Surgical Stainless...not what you think

HoB said:
No, I think Esev answered your first (1) question: Surgical stainless is what ever the maker found to be cheapest. It is a marketing/hyping term and, yes, it might be as bad/unsuitable (for a knife) as 316 which isn't even hardenable.

Unfortuantely, the first and second question are completely unrelated. As answer to the second question 13C26 is probably a resonable guess. I would think, it is a similar steel as used in razor blades. Something that is cheap, fine grained, corrosion resistant and, very importantly, something that can be stamped.
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Touché monsieur HoB. I took it as one question. He was looking at a scalpel when it the question occurred to him and was describing what he wanted to know. But, it could be taken as two. And if he was asking two, then Esav did answer the first one.
 
TheKnifeCollector said:
The scalpel blades ARE used and thrown away. The handles get washed and sterilized. A surgeon uses the skin knife once, for making the initial incision. The changes to another blade for inside. In an Ortho paedic case, you go through many blades. The blades ARE very much disposable!! I should know, I was a Surgical Technologist for 11 years. (The ST is the one who sets up the sterile field and passes instruments to the surgeon.)

"As far as I know, no they aren't. Surgical scalpels are washed, and sterilised in an autoclave. Scalpels don't need sharpening very often as live flesh is not particularly difficult or hard to cut."

You are wrong.
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No sir, you are wrong. you said "SCALPELS are used once and thrown away". They aren't. A scalpel is a knife-like object of integral blade and handle in sizes from 5" to 12" made of one piece of surgical steel. I used to have a 12" scalpel that looked rather like a sheffield meat carving knife.

Now you change the story to a scalpel handle with a disposable blade. These are often used in doctors surgerys for mickey mouse procedures like removing wood splinters. Even I have one of those! True scalpels are not disposed of after one use. I am horrified if hospitals are using them. I agree blades are disposable, (I have an assortment of sealed blades) but scalpels aren't.
 
These days, most operating theatres use disposable blades. Many procedures need a few different blade shapes and sizes and it is easier this way. You want something that will cut easily, and you usually don't give a damn about the strength of the blade. The blades are very thin and flat-ground. Not useful for most other applications (possible exception for box-cutting).

Surgical steel (the medical term) was used before disposable blades came into widespread use. What that meant, therefore, is steel that could be easily sterilized. Perhaps many of you don't know this, but it is not easy to sterilize something for surgical use. The best method is the autoclave, which uses high pressure and temperature to do it. Think steam. Now you average knife collector would rather slam his testicles in a car door than put his one-of-a-kind Moran forged Bowie through an autoclave, because it'll rust faster than you can say Scagel. Surgical steel has a LOT of chromium, and relatively low iron content.

Of course, this was modified in time, when other materials became available, but still, the medical use of "surgical steel" as a term applies to something that the average knife guy, or lady, would not want in their blade. (Think implants.)
 
Andrew, I am confused.:confused:
Who are you saying is wrong? I think madam Knife Collector is stating that the scalpel blades are disposed of but that the handles are sterilized. And I think you are saying the same thing.

I seem to be missing something. :jerkit: (although more and more I find this a not unusual state.)
 
Lets see what wiki has to say:
"A scalpel is a very sharp knife used for surgery, anatomical dissection, and various arts and crafts. Scalpels may be disposable or re-usable. Re-usable scalpels can have attached, resharpenable blades or, more commonly, non-attached, replaceable blades. Disposable scalpels usually have a plastic handle with an extensible blade (like a utility knife) and are used once, then the entire instrument discarded.

Scalpel blades are usually of hardened and tempered steel (stainless), but Titanium, Ceramic, Diamond and even Obsidian are not uncommon. For example, when performing surgery under MRI guidance, metallic blades are unusable (the steel blades would be drawn to the magnets) or may cause image artifacts. Alternatives to scalpels in surgical applications include electrocautery and lasers."

As far as I know, most scalpels used in hospitals are disposable. They come in a sterile wrapping, are cheap, and are uniform which surgeons probably appreciate.

