The Thread for the Steel that Doesn't Exist

I'm mildly disappointed. I thought this topic was going to be more about describing the characteristics of the perfect metal for a survival knife. I want to do that.

Unobtainium

Easy to sharpen and maintain
Holds an edge forever
Super lightweight
Super durable
Ultra resistant to corrosion
Sparks flint and quartz
Inexpensive
Does your taxes
Shoots rainbows
 
imho, 3v isn't that difficult to sharpen, so it's still near the top of the list imho
(carry a leather strop with some diamond paste?, it can be a very small kit)

outside of that... 14c28n is extremely tough, commonly used in many fixed blades, and has a very low cost and definitely easier to sharpen on river rocks
... again, I'd still carry a small strop
 
Malty Falcon said:
It seems like a lot of folks are thinking of sharpening a knife on a river stone. Very primordial.

I know for a fact that I will never leave on any trip without the right equipment. Like a full tank of gas for a long journey, I already have the car (Grail Knife), why would any of y'all not have the right gear? Does anybody ever go into the wilderness for a night with only a ferro rod? Of course we COULD, but it's 2022!

"Any fool can be uncomfortable"
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I've always thought the river rock argument to be a strawman. How many have tried? I have, and can't do a reliable job. So it doesn't matter what steel I bring, I need to bring a sharpener. And if I bring a diamond sharpener, I've got all steels covered. Easy.
 
I want a knife that can fell large swaths of rainforest with just a thought, and is easy to sharpen.
 
IaccidentlyCutmyThumb said:
Hey I was just thinking about the perfect steel for survival knives. It doesn't exist. It sounds odd in a market replete with options that there wouldn't be an optimized, close to unified opinion on what steel is optimal for that application. I am thinking in this case the perfect steel would have all of the traits of CPM 3V, if 3V was easier to sharpen with natural sources (river stones). It's semi-stainless, holds a fantastic edge, is tough as can be, but it's a real jerk to maintain unless you have a strop and or diamond stones. I know that most of us take stuff like that with us while we're out, I certainly do. But sometimes one forgets those things and/or is constrained by weight and just doesn't want to carry a little DC3, or wants to know they can maintain their tool reasonably easily if they lost their stone. Plus it's just nice to have a steel that's easier to sharpen.

I figure the industry could do a lot better with a version of CPM 3V that holds an edge 80-90% as well in exchange for being like 50% easier to sharpen, with the semi-stainlessness and toughness of 3V. I have no idea if this is possible, it's just something I thought about and noticed was missing. Do any of you have a specific use case steel that you wished existed? Is it feasible? Or would the vanadium found in modern particle metallurgy make this more difficult to achieve?
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It sounds like you want 3V and to learn how to sharpen better. 3V isn’t difficult to sharpen.
 
Larrin said:
It sounds like you want 3V and to learn how to sharpen better. 3V isn’t difficult to sharpen.
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Whoa a reply from the man himself! Unexpected. Yeah, I've run it once through a Ken Onion, just to see if it polished easily, and it did. I can't imagine with any infrastructure it would be that hard to sharpen, I was more interested in being able to sharpen in the wild. Although a buddy of mine stropped his 3V back to a good edge on birch bark, so maybe that's just the way to go.
 
Okay, so I went camping this weekend in the rockies. Took my Benchmade Leuku. I had it shaving sharp when I went out there, and did probably 50 feathersticks with it, and batoned a bunch of wood. Also lent it to the couple my GF and I went camping with and I think, I can't be sure, but I think one of them batoned it into the rocky ground at one point. I'll have to pay closer attention to him in the future lol.

It was no longer shaving sharp, but still had a really, really good working edge. And it held that for quite some time. So I ran it against my axe sharpening puck (on the fine side no less), and stropped it on an old leather belt like 10 times per side, if that. Got it back to an okay level of shaving sharp in a total of like 4 minutes. So it turns out 3V's way easier to sharpen than I thought. Reading posts on this forum over the course of years made it seem like it was a tricky thing to do without a full setup that involved diamond plates. Now that I've done it, it's no biggie at all.

It lost the shaving sharpness again after I carved (very poorly) into a stick for a few hours and made another 15-ish feathersticks. But again, it held a really, really good working edge the entire time. I'm going to get a mirror polish on it and see if that helps hold the shaving edge.

Turns out you guys were right, it's pretty much everything I wanted. Big fan of the steel. Especially given that it rained very hard for the first bit of the trip and the steel didn't rust one bit, even with minimal maintenance and a leather sheath. Did everything I wanted.

