Wood Carving Blade Steel

H

HaidaGwaiian

Joined
Oct 3, 2013
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Hi all - I was wondering what steels you would recommend for wood carving blades? I work in western red cedar predominantly, but also in alder and maple. Thanks.
 
Carbon steel. All serious work tools are carbon steel. Just oil the blade occasionally and don't store the blade wet.
 
I'd say D2 or S30V, however i have used a RAT1, Fox 75 & a SAK to carve a hollow spiral from a piece of white oak. cedar being a softer wood most steels will work, these are just my thoughts
 
Western Red Cedar is very soft. Any steel that you can get to a screaming sharp and thin edge will work.

Alder is not difficult to carve, but what kind of maple are you using? Soft maples (Western Bigleaf and Silver and sometimes Red) are not hard to work with (as you know) and won't pose much problem to any steel you choose. Hard Maple (Eastern Sugar Maple especially) can be tough stuff though.

Still, any decent steel ought to work just fine. Just figure out how well you can sharpen and choose accordingly. Maybe be careful with some of the less tough steels if you are levering big chips out of harder wood with a very thin edge. I chipped the extra-hard edge carving too aggressively on a Japanese carving knife I have. Not sure the steel, but the core is on the brittle side.

Can you share pics of the stuff you carve?
 
Most woodworking tools such as chisels and planer blades are of carbon steels due to ease of maintenance and push cutting ability when sharpened to a high polish to my knowledge.
 
Some of the commercially available carving knives are made from D1 and D2 carbon steel. Some use 1095 as well. You want a blade that can be kept sharp with just a good stropping, an not have to re-grind every time it gets dull. I have a carving knife from Hock tools that is made from Tool steel (D1 I think) that stay's sharp with a few strokes on my Flexcut Gold saturated strop. Once I got it shaving sharp, it is easy to maintain on the strop. I strop it about every 20 to 30 minutes of carving use.

Blessings,

Omar
 
What they said, carbon steel. I also like the look of carbon steel better than stainless. Just my preference.
 
O1 and what Omar said.

Aus8 (Cold Steel mini tuff lite) and Opinel's carbon work well too if properly set up.

These are a few of my carvers. 1095 from Deepwoods Ventures.

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How to properly (imo) set up an Opinel.

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1095 and 01

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Another group

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And how I set up a mini tuff reprofiled to a more acute edge than the already excellent geometry from CS.

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Mods done were with helpful ideas from my friends here. ;)

Hope you don't mind all the pics. :)
 
Blade geometry determines the functionality of steel and HT. If all things being equal I would prefer 01.
 
Thanks dogstar and MNofUSN - I do use carbon steels, and I'll look into the steels you listed, MNofUSN.
MNofUSN said:
I'd say D2 or S30V, however i have used a RAT1, Fox 75 & a SAK to carve a hollow spiral from a piece of white oak. cedar being a softer wood most steels will work, these are just my thoughts
Click to expand...
 
Thanks, PB Wilson. I've only worked with Western Bigleaf maple, although I'd like to try carving some Sugar Maple. For larger sculpture (in cedar), I have a dogleg Japanese slick that holds its edge for ages.

I can't figure out how to add a picture to a reply. Do the images have to be online?
 
OHALLUM said:
Some of the commercially available carving knives are made from D1 and D2 carbon steel. Some use 1095 as well. You want a blade that can be kept sharp with just a good stropping, an not have to re-grind every time it gets dull. I have a carving knife from Hock tools that is made from Tool steel (D1 I think) that stay's sharp with a few strokes on my Flexcut Gold saturated strop. Once I got it shaving sharp, it is easy to maintain on the strop. I strop it about every 20 to 30 minutes of carving use.

Blessings,

Omar
Click to expand...

Thanks, marthinus. I've heard a lot about D2 steel, OHALLUM, I'm going to try it out. I use a strop too, in between touch ups on a Tormek sharpener.
 
Thanks shane-o-ca and Strigamort - your customized knives look great. I especially like the curved knife blade holder! Smart.
 
A lot of my tools are of O1, and I do like it as well. I was just curious what other carving steels are out there. Thanks for the input, Jimmyd1982 and Balboa256, I appreciate it.
 
Whatever's sharp. Cedar isn't that hard on a properly HT'd knife IME. I use a SAK all the time. I've made several fuzz sticks out of cedar over a period of a couple weeks without having to sharpen the SAK once. Hardwoods will dull a knife faster obviously.
 
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