toughest stainless steels

[John_0917]

H-1 is super tough, and stainless.

 

[19-3ben]

what stainless steel would be best for heavy use?

Please define what you mean by heavy use. What tasks does that entail?

Exactly this.^^^

Does heavy use mean that the application is a 10" blade being used to chop trees? Does it mean 1/4" blade being used to baton logs all day? Does it mean that you do HVAC work and it'll be stripping wire and cutting fiberglass batting all day?

Different steels excel at different tasks.

For my use, I'd have to agree with @Charlie Mike. I've got an ELMAX knife from @Kosa_PL that I have been using heavily in outdoor tasks, and it seems to gracefully shrug off all manner of use and abuse.

Shameless picture, just because.

 

[marcinek]

Does heavy use mean that the application is a 10" blade being used to chop trees? Does it mean 1/4" blade being used to baton logs all day? Does it mean that you do HVAC work and it'll be stripping wire and cutting fiberglass batting all day?

Or will it undergo bending/twisting while prying?

Nice knife, BTW!!

 

[dirc]

Buck's stainless is 420HC - which has about 0.5% carbon, and is very tough! (they use a great BOS heat treatment)

...
I also like 14c28n for a tough ss which is low cost compared to pm steels like elmax

 

[Yorkshire Boy]

12c27 is cheap and relatively tough.

 

[sharp thoughts]

I bought it used on the forum, but it came with significant flaws in fit and finish. I couldn't resell it because of the flaws, so that gave me the chance to learn something about Randall knives. Even in gentle testing at first, it was apparent the the blade had little strength, making it worthless to me. So I pushed it harder, and the knife could take virtually no abuse without failing.

While I have no doubt about what you are saying, I was hoping that you would elaborate more on what the testing consisted of that caused this kind of failure. From the pic I can see a sizeable chip along the edge, and what appears to look like a bend in the blade. Thanks in advance.

 

[Twindog]

While I have no doubt about what you are saying, I was hoping that you would elaborate more on what the testing consisted of that caused this kind of failure. From the pic I can see a sizeable chip along the edge, and what appears to look like a bend in the blade. Thanks in advance.

Sure. The flaws in F&F and the sheath, which was cut through the threads, were serious. I contacted Randall to see if it was even a Randall, but they said that because I didn't buy it from an authorized dealer, I was out of luck. I even sent them photos of the horrible jumping, but they ignored me.

The first test was some gentle tip and pry in soft wood. The tip bent. Then I stabbed it deep into wood and pried, and it bent easily. Not tools, just hand pressure. The damage to the edge was chopping a nail, which I realize is abuse, but by then the blade and knife were worthless anyway so I thought I'd see what the steel could do.

The knife is basically junk. I did the same tests with a 1095 Chef's knife that I decided I didn't like because the steel took too much effort to keep from rusting. The 1095 was hardened to 60 Rc. That chef's knife took everything that I threw at the Randall -- except for the nail chop -- and suffered not a bit of damage, despite the blade being thinner. The chef's knife had an awesome heat treat and was hardened correctly. The Randall is just junk. I'll never buy a Randall again.

 

[sharp thoughts]

Sure. The flaws in F&F and the sheath, which was cut through the threads, were serious. I contacted Randall to see if it was even a Randall, but they said that because I didn't buy it from an authorized dealer, I was out of luck. I even sent them photos of the horrible jumping, but they ignored me.

The first test was some gentle tip and pry in soft wood. The tip bent. Then I stabbed it deep into wood and pried, and it bent easily. Not tools, just hand pressure. The damage to the edge was chopping a nail, which I realize is abuse, but by then the blade and knife were worthless anyway so I thought I'd see what the steel could do.

The knife is basically junk. I did the same tests with a 1095 Chef's knife that I decided I didn't like because the steel took too much effort to keep from rusting. The 1095 was hardened to 60 Rc. That chef's knife took everything that I threw at the Randall -- except for the nail chop -- and suffered not a bit of damage, despite the blade being thinner. The chef's knife had an awesome heat treat and was hardened correctly. The Randall is just junk. I'll never buy a Randall again.

Thanks. Sounds like a typical response coming from Randall regardless of whether or not it came from an authorized dealer. Anyway I didn't mean to derail the original intent of the thread and was just curious. Thanks again.

 

[Lapedog]

AEBL for a big chopper needing impact resistance.
Elmax for anything else, is my preference.

With AEB-L being essentially the same steel as sandvik 13c26 I wonder how tough sandvik’s 12c26 and 14c27n are by comparison. All 3 of those steels are fairly similar in both composition as well as being fine grained stainless.

 

[kuraki]

With AEB-L being essentially the same steel as sandvik 13c26 I wonder how tough sandvik’s 12c26 and 14c27n are by comparison. All 3 of those steels are fairly similar in both composition as well as being fine grained stainless.

I imagine they're right there with it.