Review SRM 9201 D2 Folder ( test )

[old4570]

SRM 9201 D2 Folder

Where to start ?
A) The very first thing you notice is just how much this knife hurts to hold . It's almost like some one designed the knife to be uncomfortable to hold . It irritates the hand seriously . Only after I chamfered ( rolled ) every edge , corner , did the knife not irk me ! All the edges are sharp and pointy .. One has to wonder what the QC guy was thinking ?
B) The knife runs on bushes , so is not quite as smooth as a knife on Ball bearings . Not bad , but not great either .
C) Factory edge was FUBAR !
One hour of grinding and there was still plenty of FUBAR left . The grind is off center , each side of the bevel is at a different angle . There are dips or hollows in the grind . Making cleaning up the edge almost impossible without removing a lot of metal .
The rubbish factory grind returned a 150 slice fail ..

Yes there is a fresh wet stone grinder edge now , but lots of FUBAR left . The entire 1/3 of the blade on one side toward the handle / grip is FUBAR on one side .
Near the tip there is a hollow I could not correct ...
At the rope again soon I guess ...
Yeah , we had some horrendous rain yesterday afternoon , actually had a river flowing down both sides of the house .. And ponds in the front yard !

Soooo ! ( Wet stone grinder edge )
I sliced some rope . .....
And the knife returned a 100 slice fail ..
I think this is a first , loosing slices with the wet stone grinder edge ...
Yeah , 100 slices and the edge was gone ...... Bye bye !

On the guided knife sharpener , the SRM D2 offered little resistance to the diamond cutter / sharpener ..
The diamond ate the steel easily ..
Maybe not the softest steel ever , but I cant say it was hard either .
So next will be a 22deg 180 grit diamond cut edge off the guided knife sharpener . ( ? ) Will it do better ...

In a nutshell !
SRM has produced another ( I own a few ) disappointing knife .
D2 Tool steel blade ? ( I would really have to question that )
I put some effort into the edge , and it hard failed @ 120 slices ... ( only 330 slices short of decent D2 )
120 slices for D2 is abysmal ... ( This sample - the knife I own / tested )
If this is par for the coarse .... Then I recommend you don't waste your money as I have .
For me ( speaking for myself and the SRM I own ) , SRM has been a disappointing brand for blade performance .
And as this sample is showing , for me , continues the tradition of being disappointing .
So in my humblest opinion , this knife might be best avoided . ( maybe / possibly all SRM knives - if built to this standard )

 

[AntoniusBlade]

Hello, and sorry to hear about your irritation with that particular knife. I can surely relate!

Have you tried using a higher grit to begin with on the steel?
I've learned that it is not always best to start with low grits. Like you noticed, it will just tear out gobs of metal without doing much else.
I'm thinking 300 grit to start with as your most coarse grit. 600 grit, then 1500, and finish on a kangaroo strop with 4 micron cbn emulsion.
We are talking diamond here. I use the KME stones and sharpening system(No it's not perfect but I've used it well over a year now and feel comfortable with it).
Just straighten out the bevel first. Don't go at it like you are going to get a razor edge. Repair the damage first, even out that bevel best you can.
Then start on getting your edge right.
As an extreme measure, you may have to go very high on the edge until you get rid of all the damaged metal. Form burr, remove then go down a couple more degrees until you reach your target angle.
But until you get all that wavy bevel issue out of the way it's not gonna be right.

Try an 18.5 degree angle for the final edge, I used that tonight and it worked great for me. But every blade is different.

Will share with you my totally new to D2 steel observations as of tonight actually.
I just bought a Kubey Karaji in D2. This is the first D2 steel I've ever messed with, and the first time I bought a Kubey knife.
Usually I'm working with S30V, 20CV, and other difficult steels to fight with that have pissed me off more than pleased me. I can get them sharp too but they just seem to be more aggravating.

