Brass, nickel, or stainless pins

E

Enkrig

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Dec 17, 2015
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Hi everyone,

I have a general question about pin material: How do you generally decide between brass, nickel, or stainless steel pins? Do you always use the same? Do you change depending on material or color handles? What are the advantages to nickel vs stainless steel?

I'm asking because thus far I have only used brass, since that's what I had available, but for a new knife that I'm working on, I'm thinking that nickel pins might look better with the black micarta handles I will use and be stronger. On another knife I'm working on, I will use wood handles and I'm thinking that brass might look better. In any case, it got me wondering if there are some general principles...

Looking forward to your comments. Thank you.
 
Looking forward to any replies because I've wondered this myself. I've always assumed it was just based on opinion/looks but I don't know.
 
The choice is entirely aesthetic. The disparity in strength among those you've listed is inconsequential for a knife handle, unless it's you're intention to do VERY nasty things to the knife.

Use what you find appealing, or which compliments the other design elements of the knife. Be aware that various stainless steels have different color tones or lusters to them, and a keen eye will pick up the differences, so mixing and matching is a no-no (e.g. 416 for a guard with 303 pins).
 
Exactly what Mathew just said . I would add that some collectors don't like to have to polish brass and nickel silver constantly and they will shy away from such materials , that's one reason so many makers shy away from them too. Personally i don't think anything looks better than a nice piece of brass with a nice dark brown wood like Gidgee or walnut but I would only go that way on a using knife.
 
another consideration is if you are going to peen the pins (something I just started doing)
so nickel silver is softer and the ends can be peened, like brass.
 
I only use 1/8th inch brass pins. Some people will complain that they arent as strong or what not, but I only make kitchen knives and use mostly dark woods "cocobolo, bias cut palm, and so on" and find it to be attractive. And the way i see it, if you treat you kitchen knives so roughly that 3 pins and epoxy cant keep the handle on, A you shouldnt be using hand made knives, and B the wood in the handle is going to be more than shot.
 
Choice is not totally eastethic.

You CAN'T use stainless pins in carbon/low-alloy steel.

Why?

Bimetal Corrosion.
 
Kosa, that's my concern, but up today i had no issues. Galvanic reaction follows by gradient and the differential is not so high between steels of slightly different alloy.
Technically to be safe, the differetial should be less than 0.25V.
Stainless-carbon has 0.35V, brass-carbon has 0.45V, nickel silver 0,50V.
The less of the evil is using stainless pins on carbon steels, short of using carbon steel pins, but i'm more concerned of "sweat corrosion" LOL ;)
 
Yes but for a galvanic reaction, you need an electrolyte as a catalyst, without that, its just two pieces of metal touching each other and you'll find many examples of that throughout the industrial world with no issues. Also if you have taken proper precautions prior to use, you've cleaned and dried your pins and then put a light coat of epoxy on them, thereby shielding them from actually touching the other metal except in minute spots. Even after that, it would take a long time before the reaction caused enough corrosion to affect the pin and bond. This could also happen with just about any metal combination as it is the dissimilar metals combined with an electrolyte that cause the reaction; ie a battery.
 
Yes, usually music wire is high carbon and can be found in many different sizes. I use it as its easier for me to find than stainless in the smaller diameters.
 
I had no idea about the bimetal corrosion effect...
Up to this point I have only dealt with stainless steel knives with brass pins though, so I guess some of these issues might be somewhat mitigated by the corrosion resistance in the stainless steel.
 
Enkrig said:
Hi everyone,

I have a general question about pin material: How do you generally decide between brass, nickel, or stainless steel pins? Do you always use the same? Do you change depending on material or color handles? What are the advantages to nickel vs stainless steel?

I'm asking because thus far I have only used brass, since that's what I had available, but for a new knife that I'm working on, I'm thinking that nickel pins might look better with the black micarta handles I will use and be stronger. On another knife I'm working on, I will use wood handles and I'm thinking that brass might look better. In any case, it got me wondering if there are some general principles...

Looking forward to your comments. Thank you.
Click to expand...

Kosa_PL said:
Choice is not totally eastethic.

You CAN'T use stainless pins in carbon/low-alloy steel.

Why?

Bimetal Corrosion.
Click to expand...

My two cents on this topic is while I like the look of Brass, I mostly make culinary knives and myself and many of my customers live by the ocean so there is salt air as well.

Brass, if left wet or damp oxidizes and can grow green sludge if really left damp for a period of time so I use Stainless Loveless type bolts on my knives.
 
tattooedfreak has it right, no galvanic corrosion unless you're in the habit of doing things like storing your knife in salt water or some other conductive solution. Even constant use in salt water environments wouldn't have much of an effect, as long as the knife is rinsed and dried after use.
 
Matthew Gregory said:
The choice is entirely aesthetic. The disparity in strength among those you've listed is inconsequential for a knife handle, unless it's you're intention to do VERY nasty things to the knife.

Use what you find appealing, or which compliments the other design elements of the knife. Be aware that various stainless steels have different color tones or lusters to them, and a keen eye will pick up the differences, so mixing and matching is a no-no (e.g. 416 for a guard with 303 pins).
Click to expand...

The potential bimetal issues mentioned aside, are there combinations of pin and handle material that you guys have found that you end up using often? I'm thinking that after some time people develop their own preference and I'm wondering what that is.
 
Should you want carbon steel pins, common nails work very well. Music wire is entirely too hard.
 
If we buy into the theory that you should not use SS hardware on a carbon steel knife, I guess corby bolts are a waste right?
 
As a chemist, galvanic potential differences and its related corrosion is not an issue on any handle sealed with epoxy and would not be an issue on an unsealed handle unless the knife was constantly wet with water containing some sort of salts to make an electrolyte.

As to the original question about peening pins -
A handle can warp due to outside moisture or getting wet. A run through a dishwasher can lift the scales 1/8" off the tang on one end. Using Corby or Loveless bolts will make this impossible. It also entirely eliminates the need to use clamps. They come in stainless, nickel, brass, copper, and in a wide variety of diameters and lengths.
 
I get my Loveless Style Bolts from Jantz Supply,
Over the years and buying them from different vendors, I find theirs to be the most consistent in size with clean threading and nuts. A few of the suppliers get theirs from over seas and a couple of batches were not cleanly tapped & I had to buy an 8/32" drill & tap to clean many of the nuts up so I could use them.
Took a lot of time. :grumpy:
 
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