Thin is in! Edge thin, that is.

[Don Powell]

I know, I'm just a rank amateur. But I like making knives.
About a year ago, I made a knife for my grandson. Since he
saw me chop a sapling down with my carbon steel knife, he thought
this was pretty neat. So, I chose A2 when I made his knife. I had
it heat treated by Paul Bos, of course. Now, there was one difference,
I ground the edge thin, at least thiner than I usually do. The edge was .020, and I had Paul Bos heat treat this blade to HRC 60. I worried that he would not be able to chop saplings down with this thin blade. This knife works great. It cuts like crazy, and the edge has not chipped out. I just finished a CPM 3V blade with a .018 edge and My son and I used it for field dressing two deer. There is no comparison, this thin edge is fantastic. Have I been missing the boat?
Does everyone grind thin edges? How thin is thin?

 

[Arthur Washburn]

Don,

I make dress damascus folders mostly so normally they dont see a lot of use. But no matter what Im making notmally the edge is.010-.015 is the norm for my blades.

 

[Jerry Hossom]

There's a big difference in ideal edge thickness depending on whether a blade is hollow ground or flat ground. And if hollow ground, the blade might actually be thinner above the edge than at the edge. Most of mine are. I don't think I'd consider going thinner than .020" on one of my knives in anything but CPM-3V. Flat ground blades might even be ground to zero, and many are.

The intended use of the knife and its size might also mitigate how thick or thin the ideal edge might be. If it is edged with a flat bevel or is convex can also influence how thick it might be.

It sounds to me like Don got it about right.