Help me get caught up.

The rise of very high quality, Chinese OEM work. Reate, WE, Bestech, are all doing excellent work at extremely competitive price points.
 
Mo2 said:
Yea, I mean it depends on the ht. Most of the China stuff rusts super easy. I mean unless you take care of them. My China d2 rusts unless I oil it. The USA stuff doesn't seem to rust easy at all. Go figure.
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All my D2 is American made, so I can't really speak to Chinese D2 rusting, but that seems odd. So long as the steel is the same composition and good HT, the steel has no idea where it was smelted. I wonder why it would make a difference.
 
Mo2 said:
Yea, I mean it depends on the ht. Most of the China stuff rusts super easy. I mean unless you take care of them. My China d2 rusts unless I oil it. The USA stuff doesn't seem to rust easy at all. Go figure.
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Rust resistance doesn't really have anything to do with heat treat.
 
Barman1 said:
I was a serious holdout but they've worn me down a bit.
My 3 most carried are US designed and manufactured but I do appreciate the variety and innovation that the aforementioned have to offer.
Right now I'm chasing a couple of Italian made folders that will be released this week, lots of innovation going on in that neck of the woods as well.
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Chinese knives seem to still be at their best when they are designed by 3rd party designers.

They have certainly got the production down but I still find many of their in house knives to be “over-designed”.

Their collab knives with well known designers have become truly impressive.
 
19-3ben said:
All my D2 is American made, so I can't really speak to Chinese D2 rusting, but that seems odd. So long as the steel is the same composition and good HT, the steel has no idea where it was smelted. I wonder why it would make a difference.
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It doesn't. Real D2 isn't rust prone, regardless of where it is heat treated.
 
Its my impression, that some of the Chinese 'D2' steel suffer from 'Bark River Syndrome:' Just because it says D2 on the knife, it might not actually be D2.
China makes some beautiful knives but its not unknown for some manufacturers to maybe not always be completely … truthful (knowingly or not).

Caveat; I dont own any Chinese D2 knives - actual D2 or not.
I have US and European D2 knives and they friggin' rock (as does A2). Ohh, and they dont have a tendency to rust.
 
marcinek said:
Rust resistance doesn't really have anything to do with heat treat.
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Everything I've read on the subject it says it does. In fact the difference between 3v and delta 3v is the heat treatment and d3v being way more corrosion resistant. Heat treatment is a profile or recipe so to say. Of different temperatures and hold times for different events to happen to the steel and depending how its done will result in the end result. Ie if you hold d2 at a specific heat for the required amount of time to let the carbides and carbon come into solution you won't have issues like chipping and rust and getting that good grain structure known from the USA makers. The other thing that matters is tempering Temps and durations.

I mean maybe it's better if you read some of the posts on heat treatment from the guys I've learned from in the knife making subfoeums. I'm less about explaining it and more about just understanding it.
 
Rust resistance is affected by heat treatment. No amount of heat treating is going to help 1095. But higher hardening temperatures means more chromium carbides dissolve leaving more chromium in solution to contribute to corrosion resistance. I have an article on how much chromium D2 needs to be stainless with more info. Also an upper temper leads to the precipitation of tiny chromium carbides which reduces corrosion resistance. It’s hard to reduce the technical information in a short response, but in summary heat treatment can definitely affect corrosion resistance.
 
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My understanding is

1) Heat treatment is primarily a "hardness/strength/etc" process;
2) Heat treated metal is often more rust resistant than the same metal which has not been heat treated.

But I will defer to what the experts here have told you.
 
Heat treated steel is more rust resistant for the same reason I gave above. Corrosion resistance isn’t an on/off thing like heat treating turns it on. Different heat treatments lead to different amounts of chromium in solution.
 
Though to be clear I’m not suggesting I have any knowledge about American heat treated D2 having significantly different corrosion resistance to Chinese heat treated D2, if they were both using the standard industrial practice it would be similar.
 
Larrin said:
Though to be clear I’m not suggesting I have any knowledge about American heat treated D2 having significantly different corrosion resistance to Chinese heat treated D2, if they were both using the standard industrial practice it would be similar.
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So, and tell me if I am putting words in your mouth, you are saying that, from your understanding, D2 with treatment A and D2 with treatment B, if A and B both use standard practice to produce a steel usable for a knife (acceptable hardness, strength, etc), should have similar rust resistance.
 
marcinek said:
So, and tell me if I am putting words in your mouth, you are saying that, from your understanding, D2 with treatment A and D2 with treatment B, if A and B both use standard practice to produce a steel usable for a knife (acceptable hardness, strength, etc), should have similar rust resistance.
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When I say standard industrial practice I am referring to the heat treatment. If the heat treatment is the same and the composition is the same then the corrosion resistance is the same.

Edit: And I’m referring to the steel only and not surface finish or coatings.
 
Larrin said:
When I say standard industrial practice I am referring to the heat treatment. If the heat treatment is the same and the composition is the same then the corrosion resistance is the same.

Edit: And I’m referring to the steel only and not surface finish or coatings.
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Now this may be unanswerable, but...if 2 heat treats produce, say, similar hardness, will they produce similar rust resistance?
 
marcinek said:
Now this may be unanswerable, but...if 2 heat treats produce, say, similar hardness, will they produce similar rust resistance?
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They may not, a classic example is whether an upper or lower temper is used. A lot of stainless steel data sheets specifically recommend against the upper temper, which has been relatively commonly used in 154CM, ATS-34, and BG-42. The S110V datasheet has some experimental results.
 
marcinek said:
Now this may be unanswerable, but...if 2 heat treats produce, say, similar hardness, will they produce similar rust resistance?
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Well... . Two knives of different recipes can be very different from one another but be the same hardness. Hrc can only tell you hrc. Not the grain structure of the steel or other things.
 
Larrin said:
I wonder why it took so long given that D2 has been ubiquitous as a tool steel for so many decades. Should have been cheap.
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Probably because the cost of machining D2 are higher and it is harder on equipment (not more than some other more expensive new super steels).

One of the things I noted from D2 knives made by queen, they seemed to be ground thicker. Less material removed than with similar knives from them in Ats34, and other stainless and carbon steel models...... like grinding away the D2 was just taking too darned long!!!! My experience is anecdotal...


kvaughn said:
There has been surge in the popularity of quality traditional slipjoints. Particularly American made.--KV
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I'd agree with this too. GEC has really hit the scene, as well as custom, and collaboration knives.... but I've sure got more traditional folders than ever.
 
Mo2 said:
Well... . Two knives of different recipes can be very different from one another but be the same hardness. Hrc can only tell you hrc. Not the grain structure of the steel or other things.
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Recipes? What do you mean?
 
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