The Language of Steel

Indiana Joe

Indiana Joe

Joined
Sep 28, 2007
Messages
729
If a blade comes in a certain steel, most of those folks "in the know" have an understanding of just what that steel means, in terms of quality--hardness, edge retention, etc.
I have seen several references to Spyderco's charts and they are good for what elements need to be added to the stell in order to give it a certain quality. But they really doesn't "rank" the steels. Is there a chart out there, for reference, that explains the difference between 440C, 1095, AUS 4, VG-10, etc.etc.?
 
tsiloics said:
The sticky in M,T&E is a good starting point.
Click to expand...

He means the Steel FAQ sticky
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=368828

That's a good place to start. But there is no one source that is going to tell you everything you are asking.

You can't "rank" steels. You can only compare various properties. Each steel has a blend of properties. And many properties are a trade-off. To get more of one property, you have to give up some of another property. So, different steels work better for different people because their usages are different.

Figure out what you are wanting to do with a knife and what properties that usage requires from the steel. Then you can figure out what steels you should be looking at. (for a lot of alloys, their properties are so similar that you won't really notice the difference between them in actual use.)

The Steel FAQ is a good place to start.
 
There's no easy way to "rank" steels. There are tradeoffs to each one. There are also other factors to consider as well...some steels get tougher as they are used and sharpened more(H1 for instance). There are about as many opinions on steel as there are opinions.
 
knarfeng said:
He means the Steel FAQ sticky
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=368828

Each steel has a blend of properties. And many properties are a trade-off. To get more of one property, you have to give up some of another property. So, different steels work better for different people because their usages are different.

Figure out what you are wanting to do with a knife and what properties that usage requires from the steel. Then you can figure out what steels you should be looking at.
Click to expand...
Thanks guys, for giving me some direction. That sticky is a good start. And the explanation of property trade-off, makes sense to me.
 
Keep in mind that some steel alloys aren't good for blades. There's nothing you can do to get around that. These steels just weren't confected for blades; they were confected for other purposes and, in the process of optimizing them for those applications, the characteristics that make for good blade steel were compromised. 18/10 is a good example of this.

Other steels were confected specifically to optimize the characteristics that make good blades. 12C27 is a good example of this; it was originally specifically formulated for the production of razor blades.

But, even if you have a promising steel alloy such as 12C27, whether or not a specific piece of it is a good blade depends as much on the heat treatment as the alloy. 12C27 -- just as one example -- as the potential to be a good blade, but it takes the right heat treatment to make it so.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top