What steel do you prefer for hunting knives?

Kevin Cox said:
Hi I get it Descaled and the great thing about NSM they will cut the width you want so I have no waste. My hunters at 10´´ so my sheet comes 10x36 . Great service.
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Do they make sure the grain orientation is correct?
 
I had a Spyderco Gayle Bradly 2 that was hands down the best folder I ever lost. It was 63-64 Rc and felt noticeably harder than my benchmades on the stones. I used it hard in construction work that is probably harder on a blade than any hunting situation. It was a hollow grind and was down to .009 behind the edge and the hollow must have been half of that tops, it was deep. I don't think the knife so much as chipped even with a fine edge.i carried it every day for 4 years without any issues. Competition choppers run it a bit softer but not soft. Unlike my S110V blade M4 can still be run with a thin edge as far as I know it is the most wear resistant of the steels like Z-Wear and 4V that can be run extremely hard and have enough toughness to be run thin as well. As tough as 3V is from what I have heard it can't be run as thin in competition cutters because you can get permanent deformation when it flexes in the cut. For a hunting knife do you need more toughness than a competition cutter. I can see a argument for bushcraft knives that might be batoned through crazy twisted wood and knots but not a sub 4" hunter.
 
Storm W said:
I had a Spyderco Gayle Bradly 2 that was hands down the best folder I ever lost. It was 63-64 Rc and felt noticeably harder than my benchmades on the stones. I used it hard in construction work that is probably harder on a blade than any hunting situation. It was a hollow grind and was down to .009 behind the edge and the hollow must have been half of that tops, it was deep. I don't think the knife so much as chipped even with a fine edge.i carried it every day for 4 years without any issues. Competition choppers run it a bit softer but not soft. Unlike my S110V blade M4 can still be run with a thin edge as far as I know it is the most wear resistant of the steels like Z-Wear and 4V that can be run extremely hard and have enough toughness to be run thin as well. As tough as 3V is from what I have heard it can't be run as thin in competition cutters because you can get permanent deformation when it flexes in the cut. For a hunting knife do you need more toughness than a competition cutter. I can see a argument for bushcraft knives that might be batoned through crazy twisted wood and knots but not a sub 4" hunter.
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Heard some great stuff about m4 as well. Decisions decisions lol
 
Justin Schmidt said:
Heard some great stuff about m4 as well. Decisions decisions lol
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the 3v,4v,v4e,z-wear,m4 group will all perform quite similarly, except 3v can’t be run as hard for those super fine edges. As long as you are confident in the geometry your heat treat can support, any make great knives. The stainless options like s45vn, and Elmax are great too, but do best with geometry at 0.010” or thicker. You can use 0.005” with the non stainless options, with 3v splitting the difference. It just loses too much when run hard enough for such fine geometry.

I like Z-wear, not because it is better than the others, but I have made more knives out of it than the other steels. I just know it better.
 
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Justin Schmidt said:
Heard some great stuff about m4 as well. Decisions decisions lol
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Willie71 Willie71 is the man to ask about how thin and hard you can run those steels. I will tell you that his Z-wear is a mother to grind at 66Rc though. Be prepared to use a pile of belts if you are going to do it hard. Also I I lost about 1.5" off of a chef out of M4 when doing it soft because instead of flexing or taking a mild set from to much pressure it just suddenly folded over so get enough to get used to grinding it.
 
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
I will caution people reading this thread not to get totally caught up in the BEST steel idea. Every steel we have discussed will make a great knife if HTed properly. They will also make poor knives with improper HT. The difference between the lowest and the highest on the charts we ar referring to is almost inconsequential in most blades for general use. What that means is that a hunting knife properly made from all of these steel will seem nearly identical to a normal user.

