Steel for hunting knife?

koyote said:
well, there's plenty of knifemakers here- and the truth is that there isn't (as far as I can tell) any One True Steel for a general purpose camp/survival knife. Posting pictures of the blade in question would help, though.

I'd certainly recommend having a go at it- whether you use recycled steel or new, and knowing you might make the knife 5 times before it's Really Good (though with a little attention the first one will be fine and usable)- just go for it. I started wityh Ace sandpaper, one nicholson 12 inch file, and a castoff 6 inch grinder. I did a LOT of hand filing (but then again, I'm glad I did).
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Yeah...and this doesn't even take into account the issue of cord-wrapped handles! (Right, Koyote?) :D
 
If we set aside cost....set aside the ability to forge to shape...ease of machining...and look at sheer performance....


CPM 3V

Hands down...


Edge-holding (wear resistance) - very high
Toughness - very high
Stain resistance (not stainless, but 7.5% chromium does help some)



Not many makers use it because of the cost...but it really is a high-performance steel.

Send the blade off to Paul Bos for that "perfect" heat-treat and you'll be set!

:thumbup:
 
If it were my knife I would like CPM154 or ATS34 personally; maybe a little bit harder to sharpen but I like the edge retention and that fact that it doesn't rust as easy. I've also heard that CPM 3V is great but have no personal experience so I couldn't give you any advice on that.
 
This is the problem with the "B" word (BEST).

Best for cost, best for forging, best for home HT,best for looks, best for corrosion resistance,best for.........................
You have to pick your parameters, and then pick the "best" steel that fits them.
Stacy
 
1/8" for a 10" blade? seems rather on the thin side for a large blade like that. for blades that size i usually use 1084 or L6. You're going to find that all makers have their own preferences in materials for certain uses.

Will
Formerly known as Badbamaump
 
O1 for forging or home heat treatment, CPM-154 or S30V for stock removal. CPM-154 is much easier to work with than S30V and is easier to sharpen, S30V is both tougher and more wear resistant.

A camp/hunting/survival knife is more of an Ed Fowler type knife where toughness is about the only important thing, though others are correct in that 1045 is a bit soft, I'd go with L6 or 1084 myself. 1084 would probably be a little easier to differentially harden, though IMO the performance would be greater from L6.
 
If you're going to use O-1 for forging, and you want to add slab handles, drill the slab holes before you forge. I've tried twice to anneal O-1 in vermiculite, after forging, and no way are you going to drill holes in that stuff after forging! That stuff is staying hard!
 
You can go crazy trying to pick a steel that is "best". You might think that a maximally hard blade is "best", but if it is too hard it will break like a file if you drop it on the floor. You might think that a blade that is easy to sharpen is "best", but it will also tend to be easy to dull. You usually have to trade off some hardness and some wear resistance if you want to get toughness (resistance to breakage) and easy sharpening. There is also the question of sharpness verses wear resistance. Some of the steels with a lot of fancy alloying elements to reduce wear are sort of lumpy and don't take an extremely fine edge.

So you have to ask yourself how tough do you want your blade. If you want to be positive that it won't break you need to use a simpler steel and maybe reduce the hardness. If you pick a simple 1085 or 1095 carbon steel it can be extremely tough and also take an extremely fine edge. It will dull with use, but will be easy to resharpen. You also have the option of having the blade edge heat treated to be harder than the remainder of the blade. This will reduce wear and keep the blade tough. This costs a bit of money. It will still take a really fine edge and be only moderately hard to sharpen. You could also pick steels with some alloying elements intended to add toughness rather than hardness. You could pick 5160 which is a spring steel or L6 which is designed for power saw blades. These may be a bit harder to sharpen than the simple 10xx series steels. If you are heading in this direction and have more money to spend you could select CPM3V alloy. This will be more of a problem to sharpen, but will be tough.

If you can sacrifice a little toughness (you don't plan to ever use the knife as a crowbar) you can go to fancier tool steels. More carbon or alloying elements are added to the steel for greater wear resistance, but at some loss of toughness. For only minor loss of toughness you could look at O1, A2, W2, 52100. These all take really sharp edges and are very tough by most standards. They start to pick up a little wear resistance from more carbon or by added vanadium in the mix. They are consequently a little harder to sharpen than the simple carbon steels. The O1, W2, and 52100 can also be differentially hardened.

For your big knife selection I think these steels could all work. Try talking to some of the custom makers on this forum and see who can make your knife for a reasonable price. See what steels he commonly works with. I get better results when I don't push people to use unfamiliar tools and processes.
 
Just my .02 cents

I could not Imagen the need for anything more them 52100 ,,,,, or 5160 for that matter.

Last elk I quartered, earlier that morning, I needed to clean some battery post and cables, scrapping the inside of the lugs with the tip of my hunter. Yes, it did kill the edge, but sharpened right back up in less time then it took to clean the cables.

The point of my .02 cents worth, knives are called to do things we never expected them to do. 52100 is my choice.
 
Survival/ camp knife: 5160, fully hardened and tempered at 350 F with a soft back draw. GunKote for corrosion resistance is good too.
 
flatgrinder said:
Survival/ camp knife: 5160, fully hardened and tempered at 350 F with a soft back draw. GunKote for corrosion resistance is good too.
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What does a soft back draw mean? I've done a little more reasearching and I might go with 5160 with a differentially hardened blade or cpm3v. I will try to post photos of the knife I'm looking to remake later so maybe it'll help you guys/gals give me more informed advice.
 
There are a couple of major ways to get a knife edge that is harder than a knife spine. You can cool the edge down faster than the spine of the blade when you do the hardening quench. The other ways is to harden the whole blade evenly then go back and soften the spine with localized heating. This is the soft back draw. You use run a torch along the spine of the hardened blade to temper it softer than the edge.
 
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