I'm still curious if there's a balance of steel attributes that could be realistically achieved today that people want, but as far as what I want, I definitely found it.

I'm gonna take the Leuku out at least 5 more times in the coming months for camping, including a backpacking trip, and really push this steel and see how it does.
 
I've currently over 30 different steels in knives, tools, etc... From "crap" Chinese kitchen knife steel to M390, 3v, Elmax, S90v etc... I don't find 3v at all difficult to sharpen. More of a pain to sharpen a full scandi 1095 blade than to touch up a secondary bevel (3v).

I love to buy tools, knives, Axes etc... but as the saying goes (something like) it's not the tool, but the person using it.

I'm more experienced with woodworking tools than knives where it comes to many of you on here so will use that as an example - I've expensive Lie Nielsen and Japanese chisels but still prefer using my 70-100 year old Marples and Ward chisels. The steel of the latter would be to most on here vastly inferior but I prefer it for long term daily use.

I Like the modern steels like most here but in long term "serious" work (earning money) sometimes simple works best.
 
Dav1 said:
I've currently over 30 different steels in knives, tools, etc... From "crap" Chinese kitchen knife steel to M390, 3v, Elmax, S90v etc... I don't find 3v at all difficult to sharpen. More of a pain to sharpen a full scandi 1095 blade than to touch up a secondary bevel (3v).

I love to buy tools, knives, Axes etc... but as the saying goes (something like) it's not the tool, but the person using it.

I'm more experienced with woodworking tools than knives where it comes to many of you on here so will use that as an example - I've expensive Lie Nielsen and Japanese chisels but still prefer using my 70-100 year old Marples and Ward chisels. The steel of the latter would be to most on here vastly inferior but I prefer it for long term daily use.

I Like the modern steels like most here but in long term "serious" work (earning money) sometimes simple works best.
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Yeah I've been using simple steel knives for like 23 years or something, not a huge amount but like 95% of my life and I was always very happy with them. Branching out to new steels is mostly to see if the hype is real. With that being said so far I'm impressed. I personally have never had an issue with sharpening a 1095 scandi, and I do think as long as you have a flat stone it's easier than 3V (my limited experience acknowledged). Maybe with time that will change and I'll be annoyed with the 1095 scandis.

But I hear what you're saying. I still love my used and abused BK-16 more than any other knife.
 
scdub said:
S7

Imho for a “survival knife” there is really no need for stainless.

Unless/until there is a stainless that’s ACTUALLY as tough as high-carbon steels, (and I don’t believe there are any as of yet), then carbon wins due to superior DURABILITY.

While you’re in a survival situation, you will likely use the blade often enough that edge oxidation shouldn’t matter. Surface rust on the blade flats?? Who cares? Your blade is less likely to break, and that’s paramount.
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I believe there are several actually. 14c28n, aebl, LC200N, Nitro-v, and magnacut come to mind. All of which have comparable toughness with high carbon steels.

Personally, I also feel like toughness tends to be an overvalued property in fixed blades. Makers are putting out 1/4” thick blades in high toughness steels to the extent that you’d think prying open steel doors is the most basic task you use a knife for. Everyone’s presumed survival needs are a bit different, but generally speaking a moderate to high toughness steel with fairly thin blade stock would perform the majority of tasks you’d need it for in such a situation.

Of course, everyone’s idea of a survival knife varies a bit. If chopping down trees or chopping through bone is more of your ideal than I suppose super high toughness would be a realistic priority.
 
RousingRabbles said:
Of course, everyone’s idea of a survival knife varies a bit. If chopping down trees or chopping through bone is more of your ideal than I suppose super high toughness would be a realistic priority.
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Yup.

I have several knives that qualify in my mind as “survival knives”, but my large survival knives are primarily there to create insulation (shelter) as quickly and with as little exertion as possible.

I carry my large survival knives on hikes where I’m carrying minimal other survival gear (just fire, duct tape and a tourniquet for example), so I definitely want a knife that will chop down trees, baton, and even smack an occasional rock without fear of breaking it (because in this situation I’ll probably be tired and scared and not super delicate with my knife).

I’m not in freezing weather when I do this, but if I were I’d probably trade out my large knife for a smaller one along with a Silky saw and axe because wood cutting would be even more important.

If I’m backpacking and PLANNING to spend a night or two out, then I carry a shelter and extra clothing with me so there’s no need for a large survival knife or super tough steel.
 
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