Cold Steel Knives
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The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
For the Want of a Knife - Lynn C Thompson
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I love Lynn's articles and am always happy to see more of what he has to say on pretty much anything. He's got a lot of experience really living life, so what he has to say is always interesting and valuable. Thanks for posting this, Cold Steel guy.
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that was a good article. i too hope im brave enough to step up when given the chance, and i also want to be able to better the world in small ways with my talents of knife sharpening which i dont charge for.
a small point in the article has raised an old question i have with cold steel regarding choice of steel. i understand steels are always a compromise between edge holding toughness and corrosion resistance, im not saying i know nearly as much about running a business, but for sake of curiosity and conversation, if CS is constantly trying to improve and offer the best, when the entireity of the knife community regards the aus series of stainless as mid grade, why is it used by cold steel, and if it is truly the best, why is it not the core of san mai III, which is regarded by cold steel as the best stuff a knife can be made from? i know countless cold steel fans, myself included, who all advertise, promote, and carry your products with good reason. theyre an excellent quality to price ratio. but out of all of these people, all of them have commented also "i wish cold steel would sell a more expensive version of this steel in __ steel". has cold steel tested cpm m4?
PS we miss VG1 folders and look forward to san mai ones
a small point in the article has raised an old question i have with cold steel regarding choice of steel. i understand steels are always a compromise between edge holding toughness and corrosion resistance, im not saying i know nearly as much about running a business, but for sake of curiosity and conversation, if CS is constantly trying to improve and offer the best, when the entireity of the knife community regards the aus series of stainless as mid grade, why is it used by cold steel, and if it is truly the best, why is it not the core of san mai III, which is regarded by cold steel as the best stuff a knife can be made from? i know countless cold steel fans, myself included, who all advertise, promote, and carry your products with good reason. theyre an excellent quality to price ratio. but out of all of these people, all of them have commented also "i wish cold steel would sell a more expensive version of this steel in __ steel". has cold steel tested cpm m4?
PS we miss VG1 folders and look forward to san mai ones
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AUS8A is an all around good performing steel. It doesn't excel at any one particular thing (except maybe ease of sharpening) but there's nothing it's bad at, either. It can take and hold an edge, take a beating, resist rust, etc.
Factor in that it's not too expensive, and you have a very attractive steel, no matter how you look at it.
VG-1 might hold an edge and resist rust better than AUS8A, but it's definitely not as easy to sharpen, nor is it as tough. You could certainly say similar things about more expensive steels like D2, 154CM, S30V, etc.
For the kinds of knives Cold Steel makes, I think AUS8A is great.
As for San Mai III folders...Cold Steel used to do that, but not anymore. My guess is that they were too expensive and didn't sell well enough for it to be a sustainable venture.
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Cold Steel has very tough quality control standards, and uses quality materials. Keeping the prices down isn't always easy. The thing about Cold Steel is that they at least seem to be far more concerned with performance than anything else. The bottom line is that you don't need carbon fiber scales or the super duper steel Blade has been going on about that happens to cost an arm and a leg. When performance is your primary concern it's easy to see that sometimes the most functional options are inexpensive.
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A "better steel"? For what? Different steels perform differently in different categories. AUS8A is an excellent "all around" steel. No, it absolutely won't hold an edge like S30V, but AUS8A is tougher and more flexible. AUS8A is a steel you can put on just about any knife and expect good results, because while it doesn't get top marks in anything (except perhaps ease of sharpening), there's nothing it's really bad at, either. S30V is awesome for an EDC folder, but I'm not so sure I'd want it on a combat knife, for instance. AUS8A is good for both.
Let's remember here that Cold Steel has always been primarily a martial company.
"We were tactical when tactical wasn't cool!" -Lynn C. Thompson
Cold Steel makes great EDC and utility knives, but its focus has always been on martial arts and combat. So, for a company with such a huge lineup, with a focus like Cold Steel's, it makes a lot of sense to widely use AUS8A, which is everything I described it to be above, and not too expensive, either!
You're not so sure? Well, I'll simply mention this:
"Strider Knives is a privately owned and operated company devoted solely to the development and construction of edged tools designed to survive use in the harshest of conditions.
The company was founded and is currently operated by former military personnel. The initial goal was to provide a field service knife constructed with the finest components available, yet affordable to the average enlisted man and within his maintenance abilities."
Guess what steel Strider uses. Hint, it's not AUS8. Zero Tolerance is another brand of knife catering to combat/military usage. They too use S30V, they do not use AUS8. Both companies that produce knives for military/combat usage, both HIGHLY respected in their fields, both with S30V, not AUS8. I'd certainly have no problems using S30V on an EDC folder OR a combat knife, as it too is good for both, but with better edge retention and corrosion resistance than AUS8.
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Please tell me you don't believe that tripe about Strider being founded by super duper tactical special ninja forces operators. Mick "Strider" was proven in court to be a liar.
Regarding the steels, AUS8A is still tougher than S30V. It's a better hard use steel. But, if you really want the ultimate in toughness and performance you'll need to look to carbon steels instead of stainless steels.
Cold Steel wins with their choice of steel yet again. Noss, after testing the $25 1055 GI Tanto by Cold Steel, remarks that not only is the GI Tanto tougher than the Strider BT, it cuts better, too!
[video=youtube;jlPzN5eGcvI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlPzN5eGcvI[/video]
Now, for AUS8A...
