Where to purchase good tool steel?

R

RaymondMillbrae

Joined
Sep 8, 2006
Messages
9
Hey guys,

I am in the san francisco bay area, and I was wondering if anybody has any suggestions to where I can purchase knife-making steel.

I do not want to dump a large amount of money on steel. Just enough to make two or three knives.

I have checked on ebay and a few steel manufacturers...but ebay is hit and run on steel quality, and the steel manufacturers only sell in bulk.

In Christ: Raymond
 
ib2v4u said:
Aldo Bruno is the guy. He is a knife guy who got into rounding up good steel and he will treat you right.

http://njsteelbaron.com/
Click to expand...

Aldo is your best choice. if you are going to be doing your own heat treat, his custom melted 1084 is your best bet, If you are sending out for heat treat any of the air hardening steels he sells will be good, my personal choice for air hardening steel is the CPM154 I got from Aldo, the CPM is a bit more expensive than some steels, but the steel is that cheapest part of your process, so you might as well buy the best

-Page
 
I use Amtek for my 0-1 and Aldo for just about anything else. So far, no one has come close to beating Amteck on 0-1.
 
Hey guys,

since I already have your attention, I have another question for you.

Do y'all grind your own knife shapes, or do some of y'all go someplace with a water jet cutter.

Seems like I heard someone say they can get a knife shape cut out for approximately $10.00. Is this true? Have some of y'all done this, and what did y'all pay?

In Christ: Raymond
 
sunshadow said:
Aldo is your best choice. if you are going to be doing your own heat treat, his custom melted 1084 is your best bet, If you are sending out for heat treat any of the air hardening steels he sells will be good, my personal choice for air hardening steel is the CPM154 I got from Aldo, the CPM is a bit more expensive than some steels, but the steel is that cheapest part of your process, so you might as well buy the best

-Page
Click to expand...

I went with Aldo too.. good prices and shipping isn't bad .. order enough though.. you'll want more.
 
Aldo will take small orders happily, and shipping isn't too much.
 
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+1 for Aldo. Recently ordered some steel and there was a shipping mixup, and he made it right, went above and beyond to do so. He is a stand up guy.
 
+1 for Aldo. Cheap shipping and super service. The guy is good to deal with.
 
Aldo(njsteelbaron.com) is the best, great prices, good/fast shipping, excellent service. If you don't see a particular steel you want on his site give him a call or send an email to see if he has it(or can get it for you)
Also I have had great experiences with onlinemetals.com, they have an excellent selection of toolsteel in just about any size you want and fully annealed.
 
Njsteelbaron.com is great! Alphaknifesupply.com is great for smaller pieces and for some of the other particle steels like elmax.


Waterjet cutting is great if you've got a proven design that you plan on making a bunch of but it is not something I would recommend for a beginner. 6-10 bucks a blade sounds about right if you have a whole pile of them made at once. The price to do just one or two will be quite a lot higher most places. Odds are that your first few knives will seem great at first but by the time you get them done you'll see many areas that need improvement. It's hard to change a design after you've got 30 of them profiled. `
 
Waterjet cutting is great. IF you have a proven design like Jason said. I wanted to make a drop point hunter for my standard knife. I made one from 5160 and when finished used it a bit then made another with small improvements and used it for a while then a 3rd from D2 that was really what I wanted. Then I sent a chunk of D2 plate off and got 36 cut out. Now I have another style ready to cut out and need more of the drop points. Going to tweak the drop point a bit on the second batch
 
There is a very old and big scrap/salvage place in Redwood City called Allan Steel, right off I-101/Whipple Ave. towards the bay. He has all sorts of salvaged tools, bits, etc., so if you're looking for that type of steel source, that's a good place. I can spend hours in there looking in his warehouse. He's got everything from heavy industrial parts to marine to electronics. Plus a great supply of clean bar stock in varying alloys and metals. He custom cuts and grinds too. Only open M-F though.
 
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