As an experiment in the psychology of marketing hype I had a customer/friend who used a lot of my knives. He read an article on Elmax back when it was an up and coming steel. He wanted a kitchen knife made exactly like one he had recently bought from me, but in Elmax. I made him another in S35VN from the same batch of blades as his first one and gave it to him as a gift for being a good customer. I told him that it was Elmax and I had given it a special heat treatment to make it far superior to the S35VN knife he had bought. He emailed me a week later and said the knife outcut the S35VN knife by a huge margin. After a few weeks of more praise for the Elmax blade I told him he was imagining the improvement, and after he said he could even feel the difference in using them, I told him they were both S35VN from the same batch and HT.
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I agree with the best steel thought that Stacy expressed here. A good friend of mine writes for a lot of different outdoor/hunting/gun magazines. He'd been after me for some years to broaden out of my cowboy knife deal and design and make some more sporting type knives. I roped him and made him help me design both my Sonoran Skinner, Sonoran Hunter and the Sonoran Belt knife (caper, edc, bird and trout). I made 2 sets of these knives and they were identical except for the the bolster on one set being nickel silver and the other being brass. He was going to a large TX game ranch where he was test driving a new Weatherby rifle. This place was also a working cattle ranch, so I knew the Belt Knife would fit right in as it was originally designed as a branding knife. My buddy set up a blind test with the manager and gave the guides each a set of these knives. The manager knew they were different steels the guides did not. One set was in A2 @62RC the other in the latest and greatest with the latest whizbang HT. First week the guides alternated switching between the sets each day. By the end of the week the manager told me they were arm wrestling over the who got to take the A2. In the second week they just broke up the A2 set and each took one, leaving the other set at the lodge. By the end of the season each guide as well as the manager had purchased more of these knives, with their own money, not the ranches. These guys process more game in a day, then many hunters do in a year and more in a week than lots do in a lifetime. This test took place many years ago. I just recently finished 3 more Sonoran Hunters in my last batch of knives. One of the guides ordered three, one for each of his sons.

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Must be something there in that A2 at 62RC, seems to work.
 
J-T-K said:
Surely a 80CRV2 wide Lapp blade is a tried and tested tool?
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Sure it's a great tool and there are a lot of good knives made out of it but for what is being discussed for starters it is not even a little bit resistant to rusting. Second the thread is about hunting knives and in my mind at least we are not talking about much more than a 4" blade so there is no chopping and they are not designed to baton. All of the steels being talked about are stainless or highly resistant to rusting though they may stain and second most of them between 7 to 15 times the edge retention depending on how everything is heat treated and most are tougher allowing higher hardness and thinner bevels allowing better performance and edge retention. Simple steels have a reputation for being very tough but looking at Larrins testing has shown that even though they are somewhat tough they can't hang with some of the steels being discussed and that PM does make a difference as well as the added alloying can add toughness as well as edge retention.
 
Sorry - I don't mean a leuku, but one of the shorter companion Lapp knives. Typically 3-4'' long and about a half wider than a puukko. A bit like a short leuku, with a similar overall blade profile, and often a bit of a groove around the bolster rather than going straight into the blade. 2.5-3.5mm thickness.

I completely get the modern SS improving on it but there's something to be said for the design.
 
Storm W said:
Sure it's a great tool and there are a lot of good knives made out of it but for what is being discussed for starters it is not even a little bit resistant to rusting. Second the thread is about hunting knives and in my mind at least we are not talking about much more than a 4" blade so there is no chopping and they are not designed to baton. All of the steels being talked about are stainless or highly resistant to rusting though they may stain and second most of them between 7 to 15 times the edge retention depending on how everything is heat treated and most are tougher allowing higher hardness and thinner bevels allowing better performance and edge retention. Simple steels have a reputation for being very tough but looking at Larrins testing has shown that even though they are somewhat tough they can't hang with some of the steels being discussed and that PM does make a difference as well as the added alloying can add toughness as well as edge retention.
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if toughness was the primary consideration, depending on budget, and whether stainless was a priority, AEB-l, z-fiNit, z-tuff, 8670, 3v, and a8mod are all great choices.
 
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