[video=youtube;Sbk6-bfzHQY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sbk6-bfzHQY[/video]
What more could you possibly want? There are dozens more tests you can see which prove AUS8A to be a great steel choice. Why would any value-minded person spend four or five times as much just for a steel which offers higher performance in one or two areas but lower performance in other critical areas?
Sorry, but "because Strider and Zero Tolerance use it" doesn't cut it. Real, proven performance does.
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Yes, carbon steel is higher performance than stainless.
Mick was military, just not "special forces" or whatever elite unit he was trying to pass himself off as(that's one reason I won't buy a Strider)...and his partners ARE legitimate(you can even find that in the thread you linked). And both Striders and ZT have been proven time and again, by many, many people who both have served and are currently serving in the military, there's more than a few members here who will testify to that from their own personal experience. Hell man, ZT is one of the most respected production makers out there, they didn't earn that level of respect for no reason.
And AUS8 is fine for me, but if I want the BEST, it's not AUS8. Has nothing to do with "value minded", look at the number of people who own Sebenzas or other CRKs-I will never buy one, cause the difference in performance between a $400+ Sebby and a $150 Spyderco is not worth the extra cost to me, but for many people, it is. It may not be "value minded", but plenty of people buy CRKs anyway, cause they want that extra level of quality, even with the huge increase in price. Or in my case, it's why I've payed $50+ for a Condor panga, but have yet to get around to spending $25 for a Cold Steel one. Sure, I'm not saying CS should quit using AUS8, they definitely shouldn't, but there's a reason there's so many people wish CS would use a better steel than AUS8, and there's also a reason why AUS8 is almost universally considered a mid-range steel.
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Strider continues to use the lies Mickey Ray Burger spread about "his past" to sell their products. I'm not doubting that ZT is well respected, but it is my opinion that a ZT won't really give me anything that my Recon 1 doesn't...while being a weaker knife overall.
[video=youtube;BybLLs4V2FA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BybLLs4V2FA[/video]
The point that I'm trying to emphasize here is that Cold Steel knows what they're doing. Over thirty years of Lynn's martial arts, hunting and survival experience, and Andrew Demko's custom knifemaking experience, goes into every Cold Steel knife. Not to mention the great contributions from Robert Vaughn, Ron Balicki, and others. AUS8A offers good performance in everything you could want in a knife steel. Edge retention, ease of sharpening, rust resistance, shock resistance, wear resistance, it's all there, it just isn't the best at any of them. Not only that, but it's pretty inexpensive. If you want a different steel, it will be better in some categories, but worse in others, regardless of its price point, and it is my opinion that the cost of manufacturing certain steels has a lot to do with the price point and not as much to do with performance (not implying that S30V and other expensive steels aren't high performance).
First off, that video of a LOCK failure has nothing to do with the qualities of the steel. And CS isn't immune to lock failure either, despite having probably the best locking mechanism in the industry:
[video=youtube;7WoEJwE2UsU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WoEJwE2UsU[/video].
See, even the very best can fail sometimes. Rare, and I certainly have no worries trusting MY triad lock knives, but still, it can happen. But both videos are irrelevant in terms of blade steel anyways...both those blades could have been made of some Wolverine quality adamantium or something and the lock could still fail. Yes, AUS8 is inexpensive, that's what makes it a good value...but there are a LOT of people who would be willing to pay a higher price for a higher quality steel(for me, it would depend on the knife and the price), if you look online it's pretty much the most requested thing for CS to do. S30V isn't weaker than AUS8, but it does have higher corrosion resistance AND better edge holding...both pretty big things to a lot of people(and the tradeoff is that it's just very slightly harder to sharpen, considering you won't need to sharpen it as often, I consider that more than a fair trade, if price wasn't an issue and I just wanted the best I could get). I'm not saying AUS8 sucks, I'm simply saying that it's not the best. Best in it's price range, probably so, but best overall, no...and there's a lot of people willing to pay the extra price for the extra quality level. And with the new Warcraft tanto using a higher grade steel, maybe CS is gonna branch out, and put out some stuff to appeal to all those people who like CS but aren't fond of AUS8. Me, I'll keep buying CS either way(in fact, I'm about to order a GI Tanto after coming into an unexpected $20), but I would at least like the option to get something a bit higher end.
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I'm not so sure if you watched the video. He annotated that the lock did not actually fail. He was depressing the lock bar while using the knife.
I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree on steels, or this is going to turn into a "Yes it is, no it isn't" kind of argument.
I'm not so sure if you watched the video. He annotated that the lock did not actually fail. He was depressing the lock bar while using the knife.
No, he said he may have depressed the lockbar, not that he's certain he did. It's also not the only example out there. Like I said, very rare, but even the best can fail.
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AUS-8 is okay, But why have only one flavor? Nobody is saying get rid of it, But give other options like every other knife company. I've got like 7 CS folders. Most of them are older models, ultra-lock and older plus the Rajah II. All AUS-8, which isn't bad but I won't be buying anymore because it's just more of the same.
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Show me one undeniable instance of the Tri-Ad lock failing under realistic circumstances. I'll wait.
Cold Steel also offers two folders in German 4116 from ThyssenKrupp...but it looks to me like folders are all you're looking at. Cold Steel has many fixed blades in different steels.
I'll see if I can find the old video I saw awhile back. And no, it wasn't under realistic circumstances, I don't expect it(or most locks, really) to fail under realistic circumstances, you basically HAVE to be doing something like bashing the spine full force against a rock or tree or something.