Knife sharpening

>>1066292

If the blade actually has been heat treated, you can sharp it to shaving sharp. Depending on the steel, others will dull much quicker than others. The ones that stay sharper longer, usually need more time to sharpen.

One reason why I like 1095. Takes a edge pretty quick and holds it. Also like Aus8, vg10 too. Might pick up a 5160 blade.

>>1066296
I like stainless because the neat-clean autist in me has the idea of having one stainless knife for slaying monsters and filleting fish afterwards. Prolly why I splurge money on shit like expensive knives

>>1066292
>through jihad

Kinda funny and straight to the point

>>1066292
Engineer here. In theory, any metal can be sharpened to an edge. the sharpness and hardness depend on the material though.

Now this is where the theory starts getting boring: steel "crystal" (actually isnt a crystal in chemical sense, but commonly called as such since the atom form similiar shapes) can have three patters: ferrite, austenite and martensite.
ferrite is what pure iron (ferrum) or unhardened, not stainless steel form. if you sharpen it, you will get a pyramidal pattern (four atoms in a square with another one on top of it) which cuts somewhat well, but will always have a 45° edge on atomic level.

My english is a bit to limited to explain properly, but basically, martensite (the pattern hardened steel forms) is similiar, but with a smaller base square while the center atom stay at the same height, resulting in a sharper edge (32° I think it was, but not sure on that one). This is why martensite is the preferred material for cutting edges. it is however more brittle than the other two patters.

finally austenite (which completely stainless steels as well as steels over 900°C form) is shaped like a cube with an extra atom in the middle of each side. the best edge possible form this has the cube stood on it's side, with an edge of 45°.

So basically, the sharpest and hardest edges are martensite, which is why hardened non-stainless carbon steels are preferable. to harden properly however, you need to know what alloy the steel is to choose the proper cooling temperature. cool to quick and the blade becomes to martensitic and brittle, cool to slow and it'll revert to ferrite and go soft.

austenitic / stainless steels can also be hardened, but then they no longer are stainless - they'll only rust less than other steels.

For outdoors, you'll want a softer steel than normally though so the blade won't break during batoning and similiar stuff, so buying knife intended for it (as opposed to fighting, hunting or kitchen knives) pays of.

>>1066305
Very nice.
What kind of steel would N695 Bohler be? Or A304 also? I bought a knife with full tang N695 Bohler and A304 bolsters. How would one sharpen and care of these two steels?

>>1066305
>>1066309
Also for batoning I'll carry a small hatchett and not a knife, I'm not gay.

>>1066292
no

>cheap mystery steel
such as?

>>1066319
Ganzo, Sanremu, even stuff like most Schrade and Bucks today since they're made in China. The Chinese cant make as good knives because American/European companies dont want to give away their trade secrets (heat treating, hardening). I've had alleged Ganzo 440C steel knives, which werent neither 440C nor stainless. So yeah, mystery steel
>inb4 'muh buy 'Murican'

>>1066324
what methods were used to verify the hardness?

you take a risk anytime you buy a knockoff

>The Chinese cant make as good knives
that's a broad statement

spyderco makes different knives if different countries, the lower end models made in china have cheaper blade material, but where it's made doesn't automatically mean it is junk

>>1066329
Yeah but you didnt say anything much, really. Something along the lines 'your personal experiences are your own and therefore not objective' and i agree, but I can say the same about your opinion about spyderco.

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>>1066329
>>1066348
Whereas Ganzo clearly has 440C written on the side of their knives and obviously makes soft cheap alloys that they claim are just like 440C. Which is hilarious because I love 440C because of my needs and my budget, and thr Ganzo are miles apart from 440C heh
>pic related my '440C' Ganzo
Thats why I said 'mystery steel like Ganzo' because it isnt 440C like its obviously written on their blades...

>>1066324
>The Chinese cant make as good knives because American/European companies dont want to give away their trade secrets (heat treating, hardening).
lol no, just no

American brands' (e.g.: Buck) Chinese-made models suck because they cut the costs and don't care about quality. If they wanted to forgo a bit of profits they could spend more on better materials and production, instead they just want cheap Made In China models to dump into WalMart.

>>1066352
And sell it to the American public under the guise of a patriotic company with 'patriotic' prices. Thats why a couple threads back I wrote that there is no point in ordering most Buck/Schrade/Walmart grade knives if you're from anywhere except USA, because you pay the American price + shipping and then probably import tax of your country's customs.
>$25 chinese made Schrade + absurd $21 standard shipping = worth of package higher than $45 which means 25% import tax

>>1066348
it's not just my singular opinion that companies like spyderco, ontario knife, and sanrenmu, who produces knives in china, are doing so in such a way that they wouldn't be of significantly better quality if produced in another country with the same materials

For the steel nerds around here, Zknives.com has some good resources. THere is also an androir app where you can look up a lot of info on different steels on the fly. Handy when you're shopping or at an expo or something.

>>1066324
It's a tragic misunderstanding that the Chinese (or the asian countries for that matter) can't make good knives (or anything else for that matter). THe thing to know is, that the chinese are very good at doing exactly what you ask of them. Except, if you ask for a lower price, they'll just say yes and bump the quality down a notch. So western companies will ask for something produced to a certain spec, the chinese manufacturer will quote them a price, the western company will try to haggle, the chinese manufacturer will lower the quality to keep their profit margin.

