How does PVD coating hold up?

BenLong1018

BenLong1018

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Apr 12, 2012
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I'm curious about it because I'm thinking about getting a DPX H.E.S.T. folder which I'm pretty sure has PVD coating and I don't wanna have to baby it because of the blade coating. So how does PVD hold up for you guys?
 
A proper PVD coating is tough, and one of the best coatings you can get. Its quite trendy to apply this coating on high end watches lately. Depending on how its applied it is either on a par with DLC in terms of durability or one notch below it, although it looks very different. Spyderco's and others that have DLC have a matte finish, but PVD will be almost see through and have a shiny finish. It will show fingerprints etc very easily. Its a very thin coating but its tough because it is chemically bonded with the host material. Take a look at the Striders that were done with a PVD finish quite recently to see what I mean.

More info here: http://www.oerlikon.com/balzers/en/know-how/coating-technologies/pvd-process/

and here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_vapor_deposition
 
I went on the DPX Gear website and apparently they use Mil Spec Phosphate coating, I have no clue what that is.
 
PVD varies from coating to coating. There's ZrN, TiN, TiCN, AlTiN, TiAlN, CN, CrN, etc. TiCN (titanium carbonitride) seems to be the knife companies' go-to PVD and it's worked alright in my experience. Some coatings I've run across are clearly not PVD, but they were on fairly inexpensive knives.

DLC has been fairly consistent in its performance from what I've seen. For that reason, it's what I prefer.
 
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