Must say the D2 was a pleasant surprise for me. What I noticed was that it's very responsive to diamond taking very little work to get an initial bevel set like I wanted. The factory grind was not bad, with the only issue being it was quite a high angle and convexed some. The blade on this one is extremely thick to begin with. I broke out the sharpie and used my 1500 grit stone to determine angle. I've learned that it is best to take your measurement more at the tip of blade because that is where it seems to be more prone for problems with a wide bevel. In the case of this Kubey (first one for me but not last) it was near perfect except in the back and a few areas.
Broke out my 300 grit diamond and made sure the bevel was uniform from heel to tip on both sides. After that worked on burr alternating sides and moved up in my stones. 600 then 1500 grit. When I came off the diamonds and burr was totally gone at 1500 grit, took another measurement and I was at 18 degrees. So I raised it back up to 18.5 and broke out the roo strop with 4 micron CBN emulsion and ran 2 passes on one side, two passes on the other, and 1 on each side after that. Was done. Shaves hair off my arm from both sides of blade now. Slices through paper like a razor. I lucked out! How long will that edge last? I don't know. I'm going to use it regularly and probably lightly. My uses are cardboard box cuts, paper cuts, cut a piece of fabric, a piece of plastic strapping and such. Typical around the office stuff. So, can't say how the edge retention will be.

To sum it up, started by scrubbing back and forth while moving up the blade from heel to tip with 300 grit. No pressure but stone and carrier weight.
Removed burr as I went along, until with the 300 it would not totally remove the burr on 1 side without creating it on the other.
Moved up in grit to 600, edge leading light strokes only alternating side to side until again the burr was moving side to side (very light burr now).
Went to 1500 grit, edge leading extremely light strokes and feeling little "spots" of resistance. Went lightly over them until they vanished on both sides.
Raised up my angle to 18.5 degrees and used strop with 4 micron cbn for final polish. 2 edge trailing strokes on each side and then 1 edge trailing light stroke on each side.

While this process is what has been successful with this particular knife and sample, this may not work for all my knives or even this knife on a later sharpening. Gotta feel it out is the best way I can put it into words. I've learned that. If you get hung up on angles too much it can create a lot of irritation. It's helpful but not the end all in my opinion. A good reference, and maybe a goal but the real goal is getting a sharp knife with no burrs and to a point where the edge isn't rolling or chipping while still cutting precisely.
Have numerous Spydercos and Benchmades. To this day I've yet to see any of those knife brands come to me with a good grind. It's a pain to get those right when they come with bad grinds.

Yes it's going to take some time to clean up factory messes. But instead of rushing through it in an aggravated manner (yes I know well this feeling). Sometimes it is just better to chill out and look at it as a challenge or a puzzle. Let this be an enjoyment to you, take your time on it. If it begins to make you ill, you aren't getting to that "zen" moment you need to be at! Be patient with yourself. Don't beat yourself up either over a blade that won't do right. It probably isn't you at all! But enjoy the ride man, make that blade cooperate best you can on YOUR terms!!

You'll get it right

 

[Dergyll]

Wait a minute...that looks like....

 

[old4570]

Grit ! ........ Interesting that !
Most of my knives dont care .. Cos good steel is good steel .
And soft steels - They usually respond to a course grit .
To date , going for that mirror finish has been ? .............. ?
I ordered a new guided knife sharpener and some new diamond stones .. To 3000 grit ( diamond )

So I have not fully explored Grit .. I did start doing so , and to 800 grit there was little difference ..
One of the reasons I got me a USB microscope ..
I would like to see if that mirror edge is worthwhile , or if it's just fashionable !
I know that a finer edge = a smoother cut / slice ...
But does time x effort = results ?
I mean if the wet stone grinder returns say 450 , and a mirror finish returns 500 and takes 4 hours and tennis elbow ? Is it worth it ?
These are questions I hope to explore this year ( 2022 ) ...
I was going to do it last year , but for some reason got side tracked ...
So GRIT , is definitely on the to test list .
So I just need a knife with decent steel , and see where it goes ..
I did start doing tests in 2021 ..
Bad steel / average steel and good steel .. But only got to 800 grit and for some reason forgot about it ( Things to do ) .
This year I will probably just got with good steel and start again .

Also , soft steel ! Is soft ...
I have 3cr13mov that runs with good D2 , because the steel was cooked properly .
So ......... any steel can be good ! And any steel can be bad !
SRM has a history of poor edge holding ( my SRM knives ) ...
Also , for tests to be valid and comparable .. The same method needs to be employed for creating the edge ..
The wet stone grinder is a decent Constant .. Maybe not the best possible edge , but a constant that's repeatable .
That way , if one knife does 450 and another knife does 100 ...
I know that not all steels respond the same way , but my testing needs to be consistent .