Estimated blade life of a traditional

J

Joe21

Joined
Apr 15, 2012
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I recently purchased a case trapper yellow cv and it quickly became one of my favorite knives to use arouund the house. I use it for anything from working in the garden to working with para cord to peeling an orange when im outside. Its allways in my pocket when im around the house. The only reason i dont carry it out much is the weight. It occasionally sees use if im planning on doing any fencing or ranch work. I specifically bought a benchmade 530 REI special to carry outside of the house becase i found other knives were too bulky to carry in shorts or casual wear. By the time I had my cell phone and walet in my pockets i felt weighed down enough to carry a regular knife. Anyways, these 2 knives do 95% of my cutting tasks. That being said i was wondering how long the softer CV blade of the case will last with a couple weekly sharpenings on medium whetstone.
 
If you take care of the blade and don't take off too much steel when sharpening...it will last a lifetime.
 
Welcome to the forums!

Sounds like you will be using it and sharpening it quite a bit but I wouldn't worry too much about it. It will likely hold up much longer than you might think.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if you look back on this and think "Man, I remember 20 years ago I was wondering how long this blade would last".

I recommend just using it and sharpening it as needed. It just might surprise you. Either way, enjoy the knife and thanks for joining us.:thumbup:
 
You will more than likely lose the knife before you have a chance to wear it out.
Id say it will last a lifetime and then some.
Not bad for the price.
 
Stropping it on a leather belt with some metal polish instead of using a whetstone could mean the difference between a few years and a few lifetimes, depending on how coarse the stone is. With common sense use, most of the wear will be from the stone.
 
I've seen knives that have been used for years, the owner was careful with it and stropped more often that sharpened on a stone. The blade hardly looked warn. Chances are, you'll lose the knife or get bored of it before you ever wear it out.
 
+1 on Simple man & Ozark - unless your edge is really getting torn up, I'd bet a couple of strokes on a stropp will touch up the edge. Myy EDC touches a stopp about once a week (under normal use)
 
Till the folks that have more teaching knowledge on stropping show up, go over to the Maintenance and Tinkering forum and do a search. That ought to give you reading material for a whole evening......

300Bucks
 
Joe21 said:
I recently purchased a case trapper yellow cv and it quickly became one of my favorite knives to use arouund the house. I use it for anything from working in the garden to working with para cord to peeling an orange when im outside. Its allways in my pocket when im around the house. The only reason i dont carry it out much is the weight. It occasionally sees use if im planning on doing any fencing or ranch work. I specifically bought a benchmade 530 REI special to carry outside of the house becase i found other knives were too bulky to carry in shorts or casual wear. By the time I had my cell phone and walet in my pockets i felt weighed down enough to carry a regular knife. Anyways, these 2 knives do 95% of my cutting tasks. That being said i was wondering how long the softer CV blade of the case will last with a couple weekly sharpenings on medium whetstone.
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glocktenman said:
Here are two pics of a Case sod buster in CV my friend has had most of his life...I'm thinking he's 48 now. He's a hard worker and uses knives often.
View attachment 276384View attachment 276383
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Bingo.
How long a knife lasts depends on how much you use it.

I've seen lots of pictures of knives whose blades were worn down to a splinter because it was a working man's only knife. Took them decades to wear it down, but not a lifetime.

I've also seen pictures of knives which were 100 years old and had full blades. They were the ones which didn't get used much over the years.

If you carry and use more than one knife, likely a knife will outlive you. If you use only that one knife and you use it a lot, you will likely outlive it.
 
[You can find some] some real nice ones.

I'm still using MAAS metal polish with an old belt. You can always try Flitz or Mothers Mag Wheel Polish at any Wal-Mart if you can't find the others. I think I got my MAAS from CVS. To use, just rub it on by hand, let it dry, and strop edge trailing. There are a lot of good threads on stropping here for the searching.
 
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It really all just depends on the knife.
A little peanut may last a lifetime for some, but for others it may disappear after a few harder years of use.

I Case Large Stockman, I used it on the farm and had to sharpen it almost nightly, we had tough jobs for a blade, but we had to use what we had. It's missing a good bit of blade and it would have never lasted 10 years. I also have a hunting knife that has been sharpened down considerably. It's just because it get used most. I sharpen all my knives with a Lansky, so they all get the same treatment.

Thanks to a great member of this site, I can pull out my strop and touch the edge up, VS pulling out the Lansky and polishing the edge.
 
I have put a Opinel #9 through some hard, hard use for about five years with touch up sharpening during the day on the job, and sharpening at night, sometimes establishing a new edge here are some photos to compare a relatively new #9 against my work horse. The work knife has been used to scrape mortar, cut Sheetrock, score dura rock cut, tons of R8 insulation, and flex duct, it had also been used to start holed in 30gauge & 26gauge sheet metal. I love when people say Opinels are a picnic knife. No picnic for this knife just hard work.
d43b62e1.jpg

eab8d594.jpg

4e0a7622.jpg

Hope this helps.
 
A lot of good advice on this page and I agree with most of it.

A couple things I'll add. Angle matters. You put an aggressive edge on it and you'll need to sharpen it more. How you sharpen matters. Gently polishing the edge or lightly bringing an edge to life after hard use is much different than going all the way through your stone grits every time, hence these guys advocating stropping. They're right from what I've seen. I think the guide systems can help a knife last a lot longer. I'm more exacting and precise with a lansky, I don't take off as much metal needlessly.

Steel matters too. My D2 knives naturally don't get dull nearly as quickly on the same tasks. I love carbon steel but it does wear quite a bit faster.

Will
 
I'm with what everyone else said. Medium may be to coarse and learn to strop :)

Also, I'm a firm believer it has to do with how bothered you are by a small dent or chip. Can you handle it being there until the rest of the blade catches up or do you sharpen them out all the time. Further, if just the belly is dull, do you sharpen the entire length or just bring back the belly with a little control on a stone or strop?

I use nothing but a transucent stone and different strops for my traditionals for this very reason.

There is no real reason to need a more abrasive stone imo. Most traditionals have thin blades. Its not like an axe with a huge bevel you are working on.

Just more food for thought.

Kevin
 
I hear ya the Boker is my other work knife that I don't loan to other guys at work, so it's never gotten a chip unlike the Opinel. The Opinel is my dirty work tool that I don't mind loaning out to people who don't carry and respect a good cutting tool, also the Opi is my insulation knife and any chips in the blade result in just tearing the backing foil/paper.
5ac5ad56.jpg

Boker is about 7 years old and the Opinel is about 5, my original Opi got a huge chunk taken out when someone I loaned it to hit a live wire with it, lesson learned.
 
Stich2442 said:
I hear ya the Boker is my other work knife that I don't loan to other guys at work, so it's never gotten a chip unlike the Opinel. The Opinel is my dirty work tool that I don't mind loaning out to people who don't carry and respect a good cutting tool, also the Opi is my insulation knife and any chips in the blade result in just tearing the backing foil/paper.
5ac5ad56.jpg

Boker is about 7 years old and the Opinel is about 5, my original Opi got a huge chunk taken out when someone I loaned it to hit a live wire with it, lesson learned.
Click to expand...

I should have also added, if you NEED to sharpen out chips :)
 
You would not believe how many times a day guy at work would ask me for a knife, and how many times a day I have had to ask to get it back.
 
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