Ranking of Steels in Categories based on Edge Retention cutting 5/8" rope

Did you ever test any rwl-34 blade steel?

I just received a Gareth Bull custom with rwl34 ht'd to 61-62. Curious where it ranks on the steel chart.
 
wolf5391 said:
Did you ever test any rwl-34 blade steel?

I just received a Gareth Bull custom with rwl34 ht'd to 61-62. Curious where it ranks on the steel chart.
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It should stay in Gr3.
Compliments for your purchase.
RWL34 is a very good steel.

EDIT:
I've learned that no deep-cryo is involved, thus I do downgrade to Group 4
 
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Ankerson, first off, thanks for testing these steels. Second, my mt19 clearly performs better than my satin finished s30v military and my 0561. I take all my knives way higher than 400 grit and keep them all about 30 degrees inclusive. Your tests show that at 400 grit s30v at 60 (which I believe the satin finished millies are) beats psf27. Do you believe I got a softer military or that I got a good mt19 that may be a couple of points higher hardness than the one you received?

For what it's worth, I'm not that impressed with the edge retention of my military. It doesn't keep an edge for very long. My Kershaw blur and my military are about the same, edge retention wise. I've checked the resources I can find to see if maybe I received a fake one and it doesn't show any of the common signs.

I wonder if you got an mt19 on the low end of the spectrum and military on the high end or I received the opposite.
 
bodog said:
Ankerson, first off, thanks for testing these steels. Second, my mt19 clearly performs better than my satin finished s30v military and my 0561. I take all my knives way higher than 400 grit and keep them all about 30 degrees inclusive. Your tests show that at 400 grit s30v at 60 (which I believe the satin finished millies are) beats psf27. Do you believe I got a softer military or that I got a good mt19 that may be a couple of points higher hardness than the one you received?

For what it's worth, I'm not that impressed with the edge retention of my military. It doesn't keep an edge for very long. My Kershaw blur and my military are about the same, edge retention wise. I've checked the resources I can find to see if maybe I received a fake one and it doesn't show any of the common signs.

I wonder if you got an mt19 on the low end of the spectrum and military on the high end or I received the opposite.
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+ or - 20 cuts really isn't that big of a difference....

My testing cutting manila rope is very controlled as I have removed most of the variables....

In everyday use things can change...
 
Hey Jim,

Do you have an M4 Military? Or any other M4 worthy of testing? I just realized you haven't tested M4 in the 400 grit test.
 
nccole said:
Hey Jim,

Do you have an M4 Military? Or any other M4 worthy of testing? I just realized you haven't tested M4 in the 400 grit test.
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I have a GB.... :)

Just haven't ran it yet with the coarse edge...
 
Have you done tests with fine grained and coarse grained steels side by side to see of polished edges are better than coarse edges and vice versa? For instance, would that m4 gb do significantly better with the 400 grit finish or the 6k
 
Thanks Ankie, PSF 27 delivered just what I expected it to. Did you try to polish it with EP 6k polishing tapes?

OT: could you please direct me to an online Hardness Tester reseller?

Thanks
 
Thanks for this test, Jim. Dozier D2 is well known for having an excellent heat treat, and Dozier knives have excellent geometry. I suspect that the Dozier has better blade geometry than the Mule in PSF 27, which is high-tech, high-performance version of ingot D2.

I have a Dozier Personal fixed blade that is a little smaller than the K2. The edge shoulders on my Dozier are 0.020 inches. In another test, Cliff Stamp measured the edge shoulders on a K2 at between 0.010 and 0.020. I did a quick check of another Mule I have (K390), and the edge shoulders are 0.027 on that. So I'd guess that the Dozier has a bit of a geometry advantage over the Mule, especially with a hollow-ground blade. Although with cutting rope, I'd guess that the geometry advantages of flat-ground vs hollow-ground blades are minimal.

Nonetheless, you found that spray-formed D2 had a 27 percent advantage over ingot D2, even with what is probably an advantage in geometry. (Wouldn't it be cool if the "27" in PSF 27 means a 27 percent increase in wear resistance?) I don't know the hardness of either of these knives, but the Dozier I think is about 60 Rc, and the Mule I don't know, but would expect it's fairly close.

So maybe we're seeing that the spray-forming process gives spray-formed D2 (PSF 27) a real advantage over well heat treated ingot D2. Pretty interesting.
 
Ankerson said:
Added PSF-27 MT. :)
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Could you tell us how thick your MT19 is behind the edge ? It'll also be interesting to learn the tested hardness, if and when that number becomes available. PFF27 actually did a little better, in your testing procedure, than I expected.
 
I'd like to see a straight up head to head comparison between cpm d2 and psf27 heat treated and ground the exact same way to see how good spray forming really is.
 
deskil said:
Could you tell us how thick your MT19 is behind the edge ? It'll also be interesting to learn the tested hardness, if and when that number becomes available. PFF27 actually did a little better, in your testing procedure, than I expected.
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Mine is .025" ave......
 
Twindog said:
Thanks for this test, Jim. Dozier D2 is well known for having an excellent heat treat, and Dozier knives have excellent geometry. I suspect that the Dozier has better blade geometry than the Mule in PSF 27, which is high-tech, high-performance version of ingot D2.

I have a Dozier Personal fixed blade that is a little smaller than the K2. The edge shoulders on my Dozier are 0.020 inches. In another test, Cliff Stamp measured the edge shoulders on a K2 at between 0.010 and 0.020. I did a quick check of another Mule I have (K390), and the edge shoulders are 0.027 on that. So I'd guess that the Dozier has a bit of a geometry advantage over the Mule, especially with a hollow-ground blade. Although with cutting rope, I'd guess that the geometry advantages of flat-ground vs hollow-ground blades are minimal.

Nonetheless, you found that spray-formed D2 had a 27 percent advantage over ingot D2, even with what is probably an advantage in geometry. (Wouldn't it be cool if the "27" in PSF 27 means a 27 percent increase in wear resistance?) I don't know the hardness of either of these knives, but the Dozier I think is about 60 Rc, and the Mule I don't know, but would expect it's fairly close.

So maybe we're seeing that the spray-forming process gives spray-formed D2 (PSF 27) a real advantage over well heat treated ingot D2. Pretty interesting.
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The Dozier I tested was .025" behind the edge..
 
bodog said:
Have you done tests with fine grained and coarse grained steels side by side to see of polished edges are better than coarse edges and vice versa? For instance, would that m4 gb do significantly better with the 400 grit finish or the 6k
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Yes I have done them before, it's roughly a 50% to 60% difference depending in favor of the 400 grit edge finish...
 
bodog said:
I'd like to see a straight up head to head comparison between cpm d2 and psf27 heat treated and ground the exact same way to see how good spray forming really is.
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The other thing to remember is that PSF 27 is touted to be considerably tougher than ingot D2.

psf27-chart.gif


The problem with CPM D2 was twofold: 1) Powder D2 wasn't all that much better than ingot D2; and 2) there are many other powder steels that are better than CPM D2 that it wasn't all that popular.

Spray-formed D2 may be better than ingot D2, but other powder alloys, such as CPM M4 or M390 or Elmax, appear to be better still.
 
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