Simple carbon steels..do they still evolve.

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HappyamateurDK

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Hi all.

I am a big fan of carbon knives myself, but I wonder.

Are there still any development in the traditional simple carbon steels? (white#blue# SK and other similar carbon steels)

And do the techniques the smiths use evolve and offer new properties from those steels.

Or to put it simple will a well made knife in white or blue steel be better today. Then a well made knife in the same steel was 10 or 20 years ago?

What do you all think?

Have a nice weekend👍
 
Does apex ultra count or too highly alloyed?

Besides potentially using a heat treat oven which I don't think a lot of traditional Japanese knife makers use, which would give some consistency, not sure what else there would to improve with technique. Might be something @Troopah_Knives knows!
 
I would guess in that last 50 years, the biggest advances are learning how to maximize what happens with the steel. As @jedy617 has said, heat treat via more accurate temperature control, but I would think cycles around that could also make a difference (tempering/cryo/etc.). The knowledge of what can be done has improved and some makers have taken advantage of that. Is that applicable to a simple White #1 style carbon? Someone more knowledgeable than me would have to let us know.

What also must be considered is the maker's goals. The example that comes quickly to mind is how Shihan's 52100 is treated differently than other makers - it's got a rep for being "tough".
 
jedy617 said:
Does apex ultra count or too highly alloyed?

Besides potentially using a heat treat oven which I don't think a lot of traditional Japanese knife makers use, which would give some consistency, not sure what else there would to improve with technique. Might be something @Troopah_Knives knows
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Yeah I'd say tighter temperature control is the main advancement that has been made in recent history. I am not aware of any particularly revolutionary heat treatment techniques being used in knives for these steels. Just the standard stuff like different annealing strategies, tempering temperatures, asutenitization temperatures, etc.
 
Really cool topic. Idk much about metallurgy but instrumentation and measuring would provide the same benefits as they do with pretty much anything? Higher degree of precision, repeatability, etc. like you get with a thermometer for steak. Certainly not 'necessary' but definitely can help with some processes. That a homemade forge and conventional home oven are enough to effectively heat treat 1095 is super cool.
 
Wolfram Special and Sheffcut would fall in this category, right? From what I hear there's not a whole lot to separate them from aogami/1.24xx/1.25xx and 26c3, respectively, but they are attempts to make marginal improvements on widely used simple carbons.
 
timebard said:
Wolfram Special and Sheffcut would fall in this category, right? From what I hear there's not a whole lot to separate them from aogami/1.24xx/1.25xx and 26c3, respectively, but they are attempts to make marginal improvements on widely used simple carbons.
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I'm not sure I would consider them different enough to consider them an evolution. WS is very close to V-Toku 1 and 1.2442 in spec. Sheffcut is...well I'm not even sure what they were going for there.
 
One thing that always blows me away is how many makers dont have an HRC tester. Everyones temps can be off a little bit and when makers use a recipe they found online but dont verify it drive me nuts. I am not a huge fan of Shi-Han's heat treat for example. Toughness is less important to me than edge retention but I totally respect that he has a heat treat he likes and he does it on purpose. While I have no real idea in improvements over the last 10-20 years, I do like to see a maker be intentional with his/her choice of steel and heat treat. Also, its so maker and knife dependent I dont know that you could quantify if we have improved or not. For example I am in love with a knife that I have in Wolfram Special but Apex Ultra to me is not much better than 52100 (which I love) This is coming from a small sample of 1 each though so it comes down to maker not steel.
 
Not really. Companies modify recipes just enough to get around pre-existing names, but not enough to really modify performance. Wolfram Special is basically V-toku1. Sheffcut is inconsequentially different than 26c3, though it may produce more banding. SF100 is basically AEB-L. It's novelty based marketing. though I will say that in the case of WS it's about as close as you can get to a Blue steel without paying through the nose for the bar.

Unless Malachi's special steel project bears fruit Apex Ultra will probably be the last word in low alloy steel evolution.
 
Matt Jacobs said:
One thing that always blows me away is how many makers dont have an HRC tester. Everyones temps can be off a little bit and when makers use a recipe they found online but dont verify it drive me nuts. I am not a huge fan of Shi-Han's heat treat for example. Toughness is less important to me than edge retention but I totally respect that he has a heat treat he likes and he does it on purpose. While I have no real idea in improvements over the last 10-20 years, I do like to see a maker be intentional with his/her choice of steel and heat treat. Also, its so maker and knife dependent I dont know that you could quantify if we have improved or not. For example I am in love with a knife that I have in Wolfram Special but Apex Ultra to me is not much better than 52100 (which I love) This is coming from a small sample of 1 each though so it comes down to maker not steel.
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You nailed the issues precisely. We like to talk about steels, but in reality our experience is with knives from particular makers in these steels. Because of this unless everything else is the same our comparisons are flawed. For example geometry has such a huge effect on cutting and edge retention that the difference you see between steels might have nothing to do with steels’s composition. Your example is perfect, ApexUltra is technically “better” because it has higher toughness at high hardness and higher wear resistance than 52100, but if geometries are different or one knife is just better balanced, more comfortable, better looking you might like it better and feel that the difference between steels is too small to matter. You might even see 52100 edge lasting longer if it has better geometry for the task.
 
MSicardCutlery said:
Not really. Companies modify recipes just enough to get around pre-existing names, but not enough to really modify performance. Wolfram Special is basically V-toku1. Sheffcut is inconsequentially different than 26c3, though it may produce more banding. SF100 is basically AEB-L. It's novelty based marketing. though I will say that in the case of WS it's about as close as you can get to a Blue steel without paying through the nose for the bar.