If you want a slightly more authoritative source, Merriam Webster gives this definition:
"a small straight thin-bladed knife used especially in surgery"

---> THC is actually correct.
 
Now what did I miss. Who is THC?
 
knarfeng said:
Touché monsieur HoB. I took it as one question. He was looking at a scalpel when it the question occurred to him and was describing what he wanted to know. But, it could be taken as two. And if he was asking two, then Esav did answer the first one.
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Sorry, knarfeng, as Buck clarified, apparently I misunderstood the question. I honestly thought it was meant as a general question, because you will never find a scalpel that is actually marketed or labeled as using "surgical stainless".
 
Andrew Taylor said:
No sir, you are wrong. you said "SCALPELS are used once and thrown away". They aren't. A scalpel is a knife-like object of integral blade and handle in sizes from 5" to 12" made of one piece of surgical steel. I used to have a 12" scalpel that looked rather like a sheffield meat carving knife.

Now you change the story to a scalpel handle with a disposable blade. These are often used in doctors surgerys for mickey mouse procedures like removing wood splinters. Even I have one of those! True scalpels are not disposed of after one use. I am horrified if hospitals are using them. I agree blades are disposable, (I have an assortment of sealed blades) but scalpels aren't.
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Where do you get this from? The scalpels you are talking about haven't been used in serious surgery for decades. Most serious scalpels are using disposable blades for years (decades) now, and now there are even some where the entire thing (handle and all) is disposable. That's what TKC was taking about. Do you honestly think hospitals have a shapening service that sharpens their spend scalpels and autoclaves them afterwards? WAAAYYY to expensive and time consuming. Not to mention that there are probably not enough people around with the necessary skills. The scalpels you are talking about are about as common as straight razors.

Never mind, outofgum and wikipedia beat me to it (sorry it is waaayyy late).
 
Andrew Taylor said:
True scalpels are not disposed of after one use. I am horrified if hospitals are using them.
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I'm pitching in on a moribund--if not already dead--horse here but I've spent over 25 years in OR's and have never seen a one-piece reusable scalpel. If you ever have an opportunity to see a highly magnified view of a previously used, "sterilized" scalpel edge, I promise that you won't be horrified if it's not used on you.
 
Sandvik has a branch that makes alloys for medical purposes, including a varient of 13C26 that they recommend for disposable scalpel blades.
 
Don't forget, some bedpans and gurneys are also made of steel and used in surgery, therefor "surgical steel". ;)
 
SlamFire said:
I recommend a Book titled "Fighting Iron, a metals handbook for Arms Collectors" by Art Gogan. In it he also describes trade name steels from long past.

Salesman have always picked names that sound good, but are meaningless. One of the best 19th Century salesman was Col Samuel Colt, of Colt Firearms. He claimed he made his firearms from a superior steel, and called it "Silver Steel".

Now must of the people on this forum know that silver is a very poor alloying agent, if it does anything at all. But the term sounded good, and the tradition continues today.

Made from the finest "Surgical Steel".

How bogus. But it sells.
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Actually, AFAIK the term "silver steel" is much older than Mr. Samuel Colt and has nothing to do with being alloyed with silver. I would have to read up on the exact history, but "silver steel" was the first form of a stainless steel, which was discovered by accident during the casting of cannons which had to be aged (which worked essentially as an anneal) before they could be bored. And some cannons looked surprisingly shiny after their storage period (the rest was rusted) and hence the term "silver steel" was coined. I think Leonard Lee has some more information in his book.

I think the example is not quite fitting. Steel alloying is something that is really not much older than 100 years. Sure, some early forms of alloying was attempted in one way or another for hundred of years, but for the most part, alloying depended on the constituents that happened to be in raw materials by chance. Even carbon content was not easily controlled and for the longest time was added by diffusion at low heat. It is really a fairly recent development that mankind has the ability to put what ever elements into the steel at precisely predetermined amounts and remove unwanted elements from the raw materials to form an alloy of predetermined composition. In that sense we have come far since the days of Col. Colt, and while you might forgive him making up names for his steels, there is really no excuse to obscure the issue in this day and age.
 
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