Pics of serious breaks chips or cracks on a S30v blade.

[severedthumbs]

http://raum.10gbfreehost.com/Articles/UKPK.html

this isnt chipping, it is however profiling a blade down to shit and then using it incorrectly. what is that old Mark Twain saying?

 

[Abacus]

Maybe we should all just stop using s30v. Kind of amazing that a type of steel could cause so much animosity. Surely there must be a steel that we can all agree is good?...

I'm basically kidding. But I guess I'm not a hardcore enough knifenut type to care too deeply. Most of my opinions are rooted in personal experience--experience which has shown me that a SAK will pretty much cut whatever I need to cut, and that a standard buck 110 is enough for almost anyone.

Partly this may stem from the fact that I'm a missionary and have very little income and can't afford very nice knives. Another part of me thinks that it has more to do with my belief that people should actually try different steels and thinner edges and see what conclusions they come up with on their own, instead of getting into heated debate about how well they feel a steel should theoretically perform, based soley on other's experience.

We're all just here cause cutting stuff is fun, right?

 

[Buhbuhbonky]

we're all here because TALKING ABOUT cutting stuff is fun

 

[lvbuckeye27]

i can't understand the flack that Vivi is taking. they're his blades. if he wants a 10 degree angle, that's his perogative... which makes me wonder, does anyone know offhand what the angle on a surgical scalpel is? i'm guessing it's closer to 10 degrees than 40. how about your razor blades?

someone should take a knife with a 30 degree angle and another with a 10 degree angle of similar sharpness, cut an apple in half with each, then wait and see which apple turns brown first. the cleaner cut will last longer without browning.

 

[hardheart]

Vivi is taking flak because he posted pics without telling the reader that he sharpened flat to the stone like all the bad darksiders do, cut metal, and then sharpened it again.

I guess he thought that posting this info in other threads here, in reviews on his website, with comparison pics to other knives, provided knives sharpened to ridiculously low angles in the passaround forum, and also providing links to youtube videos was enough. Obviously not, since we have to have an S30V thread every other day, you must also describe whatever you do in painstaking detail every other day because we love to rehash things constantly.

 

[k12s]

Most post-initial release and heat-treating chipping issues with S30V come from factory fresh blades. Factory sharpening causes some micro chipping, some of the time in S30V. Just as several posters in this thread state, it microchipped/they sharpened it by hand a few times/no more problems.

Pretty funny that the OP asked for pictures showing the chips, and the only guy who says he has some states no one is interested in seeing them.

This was the issue with my BM740. When I first got it I was disapointed at how easily it would chip on cardboard at the Sharpemaker 30 degree settings. This was my first knife with S30V. Sometimes it would literally take hours to work the chips out with the Sharpemaker. I eventually backbeveled at 30 and set the edge at 40 and it held up better, but stopped using it. I started using a Krien flat grind zdp189 Endura.

But a month ago I purchased the diamonds for the Shapemaker and reprofiled the edges back to 30 (took alot of steel off). Then went to the greys and on to the fines.

It has performed excellent ever since. Must have been something with the heat treat or the factory sharpening method.

My 2 cents.....

 

[Gator97]

However, if I point you to the fact that my new German-made Wusthof kitchen knives, and indeed all german kitchen knives, have angles of AT LEAST 40 degrees, sometimes 45.

Which is why they're vastly inferior in terms of cutting ability to Japanese kitchen knives sharpened to much acute angles. And because German knives use softer steel they hold the edge much worse too.

Something tells me that after hundreds of years, those plucky folks in Solingen would have figured out a pretty good angle for cutlery, and especially cutlery used in food prep.

Whatever thing tells you that, is wrong. For one, German cutlery makers are not original in their love of thick edges. Petty much any factory knife comes with edge between 40 -50. So are many customs. And it is not because fat edges cut better, it's because it stays there longer. So, in the end it's not specific to kitchen knife. It's happening because knife makers, custom and factory alike, know very well that average user has no clue what is a high performance edge, how to sharpen a knife, will abuse it in many ways, and if you give him thin edged knife he'll dull it on first use and probably return it with a complaint. Although, to give the user acute edge you'd have to use much harder steel, not 52-56 HRC that those knives typically come with.

While you do make my toes tingle, Vivi, I'm going to trust hundreds of years of knifemaking when I decide what angle to put on my knives, not just the word of a few folks on the 'net.

What you're trusting is few decades of mass market knife business and marketing, not knife making. For few hundred years stainless steel wasn't there to begin with.
Anyway, point is if you use your kitchen knives like an average knife user, i.e. hardly ever sharpen it, use it as a screwdriver, chisel and and a meat cleaver, leave them unwashed overnight after food prep, wash them in the dishwasher, drop them in the sink etc... Then perhaps U're better off with 50deg. angle stainless steel knife.

If you take care of your kitchen knives then you're missing huge performance improvement because of those axe like edges and inferior steel.

 

[Gator97]

I also like to see proves. To me this "brittleness" argument (as well as hard to sharpen) came any time new steel came to the market, but I never see proves and my experience different.

S30V is hardly a new steel by now. As for the proof, well not everyone has digicam handy when it happens. So, sometimes U'll have to trust them

 

[Larrin]

I disagree, S30V is a rather new steel.