Unless Malachi's special steel project bears fruit Apex Ultra will probably be the last word in low alloy steel evolution.
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I could see some interesting new concepts. Maybe someone will sort out a bainite HT and make an alloy with extremely high toughness or something. But yeah Low alloys tool steels are a very well-developed technology.
 
MSicardCutlery said:
Not really. Companies modify recipes just enough to get around pre-existing names, but not enough to really modify performance. Wolfram Special is basically V-toku1. Sheffcut is inconsequentially different than 26c3, though it may produce more banding. SF100 is basically AEB-L. It's novelty based marketing. though I will say that in the case of WS it's about as close as you can get to a Blue steel without paying through the nose for the bar.

Unless Malachi's special steel project bears fruit Apex Ultra will probably be the last word in low alloy steel evolution.
Click to expand...

I have also wondered why there is often such a big price difference between knives in white and blue steels, often from the same maker.

Are blue steels that more expensive to buy for the Smith, is it harder to work with?
 
HappyamateurDK said:
I have also wondered why there is often such a big price difference between knives in white and blue steels, often from the same maker.

Are blue steels that more expensive to buy for the Smith, is it harder to work with?
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Despite the very low volume of tungsten and vanadium carbides. The blue paper steels and equivalents can be noticeably more difficult to grind and finish than the lower alloy stuff. Probably due to the relatively large size of those carbides.
 
I think geometry is much more important than any small improvement in heat treatment protocols or whatever. So a knife from 20 years ago with optimal geometry is going to perform better than a knife produced today with perfect heat treatment and subpar grind. That probably goes without saying though.
 
I wasn't sure if I should comment but

For Japanese blacksmiths, some have said steel quality varies year to year or decade to decade, lots are different of course.

There isn't much advancement in steel composition. There were different subgrades of white 2(a and b) and so on, that were 0.1% carbon difference, but that seems to be going away for steel maker economic reasons. Perhaps different lots have slightly different steel microstructure they arrive at to the blacksmith.

Old knives have age hardened a bit, quite interesting, idk if it's really distinct enough though as a user, even for me. Newer japanese single knives do seem more easy to straighten. . .

Vacuum purified white steel is the only new ish advancement, but it's not really available much at all, I've only seen it in woodworking tools. I've owned 2 kanna in that steel, and I wouldn't care to seek it out again.

V toku steels I guess are just different flavor, light alloying.

I've seen magnacut in some Japanese pocket knives on the Japanese web, so I imagine some might be using western steels.

Salt baths with temperature control -- I know Ryusen had those (if I remember correctly).

Some smiths have temperature control. Yamatsuka in Sakai seems to have a lot of fancier equipment for his forged stainless.

Heated lead baths, with carbon powder on top, are common enough to see.

For example, the Suisin blog mentions that Togashi tries to use more scientific heat treat. But microstructure viewing with etching is common enough in Japan, after Kosuke Iwasaki popularized it. Hardness testing too was popularized in razors, Hayashi Diamond, and some old files came with hrc and even steel composition! Some pamplets have descriptions of martensite and cementite -- and this was the 1960s-1970s!

Too much to generalize if better or worse though for Japanese knives, I simply really don't know
 
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HappyamateurDK said:
I have also wondered why there is often such a big price difference between knives in white and blue steels, often from the same maker.

Are blue steels that more expensive to buy for the Smith, is it harder to work with?
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In Japan steels are likely bought at wholesale volume and price. I doubt it's a raw materials cost carryover. The price of domestically available imported white/blue is identical here.

If the blue steels are like WS then after forging into san mai there is a noticeable difference in workability between B/W steels, but nothing overwhelming.
 
Redwax said:
I think geometry is much more important than any small improvement in heat treatment protocols or whatever. So a knife from 20 years ago with optimal geometry is going to perform better than a knife produced today with perfect heat treatment and subpar grind. That probably goes without saying though.
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Still very relevant, if you compare inexpensive yo-gyuotos from thirty years ago, to what you get out of the box today. Or look at NOS. Modern ones, where I guess grinding is done with CNC, require a lot of work. They come twice as thick BTE.
 
refcast said:
Old knives have age hardened a bit, quite interesting, idk if it's really distinct enough though as a user, even for me. Newer japanese single knives do seem more easy to straighten.
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Very interesting info in the rest of the post! Although I'm fairly certain knives don't harden as they age, were you referring to something else?
 
Troopah_Knives said:
Very interesting info in the rest of the post! Although I'm fairly certain knives don't harden as they age, were you referring to something else?
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There are all sorts of myths about old knives and swords. I've heard they harden as they age, I've heard they continue to release stress so become tougher over time as the steel has less stress in it to break, people believe all sorts of things they can't quiet support with evidence or explain.
 
Barmoley said:
There are all sorts of myths about old knives and swords. I've heard they harden as they age, I've heard they continue to release stress so become tougher over time as the steel has less stress in it to break, people believe all sorts of things they can't quiet support with evidence or explain.
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I *think* the stress thing is real. Documented in brass instruments but not sure about knives. Is basically cryo but very, very slow.
 
azn_knives_4l said:
I *think* the stress thing is real. Documented in brass instruments but not sure about knives. Is basically cryo but very, very slow.
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Retained austenite tends to get more stable with longer hold times at room temp not less. So I highly doubt that is the case. If anything knives have a tendency to soften over extremely long periods but I would seriously doubt any measurable change occurs with aging on the time scales discussed here.

Brass is a very different thing from steel, things happen at lower temperatures.
 
Troopah_Knives said:
Retained austenite tends to get more stable with longer hold times at room temp not less. So I highly doubt that is the case. If anything knives have a tendency to soften over extremely long periods but I would seriously doubt any measurable change occurs with aging on the time scales discussed here.

Brass is a very different thing from steel, things happen at lower temperatures.
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Also welds/brazing and stuff like that in brass, lol. Swing and a miss!
 
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