrong.!
 
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Just Tom. said:
I think I agree, and I have some perfectly fine knives in stainless, but I just don’t seem able to warm to them. There is no real practical reason to dislike them, I don’t think, outside of aesthetics, and possibly how they feel cutting wood (though that may be all in my imagination too).
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To each his own. I do a bit of whittling and I enjoy the extra agression of a high-carbide steel, whether stainless or tool steel.
 
Untitled by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

For myself, I prefer stainless because I am so OCD it isn't funny and patina and me just never got along, that plus the fact that ambient air can take a razor sharp carbon blade and make it dull just sitting there a few days, you can probably strop it back to sharp again, but it just bugs me.

As mentioned in this thread, years ago the technology wasn't there yet to bring stainless into a better light for cutlery. But the generation way back, those guys were really No Nonsense kind of folk and would use what ever they had at hand. I imagine they'd chuckle how some people go crazy over the next steel flavour of the month, it wouldn't make sense to them at all. They just needed something to do the job, and I think, no offense to anyone, they were a tougher breed of men and gals back then.

And keep in mind, Stain....Less not StainNever although we now have a select few steels that can claim that, so again more technology. Soon we will have the light saber and some will argue that the old lasers were far better than the new ones. ;)

dats enough ramblin' for me :)
G2
 
Quality stainless steels have been around for many decades now, and they continue to get better and better. This Queen jumbo stockman is 70 years old and has blades of 440C, which was considered a "super steel" for quite a while.

Lrrx1jv.jpg


As alloys have improved both edge-holding and toughness have improved to where they greatly surpass traditional 1095 carbon. Many traditionals can now be had with M390 stainless, which not only resists corrosion but will cut for 4-5 times longer than 1095 before it needs sharpening. Here are a couple of examples, which could never be mistaken for "cheap junk."

jwznHMP.jpg


fiHoHzc.jpg
 
Gary W. Graley said:
Untitled by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

For myself, I prefer stainless because I am so OCD it isn't funny and patina and me just never got along, that plus the fact that ambient air can take a razor sharp carbon blade and make it dull just sitting there a few days, you can probably strop it back to sharp again, but it just bugs me.

As mentioned in this thread, years ago the technology wasn't there yet to bring stainless into a better light for cutlery. But the generation way back, those guys were really No Nonsense kind of folk and would use what ever they had at hand. I imagine they'd chuckle how some people go crazy over the next steel flavour of the month, it wouldn't make sense to them at all. They just needed something to do the job, and I think, no offense to anyone, they were a tougher breed of men and gals back then.

And keep in mind, Stain....Less not StainNever although we now have a select few steels that can claim that, so again more technology. Soon we will have the light saber and some will argue that the old lasers were far better than the new ones. ;)

dats enough ramblin' for me :)
G2
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The new laser swords just don't have the warmth and fidelity of the old laser swords. When I have to dispatch a squadron of jetpack-wearing space mercenaries, give me an old-school chemical beryllium laser sword any day - not that new-fangled neodymium-doped yttrium aluminum garnet crap!

🤣
 
hhmoore said:
J Just Tom.
Do you have any modern folders? If so, do you have the same concern about stainless steels in those? If not, why should it be an issue using the same steel in a different style knife?
I know black mamba black mamba showed one of these; but m390 is a good blade steel
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My impression, but I don't feel like he's questioning the utility of modern stainless steels - I think he's questioning their use on traditionals.

On the Viper examples shown above - some purists would object to the use of screw-together construction even though it's clearly an effective and proven method.

I see similarities to this in the discussions found in firearm forums where classic handgun aficionados may concede the utility of lightweight and durable polymer-framed pistols - but find the idea of a polymer-framed 1911 revolting.
 
birdsbeaks said:
My impression, but I don't feel like he's questioning the utility of modern stainless steels - I think he's questioning their use on traditionals.

On the Viper examples shown above - some purists would object to the use of screw-together construction even though it's clearly an effective and proven method.

I see similarities to this in the discussions found in firearm forums where classic handgun aficionados may concede the utility of lightweight and durable polymer-framed pistols - but find the idea of a polymer-framed 1911 revolting.
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I wouldn't wholly disagree about the screw-together construction...but the OP's repeated emphasis was on the idea of stainless being inferior and something he couldn't warm up to despite having some, hence my question.
I also took the thread as more of a discussion generator than anything else... despite having somewhat similar views depending on the knife.
 
Just Tom. said:
I somehow grew up with the idea that all stainless steel pocket knives were cheap junk, and I can’t seem to warm up to stainless steel even now. I have some knives I really like, except I still find the stainless blades off-putting. Convince me that I’m being ridiculous, and that stainless steel is just fine for a traditional pocket knife.

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Stainless Steel is fine for Pocket knives and would venture so far as to say for hard use larger type fixed blades is arguably a better option.

Metallurgy and the associated manufacturing processes have come a long way in the last 20-30 years. One of my uncles was a welder (RIP) and he would never have a stainless steel knife, he used to make submarines, some 30-40 years ago, made from two inch thick stainless steel. His understanding of the material most likely surpassed the layman's and looking back may have been tainted by personal experience.

In some respects we are all guilty of being members of the "flat earth" society, but being at the forefront of the technological and materials science revolution also has its own drawbacks.

In my cycling days I mistrusted the transition from good quality Reynolds carbon steel tubing to the lighter, stronger 6061 aircraft grade aluminium tubing but eventually relented and was the proud owner of a 3k Santa Cruz frameset, by then some pals had moved on to carbon fiber bikes and oh how I laughed when one of their 5K bikes suffered total catastrophic failure going down a hill at 40mph and the forks broke clean in two at the headset. Not long after the joke was on me as the Hope seatpost welded itself into the aluminium frame, despite all my efforts the frame ended up scrapped. I would, irrationally, never buy a carbon framed bike, despite new developments etc, such that some people even consider manufacturing submarines from the latest and greatest carbon fiber, with the recent catastrophic consequences that I am sure we all recall.

The lad who fell off totally revised his opinions and now races "penny farthings", which to me seems like out of the frying pan and into the fire!

Stain less steel however does have its own inherent problems, intergranular corrosion, does this affect the suitability for use in a pocket knife, probably not.
see link for further reading, not that I am an expert or anything but I do recall reading about it.


My preferences in knife steels are based on my experiences and preferences. why would I want to change that? Now if someone could invent a semi stainless steel that takes a patina, my preference, that would be really something......
 
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