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

You answered on the spyderco forums, but as I don't know how often you check there, Seeing as you've basically tried them all, do you have any "favorite" steels as far as being able to get a razor edge without a ton of work but still holding it semi passibly? Just not sure if I'm up to reprofiling supersteel, at least until I get an edge Pro :D. I can handle it taking longer than s30v, but I get the feeling some steels might take 4 times as long.

Also an plans to test the mule team 20? I'm tempted to get one but I'm not entirely sure what to expect from that steel.
 
SBaker34 said:
You answered on the spyderco forums, but as I don't know how often you check there, Seeing as you've basically tried them all, do you have any "favorite" steels as far as being able to get a razor edge without a ton of work but still holding it semi passibly? Just not sure if I'm up to reprofiling supersteel, at least until I get an edge Pro :D. I can handle it taking longer than s30v, but I get the feeling some steels might take 4 times as long.

Also an plans to test the mule team 20? I'm tempted to get one but I'm not entirely sure what to expect from that steel.
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The really nice thing about what I do with the Edge Pro is that it really doesn't matter what the steel is with the stones that I use. :D

Touching up on ceramics is the same for me also once the bevels are set.
 
Ankerson said:
The really nice thing about what I do with the Edge Pro is that it really doesn't matter what the steel is with the stones that I use. :D

Touching up on ceramics is the same for me also once the bevels are set.
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Jim, may I ask what EP stones are you using?
 
Ankerson said:
Added Cold Steel Ultimate Hunter, CTS-XHP at 63-64 HRC. :)
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Have one in the mail Jim. Thanks for the phone call / heads up Sat.
I would have over looked this one for sure. My 1st CS product in many moons.
But @ 63-64 HRC in that price range is something I am unable to pass up.
Am a sucker for deep hollow grinds & its pretty thin behind the edge as well.

Thanks again!
 
MCM said:
Have one in the mail Jim. Thanks for the phone call / heads up Sat.
I would have over looked this one for sure. My 1st CS product in many moons.
But @ 63-64 HRC in that price range is something I am unable to pass up.
Am a sucker for deep hollow grinds & its pretty thin behind the edge as well.

Thanks again!
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It's more of a very shallow hollow grind I think from what mine is, may vary some I guess. :)

Very nice knife though.
 
Ankerson said:
On that model, it's a hunter so they wanted better edge retention than on the bigger harder use models.
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It seems that with several identical or almost identical steels spyderco falls behind other makers in edge retention. Not something I expected, especially cold steel beating them. That's one of the hallmarks of spyderco, steel and heat treat. Maybe spyderco should start bumping up their heat treatment departments.
 
bodog said:
It seems that with several identical or almost identical steels spyderco falls behind other makers in edge retention. Not something I expected, especially cold steel beating them. That's one of the hallmarks of spyderco, steel and heat treat. Maybe spyderco should start bumping up their heat treatment departments.
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Spyderco, Benchmade, Lionsteel, CRK, ZT put what you want in...they handle steels in a pretty conservative way HRC wise.
Should they add at least deep, cryo huge it would be the difference.
Not a problem of mine though, as I eventually spotted a production maker that definitely does the HT the way it should be ;)
 
bodog said:
It seems that with several identical or almost identical steels spyderco falls behind other makers in edge retention. Not something I expected, especially cold steel beating them. That's one of the hallmarks of spyderco, steel and heat treat. Maybe spyderco should start bumping up their heat treatment departments.
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Geometry has a lot to do with it also in general.

A lot of those steels etc are closer than you would think by just looking at the numbers. ;)
 
Ankerson said:
Geometry has a lot to do with it also in general.

A lot of those steels etc are closer than you would think by just looking at the numbers. ;)
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The CTS-XHP and Elmax blades LOOK pretty far apart. Hell, the CTS-XHP results are almost double for the CS blade. Will .05" behind the edge and 2 points higher hardness really cause it to perform twice as good? If so then the great folks at spyderco need to up the ante a bit. The last thing anyone needs is CS being able to brag about having better performance than spyderco. CS already beats ZT at their game, I hope they don't start beating spyderco at theirs.
 
bodog said:
The CTS-XHP and Elmax blades LOOK pretty far apart. Hell, the CTS-XHP results are almost double for the CS blade. Will .05" behind the edge and 2 points higher hardness really cause it to perform twice as good? If so then the great folks at spyderco need to up the ante a bit. The last thing anyone needs is CS being able to brag about having better performance than spyderco. CS already beats ZT at their game, I hope they don't start beating spyderco at theirs.
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What game is that?
 
bodog said:
The CTS-XHP and Elmax blades LOOK pretty far apart. Hell, the CTS-XHP results are almost double for the CS blade. Will .05" behind the edge and 2 points higher hardness really cause it to perform twice as good? If so then the great folks at spyderco need to up the ante a bit. The last thing anyone needs is CS being able to brag about having better performance than spyderco. CS already beats ZT at their game, I hope they don't start beating spyderco at theirs.
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That's 3 points harder in that one model.

Normal hardness range for XHP is 60-61.
 
Zidfeldts said:
What game is that?
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Being "built like a tank" with a "bank vault" lockup that can handle the job the best for the military and first responder communities, but this isn't the place for that discussion if you disagree. Feel free to open a different thread in general discussion.
 
bodog said:
I guess I read the earlier posts wrong but wasn't the CS model above 62 and below 63.5? The spyderco was pegged @ 60.5.
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They are saying it's 63.5... ;)

It will be tested however so I will have a number on the one tested.

But I will go with what they are telling me.
 
Ankerson said:
They are saying it's 63.5... ;)

It will be tested however so I will have a number on the one tested.

But I will go with what they are telling me.
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Did you notice any undue chipping in that blade being run 3.5+ points higher than average? If not then maybe you could post the results in the spyderco forum so that they'll start running it higher, too.
 
bodog said:
Did you notice any undue chipping in that blade being run 3.5+ points higher than average? If not then maybe you could post the results in the spyderco forum so that they'll start running it higher, too.
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Noticed zero problems.

Spyderco is aware of the specs on XHP.
 
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