What type of steel should I start with

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Biggie357

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Sep 10, 2018
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Im just getting started with making my first knives. I'm starting with stock removal. What kind of steel would you guys recomend an newbie start out with? I want to make some kitchen knives like a chefs knife or pearing knives. What would be good steel for a good all purpose outdoor utility knife? I'm looking to make my first steel purchase and just wondered where I should start. Also where are some of the best places to order steel from. I'll take any help I can get. Thanks
 
For both I would go with a tool or carbon steel. For all purpose outdoor, 1095 seems to be the popular jumping off point. You could always go with something like O1, A2, D2, or even one of the CPM/particle steels, but if your new to knifemaking, I would go 1095. For the kitchen knives, if you are looking for stainless, I mostly see VG-10.

Best of luck!
 
With kitchen knives these days, I think of stainless. Aside from chefs who use their own knives, most people don't want to worry about carbon steel rusting and staining. But if you want to get into knife making and make utilitarian knives from carbon steel, 1075 - 1085 -1095 isn't bad.
 
You need to walk before you run......Start with 1075 0r 1084. Their HT is about as basic as it gets...….Minimal
soak (time at temp) time, low tempering temps, and they make very good blades....Once you have some experience with those,
then try something more challenging.
 
As a fellow newbie, I second 1075 or 1084. If you think you have a good theoretical understanding of heat treating and aren't using a completely cobbled together heat source you could try 1095 or o1, but it's extra variables to deal with and will make learning slower (those are all the steels i have experience with).
My advice, get some thin 1084 and make a few paring/utility/petty knives. You'll be able to make them faster
 
It depends on how the HT will be done. If sending it out, I would suggest buying a couple bars of AEB-L. It is a great stainless kitchen knife steel … and very reasonable in price.

If attempting your own HT, then stick with 1075 or 1084 in the beginning
 
Stacy beat me to it - how do you plan to HT? Sending out to JT or other places, then I'd go with AEB-L for the best "bang for buck" type of thing. Alpha Knife Supply is perhaps the best place around to purchase small supplies of metal.

If you're wishing to do your own HT, then as others have said, 1075, 1084, or maybe even 80CRv2?

Good luck and have fun.
 
1075/1080, 1084, 80CRV2... All are great steels, hold a fine edge and super easy to heat treat with minimal equipment.
 
Btw... you can make professional grade knives with "beginner" steels. They are beginner steels because they are easy to work with and don't require professional equipment to do the heat treat. They are not inferior and many professional bladesmiths/knifemakers use them.
 
8670 is a great choice too. It has a wide window of acceptable austenitizing temps, and is a very tough steel.
 
GrimRepo said:
I am very much a noob myself but I have been having some pretty decent success with 52100
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There is a good reason new makers with limited equipment and experience need to start with simpler steels like 1084, 1075/1080, 5160, 8670, and 80CRV.
It is, that if the HT isn't right, you get basically 1084 with some extra stuff floating around in it from higher allow steel. 52100 is a good example ( as is 1095) of steel we tend to advise against starting on for this exact reason. Without exact temperatures and soak times ( plus needed thermal cycling and normalizing) these steel may not harden properly and/or will not reach its full potential.
The full carbon and alloy content will not convert into the structures desired. The blade may seem hard, and will cut well, but is is just a 1084 blade, not a 52100 blade or a 1095 blade (more or less).

It has to do with metallurgy charts and time. The eutectic point will allow .84% carbon to combine with iron easily and almost immediately upon reaching around 1450F. The rest requires more heat and time.

I haven't seen GrimRepo's knives or tested his steel or what equipment he has, so I don't know how they are, but as a rule, without a HT oven and some experience, you will not get the full potential from 52100.
 
I will be a while before I attempt to do my own heat treating. Im going to send them out for that. My plan is to hone my skills at grinding ,handle making and overall finishing a blade . Then once I feel I have a good handle on them I will branch out into learning the smithing and HT aspects of knife making.


* PUNS UNINTENDED :)*
 
Last edited:
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
There is a good reason new makers with limited equipment and experience need to start with simpler steels like 1084, 1075/1080, 5160, 8670, and 80CRV.
It is, that if the HT isn't right, you get basically 1084 with some extra stuff floating around in it from higher allow steel. 52100 is a good example ( as is 1095) of steel we tend to advise against starting on for this exact reason. Without exact temperatures and soak times ( plus needed thermal cycling and normalizing) these steel may not harden properly and/or will not reach its full potential.
The full carbon and alloy content will not convert into the structures desired. The blade may seem hard, and will cut well, but is is just a 1084 blade, not a 52100 blade or a 1095 blade (more or less).

It has to do with metallurgy charts and time. The eutectic point will allow .84% carbon to combine with iron easily and almost immediately upon reaching around 1450F. The rest requires more heat and time.

I haven't seen GrimRepo's knives or tested his steel or what equipment he has, so I don't know how they are, but as a rule, without a HT oven and some experience, you will not get the full potential from 52100.
Click to expand...


I’m going to send some un-optimally heat treated O1, 52100, and 1095 to Larrin to see how they test. I’m pretty sure they will be worse than 1084.
 
Biggie357 said:
I will be a while before I attempt to do my own heat treating. Im going to send them out for that. My plan is to hone my skills at grinding ,handle making and overall finishing a blade . Then once I feel I have a good handle on them I will branch out into learning the smithing and HT aspects of knife making.


* PUNS UNINTENDED :)*
Click to expand...

Smart way of doing it. That's what I did and I feel like it really helped. I definitely suggest sending out to @JTknives
 
Willie71 said:
I’m going to send some un-optimally heat treated O1, 52100, and 1095 to Larrin to see how they test. I’m pretty sure they will be worse than 1084.
Click to expand...

So the question is, did you try to optimally heat treat using “sub optimal” equipment, or did you intentionally do a bad job heat treating these pieces of steel. The later would seem to be just a waste of time and steel. If you purposely did a bad job, you should expect poor results. Attempting to maximize the results both with and without a heat treat oven might be an interesting experiment. I could be reading your post wrong, but the tone makes it sound like you are designing an experiment to prove yourself right rather than an experiment to actually determine information.
 
lanternnate said:
So the question is, did you try to optimally heat treat using “sub optimal” equipment, or did you intentionally do a bad job heat treating these pieces of steel. The later would seem to be just a waste of time and steel. If you purposely did a bad job, you should expect poor results. Attempting to maximize the results both with and without a heat treat oven might be an interesting experiment. I could be reading your post wrong, but the tone makes it sound like you are designing an experiment to prove yourself right rather than an experiment to actually determine information.
Click to expand...

In the name of controlling variables, I will show what happens when you miss optimum temp by 50f, 100f, and 200f, for example. If I don’t use set temps, how would I know how much temp affects the results? If I used my forge instead, all I show is how good I personally am at guessing temperatures.

An experiment done using master smiths a few years back showed that they were out by 100-200f when judging temp by eye, on the high side, which is why I chose those temps. I’ll check with Larrin first before I do the test. Larrin has shown that air hardening steels are more forgiving with high temps for several reasons, but the carbides pinning the boundaries is a big one. My own experiments with W2 show +/-10f to be the optimum window with dropping performance outside of that window.
 
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