Kitchen knives and blade steel

B

Blackwatch

Joined
Dec 19, 2000
Messages
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I am curious about the current and future steels in most commonly available kitchen knives. These would mostly include Henckels, Wustoff, and CutCo.

For most things, these would seem to be fine. However, I believe the steels in these to be somewhere in the 420A-440A range.

Is this truly so? And, if so, why with the advent of all the truly good stainless steels (CPM steels, etc) why don't these companies come out with anything in this range?

They charge a small fortune for each knife, much more for a set, why can they not use better steels?
I realize the steels they use are easier to sharpen, but they dull quicker and aren't that much more stain resistant. The 420V steels, etc, would hold a sharper edge for longer.

Just looking for a sounding board here, and some basic steel/knife answers.
 
I agree, Blackwatch. I'd like to see better steels used on kitchen knives too. I have some good Henckels that were given to me. They are good knives and I use them daily, but I would be willing to buy a few more kitchen knives with better steel. I really wouldn't mind sharpening them either. i figure if they take a little longer to sharpen, that they'll stay sharp that much longer.

Maybe such knives are already out there, and I just don't know about them. :confused:

Bruce
 
Originally posted by Blackwatch
... if so, why with the advent of all the truly good stainless steels (CPM steels, etc) why don't these companies come out with anything in this range?

I realize the [420J/440A] steels they use are easier to sharpen, but they dull quicker and aren't that much more stain resistant. The 420V steels, etc, would hold a sharper edge for longer.
Click to expand...

Couple reasons, all related to cost and marketplace acceptance of said cost:
1. difficulty in forging and/or die cutting blanks (good steel wears out dies quickly)
2. difficulty in grinding what you did in #1
3. difficulty in heat treating...higher austenizing temps, trickier quench and tempering steps, less room for error, etc.
4. marketplace sensitivity to cost... honestly, what fraction of the total kitchen knife marketplace would spend double? low single digits at best... 98% of users don't even sharpen kitchen knives routinely.

Would I pay a 50% to 100% premium for 420V properly heat treated? You bet. But you and I are in a very lopsided minority.

We are therefore relegated to custom knives... tough news, but someone's gotta buy custom $#!+.
 
I agree with what you say, and I understand they like to make money.

However, these companies artifically inflate their pricing just to make money. Paring knives cost 50 bucks in some cases. the same knife, if sold by a non-kitchen knife company, would probably cost 20 bucks max. example: paring knife is same basic size/steel as the CRKT stiff kiss, but 2-3 times as much cash.

I guess, since we here are in the lopsided minority, I suppose they wouldn't see any profit in using better materials, and charging the same amount.

But what about custom/semi-custom kitchen knives? does anyone out there design or make them that i am overlooking? id be interested in at least finding out.
 
George Tichbourne makes well designed and superbly crafted kitchen knives at prices that match Henckels et al. His steel is nicely treated 440C which is quite rust resistant but holds an edge very well. I believe his website is http://www.tichbourneknives.com

One bonus is you will benefit from the dollar exchange since $1 Cdn is worth about $.63 US
 
The other way of looking at the situation is that making a knife blade softer makes it easier to sharpen and the average individual needs any help possible in sharpening. It is simply a matter of designing for the lowest common denominator.

Quality kitchen blades are available from people like myself but I find that even for high quality blades there is a price barrier so that is why I use 440C instead of Stellite for kitchen knives. I can afford to replace a 440C blade that has been damaged through abuse but the cost of stellite makes this impossible.
 
King Grinch :

CPM steels are hard to sharpen.
Click to expand...

This is only true is the maker did not grind the blade to suit the steel, do the heat treatment in the same manner or pick the incorrect steel for the blade.

Of course yes, if you use a hone that is not suitable for the steel it will not be very efficient, but you could say the same thing about simple steel if you tried to work it with buffing compounds suitable for brass.