 

[OwenM]

"Rather" is pretty vague. Compared to some simple carbon steels, almost every currently popular steel, particularly stainless ones, are rather new.
It's been in regular use since 2002. Some makers may have had some in '01, don't remember when Crucible actually started shipping it. I got a prototype from one maker, and one of the first batch of S30V knives from another at Blade in June 2002. By then many makers and HT guys like Paul Bos had already standardized after trying different hardnesses and HT schedules. Didn't start seeing it so much in production knives until 2003.
It may not be "new", but there's a lot of steels that are newer.

 

[Larrin]

"A lot" is pretty vague. Name five.

 

[OwenM]

Weird that we're back on here at the same time(course I've been playing on the internet off and on all day!).

Well, more recently we've begun to see specialty steels like ZDP-189, newer products from Crucible like CPMD2 and CPM154, along with fairly widespread use of steels that may not necessarily be new, but not formerly seen as common blade steel like 13C26 and 8CR13MoV.

 

[nozh2002]

S30V is hardly a new steel by now. As for the proof, well not everyone has digicam handy when it happens. So, sometimes U'll have to trust them

Well, I agree it is hardly a new steel, however as I sad - this "brittleness" argument (as well as hard to sharpen) came any time new steel came to the market. I am not saying here that CPM S30V is new steel as you may see. Believe me I now what steel is new and what not.

I am observing this brittleness+hard_to_sharp again and again and again - to me this is looks like just some kind of negative PR started by manufacturers who just can not or do not want to change. Keeping this in mind I rather will not trust such statements and ask for prove. In many cases this proves never came. Like in this case - I do not see so far what These_Nutz asked for starting this thread.

My formal testing as well as experience in day to day use shows that this steel is excellent steel and not brittle as it was represented.

Thanks, Vassili.

 

[OwenM]

True, we've seen the same arguments previously against ATS-34, BG-42, D2, S90V, and more recently ZDP-189 to name a few.

edit: I don't know much about ZDP-189 but just like with S30V, have used the first four I listed extensively with no problems related to the materials themselves. I've also created problems by (mostly intentionally)abusing all of them, and have seen nothing to turn me away from any of them, aside from limiting the size and type of knife that I would have them in, since none are suitable for heavy impacts and things of that nature.

 

[nozh2002]

...Like in this case - I do not see so far what These_Nutz asked for starting this thread...

And this alone demonstrates clearly that we should not trust to any loud accusation. Usually it is just a way to compete at least somehow better steel.

Thanks, Vassili.

 

[nozh2002]

True, we've seen the same arguments previously against ATS-34, BG-42, D2, S90V, and more recently ZDP-189 to name a few.

edit: I don't know much about ZDP-189 but just like with S30V, have used the first four I listed extensively with no problems related to the materials themselves. I've also created problems by (mostly intentionally)abusing all of them, and have seen nothing to turn me away from any of them, aside from limiting the size and type of knife that I would have them in, since none are suitable for heavy impacts and things of that nature.

ZDP189 is so far best steel I know. I almost abuse my Yuna knife cutting drywall, aluminum window screen, roots in sandy ground, chopping little but dry branches - it dulls, I have to admit, but it stand all of this better then many other steel and hold edge just superior to anything else.

Thanks, Vassili.

 

[Gator97]

I did have chipping problem with several Benchmade ATS-34 blades. Every time the blade had double bevel 30/40. Most of the time chipping was due to copper wire cutting. And that was not RCS cable, just a thin copper wire. No way it should've chipped on that. Copper's too soft compared to properly heat treated tool steel.

As for the chipping and rolling on S30V, here you go, those are taken couple years ago. But you can enjoy them in 32x-60x magnification.

Edge degradation macros

Bear in mind all that you'll see in the gallery is happening in the kitchen. No bone chopping, honest Just veggies, meat (boneless) and other food including bread. And I never cut anything w/o good cutting board, so it wasn't chipped on marble or steel plate either.

For comparison you can see how M2 behaved at 62HRC. I didn't sharpen or steel both knives during those 7 weeks.

 

[knarfeng]

Nice pics. Thanks for sharing them.

 

[Gator97]

Well, more recently we've begun to see specialty steels like ZDP-189, newer products from Crucible like CPMD2 and CPM154, along with fairly widespread use of steels that may not necessarily be new, but not formerly seen as common blade steel like 13C26 and 8CR13MoV.

I'd add CowryX, SP2, I think SRS-15 is also new.There's also R2 powdered steel.

 

[shecky]

Well, I agree it is hardly a new steel, however as I sad - this "brittleness" argument (as well as hard to sharpen) came any time new steel came to the market.

FWIW, there were a number of anecdotes about s30v chipping on this very forum. The problem with these accounts is that they're rarely reported critically, with little understanding of why such incidents may occur. Perhaps a "brittle new steel" perception phenomenon exists among knife nuts, that accounts for exceptional alertness among those early adopters of the steel, and they tended to over report where they otherwise would not. But all that is speculation, along with the idea that the "brittleness" argument accompanies any new steel.

The real interesting things about that steel is the difference in they way it performs in high end knives under hard use. Both Cliff Stamp, and more recently Noss have revealed that not all s30v on the user end is created equal, even when it comes from high end manufacturers.