steel

[Jeremy Evans]

I have made two knives out of old files and i am not sure what this steel is butt it seems ok i am ready to go and buy some steel now but i am not sure what to get i need to know what is a good steel to grind and heat i will be useing a disk grinder to profile and files to finish

 

[Mike Hull]

1080,to 1095, and 01 are all good steels that can be home heat treated without too much trouble.
5160 is another pretty tough steel.
Good luck to you.

 

[Bruz]

jbull, congrats on your knives...post pics and we'll critique them for you! Depending on your skill and what you want the knife to do will help you choose the type of steel. Read a few posts, alot of great info, will probably be able to answer your own questions. I have played with 1095 and 01, here is one site that sell flat stock http://www.admiralsteel.com/

 

[mattd]

jbull,
I have been asking many of the same questions lately. I have not made a knife yet but I bought some 01 because the heat treating sounds like it could be the most simple. I bought my steel from www.toolanddie.com.

 

[shengq]

jbull, whatever steel you buy, make sure it is annealed. More than five years ago, i bought some HR (hot rolled) 1095 from admiral steel, and they are so hard that it is impossible to file or drill on them. They are still laying arround here, and I can not make any use of them. One week ago, after gathering opinions from this forum, I purchased some CRA (cold rolled annealed)1095 from admiral steel, and I finally can cut, file and drill by hand tools now!
enjoy!
Sheng