Rdangrer, outlined many of the manufacturing problems, however the simple biggest issue is that they don't need to. The knives currently sell very well with the steels they have and they can always "upgrade" the knives with market lingo like "laser guided sharpening etc. .

-Cliff
 
Most people don't use soft cutting boards in the kitchen like they should. Regardless of the grade of steel you will quickly dull the edge if you cut on ceramic plates or in stainless steel pans. A hard steel will also do more damage to the plates and pans. Once you have dulled the edge very few people have the tools, skills, or patience to sharpen a high end steel. Most don't try and sharpen the edge until it has become very dull. At that point it is way beyond their ability to sharpen if it is a tough steel. Most of the public are better off with a steel that is easy to sharpen like 1084, 420HC, AUS-6, or 12C-27. (Even 440A is inconvenient). These alloys also respond pretty well to maintenance using a steel.

I volunteer at a soup kitchen and have access to a wide variety of cheap knives. I also buy a lot of used knives at thrift stores for use in the soup kitchen. Over the years there have been a large number of Japanese kitchen knives made of tougher "molybdenum stainless", "molybdenum-vanadium stainless", and "vanadium stainless" alloys. The ones with moly in them are such a hastle to sharpen that I don't attempt it by hand anymore, even with a large coarse diamond hone. I use a belt sander. An average person would never be able to sharpen one of these once it got dull. Some German blades have a bit too much moly for my liking in a kitchen knife.

Alloys with a pinch of Vanadium (.2% to .4%) make a practical blade for the common man (or woman). The Japanese MAC knives have Vanadium and Tungsten in small amounts and take a tremendous edge. This is similar to AUS-8. The kitchen knives from AG Russell seem to use a similar alloy. Spyderco uses a simpler stainless called MBS-26 that falls into this league. These alloys are the type that I would use the most and the highest end steels that I would give a friend. Some of the German knives are roughly equivalent.

A D2 alloy kitchen knife would work great, but I would save it for myself. I don't think any of my friends could cope with it.
 
Most chefs know nothing about knives or shall I say the steel that makes up the knife. I can say this because I am a chef. There is a point between cost and funcionability. A Kitchen knives can last 30 years under daily use if not longer. There is no reason to make these knives out of other metals that may be more expensive, Most kitchen knives Messermeister, Forchner use a version of 440 steel. 440 keeps a good edge and is easy to maintain the key to a good knife. 440 is also an easy metal to work with in large production.

Anything less thyen 440 would be too soft and would not keep an edge. If the metal was to hard it would be to difficult to resharpen on the fly and difficult to maintain the edge. The Middle ground is 440.
 
By the way, the premium German brands use more sophisticated alloys than basic 440 series. A typical alloy would be X50CrMoV15 which contains carbon, chrome, molybdenum and vanadium.
 
Fallkniven had two kitchen knives with VG-10. I have one on order. When I get it I'll let you know how it its.
 
I just supplied my younger daughter with her Talonite chef's knife made by Rob Simonich. 17" OAL, 10" blade, Corion scales.

Nick Blinoff, one of the two chefs who helped in evaluating and developing the prototype knife, still raves about his knife (the prototype). My eldest daughter loves hers.

Daddy is going to finally get one, hopefully by Christmas.

Talonite rules.

Walt
 
those german companies probably have a airplane hanger worth of their proprietary steel. ya think they are gonna just take a loss to make a few people in the know happy.....don't think so!

I wish too!

henckels welds their knives in 3 places. they don't even forge they get away with advertising forged cause they forge the bolsters. they use crappy still now. pre 70-80's they used great steel.

when I sold their sh** every house wife from hong kong to oklahoma would by anything with a henckels logo on it. they sold out a long time ago. you could have 2 can openers and if one had a henckels logo they would buy that even if it was lower quality and a higher price. it was mind boggling:confused:

wusthoff is the way to go in stainless. they still do a great job. though I am a sabatier carbon fan. they use 1095 and boy it gets sharp fast. I'll have them till I die.
 