If you are willing to pay the price, asian manufacturers are quite able to provide decent quality. E.g. WE Knives, Rike knives

>>1066324
There are no big "secrets" to heat treating.
Just hype from Buck are others because they use easy to grind steels that keep costs in US production down.

There are lots of steels that are the equivalent of 440C.
440c is not a secret, proprietary, or complicated recipe.
9cR13mov and AUS-10 are two examples. 9cr13mov the composition it literally in the name.


And rust resistance depends a lot on the finish.
I've had US made Kershaws in Sandvik steel rust because of the bead blast finish but Moras in the same steel survive salt water.

>>1066309
N695 is a good one.
304 is just everyday low carbon stainless.
Like you'd find in good quality cookware or stainless steel railings.

I'd get a Chinese copy of the Apex system for €20.
Anyone can get a decent edge on that.

>>1066292
>no other quality difference regarding the blade itself.

Depends entirely what the blade is made of and how its heat treated to give it toughness, or less toughness and more hardness. When I make kitchen knives, they tend to be in the upper 60-62HRC as people use them on soft foods and not chopping the top off a can of beans, outdoorsy knives which get used by people to try and cut down trees, stab cans of beans and other fuckery, I'll drop those down to about 57-58HRC unless its a specialist knife like a skinner, filleting knife or something like that.

Pretty much 99% of the steels used in knife making fell off the back of some other industry, usually automotive (52100, spring steels & 1075-1095) and tooling (O1, 440C, W1 & 2 etc) which we adopt, figure out how to heat treat it on its alloy composition and then beat a knife out of it with hammers, fire and abrasives.
Quality of the steel comes down to the guy making it following prescribed guidelines for that alloy.
If they add too much of something or leave something out, it changes the alloy and everything gets thrown out of whack. That's why cutlery and knife makers tend to be a bit picky about 'what' the steel actually is and demand a quality steel as our name is stuck on the side and it only takes one fuckup to ruin your name.

As I mentioned earlier, intended and actual use are things which are important to the construction of a knife, its hardness, edge geometry, mass and tempering come down to 'what does it do' and 'what are you going to do with it'. Just like taking your sports car off onto bush roads is going to beat it up, you'd much rather a 4wd that might be a bit slower on the road, but more capable off it. A knife is much the same kind of tool, there are compromises

>>1066305
your English was more than sufficient. thanks for taking the time to explain

>>1066292
>Is it true that almost any and almost every knife, except the cheapest of the cheap, can be made razor sharp with a right tool and profiling/reprofiling?
Yes, up to a point.

Any knife without a grossly messed up heat treatment can be made razor sharp. Some will be much more difficult than others depending on the technique, skill, and tools the sharpener uses (for example, cheap soft stainless steels tend to form large floppy burrs that novice sharpeners often struggle to remove).

With that being said, however, steel type, quality of heat treatment and blade hardness can have a massive impact on how well that razor sharp apex will be retained in any sort of use. Just as one example, a 52-53 HRC cheap stainless blade will likely have a razor sharp apex at a reasonable angle roll over the first time it contacts a wood or poly cutting board, whereas a 62 HRC pure carbon steel kitchen knife can take hundreds of cutting board contacts without any microscopic chipping or rolling at the apex.

The answer to most questions when it comes to knives is "it depends." For example:

What's the best steel for a knfie? It depends
What's the best grit to finish an apex at? It depends
What's the best hardness for a knife steel? It depends
What's the best sharpening method? It depends

Etc. Etc.

>>1066305
>So basically, the sharpest and hardest edges are martensite, which is why hardened non-stainless carbon steels are preferable. to harden properly however, you need to know what alloy the steel is to choose the proper cooling temperature. cool to quick and the blade becomes to martensitic and brittle, cool to slow and it'll revert to ferrite and go soft.

True, and the larger the proportion of martensite and lower the proportions of non-martensite phases the better a blade becomes at taking a thin, acute angle apex that strongly resists microscopically chipping and rolling and thereby shows excellent edge retention in push cutting work.

In soft abrasive material slicing (e.g. rope, cardboard) however, it gets a little more complicated as large volumes of non cementite carbides start can vastly increase abrasive wear resistance over pure carbon steels. They tend to do so, however, at the expense of reducing resistance to microscopic chipping and rolling at the apex and thus reduce push cutting edge retention (reflecting one of the ever present trade-offs in knives).

I always bring 6 knives when camping so I don't have to bother sharpening them, I just get my other one out.

>>1067456
Oooh, a knifemaker?

Got a website for your work?

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>>1068216
Good old fashioned cardboard is actually a really nice stropping surface, get the side of a packing box, fold it over a couple of times so its a block- polishes the edge and gets rid of burrs really well.

>>1068218
I'm fairly small time so I just do a bit here and there for family, the odd chef and butchers that want a hand made custom made knife. So I don't really make a lot of tactical or outdoor stuff unless I come up with something special for an idea, either I'm an overly experienced hobbyist or the slowest semi-professional cutler on earth. Mostly its just an artistic outlet which I don't have in an otherwise fairly mundane, black and white occupation.
Do have an idea for a couple of small Seax blades though and recently got some new steel in the other day, so when they're a bit more along the ways I'll take some pictures but at the moment I've got 2 chefs knives and 2 paring knives I've really got to get done sometime soon...