Well, if you check results - all BM knives perform way less then knives from other manufacturers of same steel.
You tested 3 Benchmades. You tested a BM in M2, and did not test any other M2 knives. You tested a BM in M390, and did not test any other M390 knives. You tested knives in D2 that placed 2, 11, 12, 37, and 43, yet you try to say that a custom knifemaker is the one who properly represents the D2 that the majority of knife users will be exposed to. Ingot cast, PM, friction stirred, but you somehow have an authority to rank them with no hardness tests, no micrographs, no spec sheets, nothing but a postal scale and no parity among the blade specs.
What represents the 1095 that everyone without there own furnace and quench tank is going to get, 5th place or 24th place?
Poor heat treatment does misrepresent steel on my opinion. I value better performance, do not know about you.
What was poor about the heat treatment? What's in the grain boundaries? What's the grain size? What was the austenizing temp? What was the hold time? I have several more questions once you can answer those? Who had the good heat treatment? Your top two D2 blades are 9 positions apart, did 11th place also screw up their heat treat?
However on my opinion Benchmade D2 steel performs poorly, worse then CPM S30V and other steels on my tests, because they did not done good job with heat treatment and this has nothing to do with vanadium carbides.
You have absolutely no idea what they did in their heat treat, you have absolutely no idea if it is representative or an outlier, you have absolutely no idea what effects a different geometry would have on it, you have absolutely no idea what the performance in other tests is. You cut a little bit of rope with one knife and then make a determination on an entire company and alloy.
You say M390 doesn't have great performance. But the M390 came from a BM knife. You declare D2 an awesome steel when it is treated by a custom maker, yet it is also the worst steel when done by BM, worse than any other manufacturer. The BM M390 performed twice as well in the rankings as the BM D2, so where is your test of a Phil Wilson in M390, or a Kershaw, a Hinderer in 20CV, or any other brand/maker? Are you going to change your tune again when the Mule comes out in M390, since the ZDP by Spyderco now has taken spots 1 & 4? You know, that company holding back the industry and not satisfying the needs of knife users because they use inferior steels and not XHP? Besting the custom knife from Yuna, which holds spot 7. Oh, it also holds spot 19. Yeah, not only the exact same alloy, but the exact same knife... yet there are no issues in your test methodology that affects consistency.
Just how often is your tune going to change about steel rankings? When are you going to realize your inconsistency in a single test that does not account for any other use means your statements mean little to nothing at all?
I would add to this that same D2 heat treated by Dozier outperform any CPM S30V even from Buck and so this indicates that vanadium carbides have nothing to do with performance, as Mr.Mastif suggested, based on his experience with old carpet cutting with three knives.
You have no idea, because you do not cut old carpet, you only cut rope. CATRA, who you love to reference whenever S60V is mentioned, has a test with silica impregnated cardstock, and they also have a test with manila rope. Guess what, results are different between the two tests - kind of why they have two tests instead of just one. Knives with smaller and lower volumes of carbides get better test results on rope than on the cardstock.
You don't know anything about Mastiff's tests or his results. You also reject his results because they don't agree with yours, but will accept anyone else's positive praise of D2, XHP, or ZDP-189. You keep asking for others to do some tests or make some claims, but you only want the ones that agree with yours.
I tested 43 knives over several years (200 cuts 1/2" manila rote each) and have some idea how different steels perform, I also did a lot of ground digging, paper cutting, wood and leather work etc. My experience is real, not limited to old carpet replacement with three knives and a lot of reading of knife forums.
According to your list, you have tested 42
knives, not 43, and you have yet to test
steels. You have inconsistent placement for the same advertised alloys, because they are in different knives. You have changed your test equipment, test methods, and gotten different test results. The one knife you retested is currently a dozen spots apart with 43 total results. You find this acceptable. You complain about the heat treat of BM D2, yet think it belongs in the test results. You list a knife that, in your own words, misrepresents the steel. Then you aren't testing steel, you are testing knives.
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