Hmmm. This is all very interesting. I've never really known much about the steels in kitchen knives. I'm quite glad I asked.

So, most German brand knives use some sort of proprietary steel, some knives use VG10 (that im quite interested in), and some just use cheapo steels....well, i was mostly interested cuz I just got some Henckels 4star for my wedding, and just was curious. I had a cutco rep come to my house telling me that henckels are 420 and that the cutco knives are 440A. and i wanted to see how accurate this was. i also, now that i've seen, am going to watch and see how that VG10 fallkniven kitchen knife turns out.

thanks guys, i love the free flow of info.
 
For me Japanese-made kitchen knives are the way to go. There is incredible variety in blade steels, blade styles and knife styles. You'll be sure to find something to suit you. Let me just highlight the two main things I like about them.

1. Steel - as I said, the choice of blade steels is enormous. From the more traditional "shirogami" and "aogami" (white steel and blue steel respectively), to high end materials like VG-10 and super exotics like ZDP-189 and Cowry X. These aren't your typical steels and should satisfy your desire for something more than the common Solingen stuff.

2. Sharpness - the Japanese have a thing for sharp edges. Most good knives (regardless of the steel) come with a scary sharp edge, a combination of an aggressive edge geometry and thin edge. The caveat here is to find the right knife for the right application.

Price wise there is a huge range, anywhere from $30 - $1000.

Insofar as Japanese production knives go, stuff from Mac and Global are good quality at prices comparable to Wusthof or Henckels. You want something beautiful to boot, try the damascus style knives from Kasumi, Ryusen or Hattori. Note: even the Fallkniven VG-10 knife is made in Japan.

Tip: check out Murray Carter, a Canadian who heads a Japanese smithy. He's also a Master Smith BTW. His Muteki line of Japanese kitchen knives is serious bang for the buck. Hey, when you have someone like Jerry Fisk singing the praises for Murray's knives, what else can you ask for? :)
 
Japanese knives just flat out rule.
I got some from justknives101.com that are
rough looking , but just cut and keep on truckin'; just a few licks with the 1200 and shine with the 6000 King waterstone and you're done for the next 3 months.
Henkels is living on reputation ; they're soft to the point of being gooey. I hope Santa brings me a nice French , carbon steel knife.:rolleyes:
 
Cutco's Blade Material
Hi all! I was just surfing and thought I'd check out what was said about Cutco on here. I am a Cutco rep, so you won't be hearing from me much because I hate when reps flood message boards trying to convince people to buy Cutco -- I mean, either you like it, or you don't.

There was some confusion about the blade material. It is 440A high carbon, surgical stainless steel with a Rockwell hardness of 55-57C. 410A is what the garden tools are made of.

Cutco's blades ARE stamped, which could make them dull faster. The reason that they don't dull quickly is because of the DD Edge. On the other hand, I have talked to several customers who ordered Cutco with the straight edges at no extra charge and have been very satisfied for 20+ years.

Perhaps our tempering process is what makes the difference here. We heat-temper our blades to 2000 degrees F, then cold-temper to -100 degrees, and then heat-temper again to 365.

All I know is that I have been working with this company for 3 years and have only ever met one customer who was not satisfied, and she only had one paring knife for 15 years -- the paring knife is not the best representative of our product, especially when it's by itself and gets overused.

Hope that this is informative and helpful!

__________________
<>< Alice <><
:rolleyes:
 
Alice, it's nice to hear the scoop on Cutco from someone who knows the product. :) I always wondered what the Rockwell hardness was, and it turns out that it's quite similar to the German knives which also range around 56 like my Forschner.

As Blackwatch said, we are a minority and we don't represent the juiciest part of the market. The general public would balk at the added cost of a fancier low carbon stainless steel like 420V, and they would quickly rust the higher carbon stainless steels.

But after it's all said and done, you're doing something wrong if your kitchen knife needs frequent resharpening. Simply re-aligning the edge with a common steel will bring it back like new for literally years if you're using a proper soft cutting board.
 
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