New BentoBoxShop M390 Delica

I spend an extra $15 at the grocery store on things I dont need just about every time I go. 15 for shipping on a knife that will last me many many years to come is a small price to pay if it’s something I want. Should be here Thursday!
 
If it makes any difference they had a para3 tested in m390 at 59.6, but the delica is made in a different factory than the Para 3.
Think I saw a pm2 at around 60hrc once.

Either way I'm not wasting any money on sub 61hrc m390 unless it's ht process has been validated via cut testing. I think it's a stupid trend when most companies release a super popular steel and it doesn't perform as well as the base steel they offer ie s30v. Cause they skimped on the ht because the mass market won't tell a difference.

I mean it has alot more chromium for stainlessness... But lol 58hrc ish for a premium price, no thanks. This is a problem with most of the companies making these "premium" steel sprint runs.

If you think Spyderco skimps on heat treat, I think you have no idea what you're talking about. Seriously. Spyderco has almost always had phenominal HT. I'm sure there is one here or there that makes it out but I highly doubt that is the norm.

How do you know they HT below 60? Source please?
 
If you think Spyderco skimps on heat treat, I think you have no idea what you're talking about. Seriously. Spyderco has almost always had phenominal HT. I'm sure there is one here or there that makes it out but I highly doubt that is the norm.

How do you know they HT below 60? Source please?
For the most part they do have a great mass production heat treatment. The m390 not so much, tested independently. Again it's not just a spyderco thing. Nearly all the companies are heat treating this type of steel to performance levels of s30v in there standard lineup.

As mentioned one of them was 62hrc and that's from spyderco and the only one at that hrc from all the the manufacturers that have this steel that have been tested.

So yea you can have blind faith in things and give your hard earned money for it. That's on you.


Video is about 3v thing but still goes for this.
 
I always love to see another cool dealer exclusive. Spyderco, keep rocking all the dealer exclusives/sprint runs/flash batches your factories can handle. Thank you!
 
For the most part they do have a great mass production heat treatment. The m390 not so much, tested independently. Again it's not just a spyderco thing. Nearly all the companies are heat treating this type of steel to performance levels of s30v in there standard lineup.

As mentioned one of them was 62hrc and that's from spyderco and the only one at that hrc from all the the manufacturers that have this steel that have been tested.

So yea you can have blind faith in things and give your hard earned money for it. That's on you.

[video snipped in quote]

Video is about 3v thing but still goes for this.


I just sat down, pulled up your spreadsheet, downloaded a copy so I could play with it a bit myself, etc., etc.

I also added two more data points: The HRC tracking post on Spyderco's forum also has a Mule at 60.5 and a Military at 61 (both M390).

I disagree with the conclusions you've drawn, both in the above quote and in your previous post about Spyderco's smaller blades being around 58 HRC.


Combining the M390 and CPM20CV numbers (and doing so throughout) - the average tested value for all tested M390/20CV models is 59.1.

I don't know what you consider a reasonable range for this steel but it seems like most people on here would like to see something in 60-62? So overall they're maybe averaging a point or two low - disappointing, but again, the average across everyone is a point higher than you said Spyderco was doing in their small knives.

Then I threw out all of the non-US made knives, since I'm not really sure I trust those companies to get it right - average 59.5. A little better.

Then to the crux of the post - Spyderco in particular - the two samples in the sheet are a Para3 at 59.6 and a PM2 at 62 for an average of 60.8.... which doesn't really support an assertion of 58 either. The other two added at 60.5 and 61 are obviously over as well.

Spyderco is averaging 60.775, which I'd say is pretty darn good both on its own and beats an international and US "industry averages" so far by 1.675 and 1.275 points, respectively.


The overall mean is again 59.1. The median is 59. The standard deviation is 1.1. Based on this results of 58 would not be uncommon at all, but they would still be considered below-average.

Spyderco's mean is 60.775. For the M390 Delicas to average 58 would be a surprise, though it may be unwise to draw too firm of conclusions on this data since we haven't seen anything on M390 from Japanese Spydercos yet. But no data presented so far seems to support that their small M390 blades are around 58 HRC or that we should expect that for the Delicas.

Histogram is below; I apologize for excel and the homemade median/mean bars - no minitab or spss on my personal computer. :(


By all means, please test some of these once they start coming in. More good data is always welcome, and crunching numbers for knives is certainly more interesting than doing it for work (man, if I got to work on a DMAIC for knife industry M390 HT process... you wouldn't even have to pay me. Not even for travel). But until then I'm not too worried about Spyderco in particular messing these up, based on what's been documented so far.

And at the end of the day all I really want is a stainless Delica that holds an edge better than VG10 and is more friendly to sharpen than ZDP - and that I'm pretty confident I'll get.

Histogram for anyone curious:
VB7EOG5.png
 

if your paying extra for a steel that doesnt have performance over s30v... then why are you buying it?
 
A tempest in a teapot ? Seems like a lot of drama over nothing.

From Carpenter CTS-204P's pdf sheet:

"The typical working hardness for the alloy is 57/59 HRC; however, a higher working hardness of 62/63 HRC can be used to enhance the material's wear resistance at the expense of corrosion resistance and toughness"

Bohler Uddeholm CATRA test results:

Bohler M390 microclean 61+ HRC Total Cards Cut: 958.6

I noticed they didn't mention anything about relative corrosion resistance and toughness when giving the CATRA results. Lack of transparency could be thought of as MARKETING. Apparently MARKETING works pretty well.

