Japanese White Steel???

rmp1911

rmp1911

Joined
Nov 15, 2012
Messages
52
Hello All,

Just a quick question.

As an aspiring knife maker, I have been doing my homework and researching all of the different knife steels out there in the world today (Mainly High Carbon Steel). I have found that there are a lot of great high carbon knife steels out there and there is no "Ultimate" knife steel. True, some will slightly outperform others depending on the task at hand but in truth, I don't believe it's "All" about the steel. IMO, It comes down to proper heat treating.

So, my questions is... What is the big stink about Japanese white steel?

Please keep in mind, I am not trying to stir up a hornets nest with all the steel snobs, I'm simply just asking a question. I'm asking because I can't find anything that proves White Steel to be superior to other steels such as 52100, 1095, 1084, O1 etc.

Please let my know your thoughts.

Thanks
 
It is very nice stuff, but more importantly, it is exotic and trendy right now. Supply and demand...
 
I've never worked with it or even owned a knife made from white steel. What makes it very nice Salem?
 
Well, I've not used it either. I believe they don't re-melt anything into those batches- so it has a purity that is hard to match by methods commonly used elsewhere, in terms of trace ingredients that are undesirable. Also, from batch to batch, alloy content is kept under tight control. For instance, here are alloy specs for white # 2:

Carbon 1-1.2%, Silicon 0.1-0.2%, Phosphorus .025%, Manganese 0.2-0.3%, Sulfur .004%, balance Iron.

AISI guidelines for W1 tool steel, showing that one batch could be significantly different than another:

0.70-1.50% Carbon, 0.10-0.40% Manganese, 0.10-0.40% Silicon, 0.15%, 0.20% Nickel, 0.10% Molybdenum, 0.15% Tungsten, 0.10% Vanadium, 0.20% Copper, 0.025% Phosphorus, 0.025% Sulfur, and the balance Iron.

You can see that W1, while quite similar, can have a greatly varying range of carbon, has more trace elements floating around in it, can have significantly more sulfur, and can have more manganese.

In particular, low manganese is very attractive to guys who clay quench for hamons. Manganese makes steel deep-harden, less of it means better activity in your hamon.

Here are specs on the W2 Don Hanson used to sell, which I use, and which in my opinion is probably close enough to Shirogami for almost anyone. The small amounts of trace ingredients don't mean much to me. Plus, it's got enough vanadium to enhance wear resistance...

C .95, Mn .22, V .19, Cr .15, Si .23, Mo .013, Ni .08, Cu .14

I hear Aldo's W2 is based on these numbers as well.

To me, this all means that if you source your non-Japanese steel carefully, you can get a version of an alloy that has properties just as good for your use as a "paper steel" would be.
Unless what you want in an alloy is the cache of the exotic. Then, paper steels become near the top of the list.
 
The Hitachi steels are known for their purity over any other steel. The S and P counts are extremely low. I think the fact that Hitachi limits their steel to Japanese smiths only (for the most part) gives White and Blue steels a mystique about them, but they aren't any sort of super steel. Just hard to get. White steel being basically just iron and carbon, with only a touch of Mn and Si. The blue steel having T and a bit of Cr added. And the Super blue has V on top of the W and Cr. The White steel is a very very fine grained steel....known for it's incredibly sharp edges, and the blue steel is known for it's carbide formation.
 
I use it. Purity and consistence are its forte.

It is popular mainly due to the cooking craze from the TV shows, which tends to make people think Japanese steel is superior.

Good 1095 or W2 will make an equally high quality knife with proper HT. None will make a high quality knife with poor HT.

Unless possessing the skills and equipment to work it, and selling to people who will pay the difference, there is no advantage to using Hitachi white/blue steels.
 
The hamon is amazing in the white steel, but it is also with Don's or Aldo's W2. The vanadium in the W2 ads some zing to the hamon. Aldo's is very close in composition to Don's. With these steels, temp control is a must. I recently did some tests with Aldo's W2, and found raising or lowering austentizing temp by as little as 10f starts to impact the steel's consistency in heat treatment and 20f from optimum starts decreasing overall hardness attained. Don uses 1450, where in my shop 1460f was the sweet spot. I chalk this up to thermocouple variation, but sent a piece to Don to check on his equipment.
 
Very good information. Thank you very much for your quick responses. It is very much appreciated.

I started working with O1 and 1095 but have recently been working with 52100 and really like it. Easy to work and takes a great edge. I've also started working with 1084 because I'm interested to see how much of a performance difference there is between 1095 and 1084. My guess...not much. I have some 1084 knives profiled and almost ready for heat treat. When they are complete, I'll update with my results and thoughts.

Thanks again
 
Hello, I'm Nathan Akins,

I'm getting into wood carving and I'm going to make a knife. I have found (correct me if I'm wrong ) that the finer the carbide and grain, the sharper the edge can possibly get. I know that heat treat and all that matters. I have found that 13c26 has an average carbide of a sixth of a micron. I have heard that o-1 has tiny grain too. I would like to know what O1 steel with a proper heat treat, and shirogami steel with a proper heat treat, average carbide/ grain sizes.

Thank you very very much.


Does anyone know how to start an article? I'm new and I'd think I'd get more answers with my own article
 
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Like the others have said, CLEAN appears to be the name of the game with those Hitachi steels. I also wonder if the formulas are specifically created to compensate for the rather primitive and sometimes hair raising traditional Japanese forging methods where they do stuff heat thin steel a lot and hammer cold blades.
 
You mean like forging it down to the width of a dime, cold forging it, then water quenching and hammer straightening while its 64rc:D. The secret in surviving all this brutal treatment is the construction Im guessing. I don't think you would see this done too much with a Honyaki blade..
 
Kentucky said:
You mean like forging it down to the width of a dime, cold forging it, then water quenching and hammer straightening while its 64rc:D. The secret in surviving all this brutal treatment is the construction Im guessing. I don't think you would see this done too much with a Honyaki blade..
Click to expand...
I have wondered why the Japanese smiths have it reversed from us in that a monosteel honyaki blade is considered to be more difficult to make but a simple forge welded blade easier? We probably have the answer there. :D
 
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