Will S30V ever be an "outdated" steel to you?

[K.O.D.]

Oh I remember those days. I was using bone until some genius brought along flint, that bastard. Had a really good collection of bone just laying around the cave too. Mostly family members.

Were they delicious?

 

[HexY3co]

Were they delicious?

Tastes like chicken.

 

[K.O.D.]

Tastes like chicken.

Huh. I always heard it was more like pork. Good to know for, huh, historical accuracy. Not future reference or anything.

 

[pholder]

Thanks for that. I thought as much about S30V and its offspring. I bought a CRK Green Beret in 2004 in S30V because it seemed to be the best I could buy for an active-duty Marine. Today, I would have bought something in a current or "modern" steel.

But wow . . .I made statements like that about Randall Made a few years ago and got pointed. . . and the blow-back was vicious and persistent. Finally, I got pointed and told not to be a troll.

To be clear: It is my belief that Randall Made knives are just as good today as they were in 1945.

Buck knives are as good today as they were in 1962 as well

 

[VorpelSword]

I worked on drilling rigs as a "mud man" back in the 1980s,. I found that the Buck 110 would not stand up to heavy use on a daily basis. By that I mean chores such as cutting 50 to 100 bags of chemical additives a day. The blades quickly became "recurved" through wear. In other applications, the tip would snap off with little lateral pleasure. With much ordinary use, the brass pins holding it all together would work loose.

They look great and make a nice first knife for a 10-year-old boy though.

With all that said: I do n ot know what knife available today would stand up well to that sort of heavy use.

 

[Officer's Match]

Still one of my favorites. Excellent steel that does everything I want it to do.

 

[The Grendels]

I have a bunch of knives made from CPM-S30V steel and I like them. I sometimes suspect that Benchmade bought an aircraft hanger, someone filled to the brim with this steel, and that's why so many of their knives are made of it. I'm still buying knives in older steels like VG-10 or 154, and have zero problems with that either.

 

[Officer's Match]

I have a bunch of knives made from CPM-S30V steel and I like them. I sometimes suspect that Benchmade bought an aircraft hanger, someone filled to the brim with this steel, and that's why so many of their knives are made of it. I'm still buying knives in older steels like VG-10 or 154, and have zero problems with that either.

Spyderco too.

 

[Jakeywax31]

This, all day. Benchmade’s treatment of this steel is top notch. I love just about everything about it. Sharpens nasty sticky sharp easily and doesn’t have a wire edge that flops around, holds the edge a long time, doesn’t chip or roll easily.

Completely agree. I really have never had a horrible knife in s30v. Had a kershaw blur a few years back that was on the soft side. Although I was beating the hell out of the knife as a grunt. The two companies that comes to mind that do an excellent job with S30v is Benchmade and Buck. I know everyone has heard that BOS heat treat is magical a million times but truth is truth. They are good. I have a griptillian that outperforms any other benchmade that I have ever had. I have pretty much had all there steel offerings at this point besides there damasteel gold class stuff.

On the other hand I do get that with time comes innovation and people are naturally drawn to the newest latest and greatest. I too am intrigued with new steels because I am a knife enthusiast. But outdated? Not for a long time in my opinion. Correct me if I am wrong but S30v is not really that old when compared to other steels.

On a side note. This Buck pocket clip is fugly. Who the hell would think this clip would look good on a knife. My goodness.

 

[crufflers]

Even OKC is putting S35VN on the RAT-6 and Blackbird now.

 

[Hashishiin]

I worked on drilling rigs as a "mud man" back in the 1980s,. I found that the Buck 110 would not stand up to heavy use on a daily basis. By that I mean chores such as cutting 50 to 100 bags of chemical additives a day. The blades quickly became "recurved" through wear. In other applications, the tip would snap off with little lateral pleasure. With much ordinary use, the brass pins holding it all together would work loose.

They look great and make a nice first knife for a 10-year-old boy though.

With all that said: I do n ot know what knife available today would stand up well to that sort of heavy use.

I imagine my M4 Shaman, with an open construction such a thick point and wear resistant steel, might do better. I don't see the tip snapping even used tough.
For a "regular" knife, though, a RAT 1 or Buck 110 LW may do better than the base 110 because of the stronger points. Cold Steel GRIK, another great value knife that is hard to kill.

 

[VorpelSword]

In 1981, the standard Buck 110 was the knife for about anyone wearing a hard hat to work. There may have been better options forty years ago, but I was not aware of them.

Carried one or another Buck 110 as an EDC well into the 1990s until Leatherman came out with models that were better than a novelty.

 

[GatorFlash1]

While my EDC is a Spyderco GB #1 CPM-M4 knife because I use it a lot around the shop, home, yard, etc. and it holds up extremely well, but I have nothing bad to say about S30V knives.

 

[XYL]

Thanks! I love it!

Who really cares but . . .A clarification. The Bronze Age ended around 1200-1100 BC. There is a good article on the Bronze Age Wikipedia . A tedious but interesting (to me) book on this subject is "1177 BC, the year Civilization Fell".

The Iron Age in Europe didn't flower till around 800BC.

Again, I recognize that none of this really matters to anyone today.

I care. It's not important, but I went and looked at the time frames for each period, only to remind myself. I'm a comparative politics geek. Clearly, as I roll my eyes at myself.