We're talking about a Spyderco DELICA. Two point nine inches blade length and 0.09" thick. I'd be happy with the enhanced corrosion resistance and toughness and use a Military (s90v, s110v, Rex45, etc) when I want to cut a lot of cardboard.

PS gotta say those spreadsheets are pretty cool. Just ran across Cedric and Ada's spreadsheet the other day too.
 
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if your paying extra for a steel that doesnt have performance over s30v... then why are you buying it?

That hasn't been my experience with my M390 PM2 or my M390 Benchmade 710DLC-1. Lots of daily carry on the first and lots of field dressed and skinned deer on the second - love them.

There's certainly variability - e.g. from Benchmade, my 707-1201 seems to underperform the 710 while the 581 and 586 both seem pretty good (though everything other than the 710 and PM2 gets used a lot less). But in my overall experience, it does do better than S30V.

Also, apart from the M390 PM2 and the 707-1201 they've not usually been more than ~$30 over the base model (since most of mine are upgrades to something that was originally S30V or D2 or XHP, or now VG10). That's worth it to me, so I'll keep buying them if it's a model I like to begin with.
 
Spyderco is averaging 60.775, which I'd say is pretty darn good both on its own and beats an international and US "industry averages" so far by 1.675 and 1.275 points, respectively.

Nice post. IMO, Spyderco has done more than any company in terms of bringing steels to market and they're known for good heat treatment including achieving the target RC.
Mo2 Mo2 Other companies may not deliver but this is the Spyderco subforum and you're spreading false information.
Let's see how this new Delica tests out.
 
Nice post. IMO, Spyderco has done more than any company in terms of bringing steels to market and they're known for good heat treatment including achieving the target RC.
Mo2 Mo2 Other companies may not deliver but this is the Spyderco subforum and you're spreading false information.
Let's see how this new Delica tests out.
VTfuKRD.jpg


No false info.
 
What is MAP?

Minimum Advertised Price - manufacturers will sometimes set a minimum price at which their dealers are allowed to advertise their products for. The idea is to protect smaller dealers from larger, higher-volume dealers that can get by on lower margins, or maybe even negative margins for a time if they're trying to drive smaller competitors out of business. Sometimes it's also used to keep prices higher than what the market might naturally set in order to cultivate an image of a more premium brand/product.

I think Benchmade, Spyderco, and ZT all use MAP now. Benchmade's introduction probably caused the largest kerfuffle on here if you want to search for more discussion.

Note that from Spyderco's perspective there's no problem advertising above MAP - just below it. But it in effect creates a price floor across most dealers, so anyone charging above it stands out.

It generally doesn't apply to models once they're discontinued, and since it's technically only minimum advertised price, sales can still happen at lower prices.

In this case, BBS is one of the few dealers that often charges above MAP, which can be frustrating when they've got an exclusive and there's no other dealers to purchase from.
 
The temptation was too strong, shipping costs notwithstanding. I shall soon own a Delica again. :D
The temptation was too strong for me too. I ve always used Enduras instead of Delicas, even though I like the feel of the Delica in the store. And I ve mostly had zdp steel on my Enduras. But the idea of m390 on the Delica seems great. I ll trust Spyderco s heat treatment just like I always have. Sal seems to have too great an interest in different blade steels not to mandate a decent heat treatment on his knives. IMHO.
I hope they don t come up with a m390 Endura. I ve got enough knives.
 

if your paying extra for a steel that doesnt have performance over s30v... then why are you buying it?
That's been my point all along,esp.w/ m390 Spyderco has been doing good on k390,rex45 and some others as far as hrc goes ,so that's good .Lately it's getting to the point for me,instead of spending big $$ on knives with experimental steels are the steels that take very keen edges with decent edge retention are more important, the Maxamet for me is like the best of both worlds.
 
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Minimum Advertised Price - manufacturers will sometimes set a minimum price at which their dealers are allowed to advertise their products for. The idea is to protect smaller dealers from larger, higher-volume dealers that can get by on lower margins, or maybe even negative margins for a time if they're trying to drive smaller competitors out of business. Sometimes it's also used to keep prices higher than what the market might naturally set in order to cultivate an image of a more premium brand/product.

I think Benchmade, Spyderco, and ZT all use MAP now. Benchmade's introduction probably caused the largest kerfuffle on here if you want to search for more discussion.

Note that from Spyderco's perspective there's no problem advertising above MAP - just below it. But it in effect creates a price floor across most dealers, so anyone charging above it stands out.

It generally doesn't apply to models once they're discontinued, and since it's technically only minimum advertised price, sales can still happen at lower prices.

In this case, BBS is one of the few dealers that often charges above MAP, which can be frustrating when they've got an exclusive and there's no other dealers to purchase from.
Thank you I’ll have to remember that.
 
Received the two I ordered on Friday this morning.

Excellent knives, QC is fantastic with very nice edge bevels consistent on both sides with nice grinding finish. Perfectly centered with great detail on the entire knife.

Slight, 1/8 turn, on the pivot screw and a few drops of Nano-Oil on the BP washers, back lock surfaces and very smooth operation.

Two of the best Delica knives from Spyder to date.

Regards,
FK
 
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