Would you be able to tell if a steel was mislabeled?

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knifezoid

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Apr 17, 2009
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We all know how much blade steel is a topic of discussion on this forum. Sometimes
a real heated one. But how well do we really know our steels? It got me thinking:
What if there was an experiment done where people were given knifes labeled as one
type of steel, but it was really made of something else? So for example, the blade
is labeled as S30V, but it's really ATS34. How many people would really know they've
been duped? 10%, 50%, 75%?

My personal guess is it'd be a very low number. Probably under 10% me being among
them.

What do you think would give it away? I think for me I would not suspect anything
till I went to sharpen the blade. D2/440c are hard to sharpen (for me). But even
then I'd probably chalk it up to my lack of sharpening skills. After that most steels
today are pretty strong, hold a good edge, resist corrosion, and sharpen fairly easily.
I think the difference is more mental/novel than anything. I don't think most knives
are pushed to a point where it makes a noticeable difference.

Note: I am talking decent steels like the ones listed above, not pot metal or flea market grade.

Anyways lemme know what you guys think. Should make for interesting discussion.
 
Even among decent steels, it'll of course depend on which you're comparing. Between something like ATS-34 and S30V, yeah, I might not be able to tell the difference under normal use until I went to sharpen it. I have an Edge Pro, and while I wouldn't consider anything "difficult" to sharpen on it, differences between steels are very noticeable once you've sharpened enough knives on it. But if you're comparing ATS-34 to something like S110V, then I think the huge difference in wear resistance would be noticeable under regular use, assuming one's "regular use" includes enough abrasive materials such as cardboard.
 
To make it even more confusing, what if the heat treat was slightly different from what you were used to?

If someone has always used a certain steel composition at a certain hardness, maybe a slight change in RC hardness could throw them completely off.
 
I think that heat treatment and geometry plays a MUCH bigger role in knife performance than steel. I think even us folks could probably only guess closely enough to classify the steel in a basic family type (carbon spring steel, carbon tool steel, low-alloy stainless, high-tech stainless)
 
H*** no... I wouldn't even know what kind of steel they were if the knives didn't tell me right on 'em :)
 
I was thinking about this over the weekend. I would not be able to tell the difference. S30V vs. old jeep leaf springs, yeah, but not much else. I just have to take the word of the manufacturer.
 
For the most part, no. I could probably (maybe) tell you the basic family. 1095/ 1075/ 5160 in one group. 420hc/ 440a/ aus6 in another group. s30v/ ats34/ vg10 in the last group. Beyond that, I'd be hard pressed to tell you what a blade was made from.

Frank
 
Unless the steels have a major difference in performance in use or in sharpening feel, I wouldn't be able to tell them apart. I'd be a bit surprised if a knife labeled as H1 started to rust though. :D
 
Interesting thread! :thumbup:

Nope, not me. Without a label, I will admit that I could not tell the difference. Adding the heat-treatment variant only makes the odds against correctly identifying a steel even greater for me...

As FortyTwoBlades has mentioned, blade geometry plays a greater role in my personal knife selection process anyway. I've never worn out a blade regardless of what it's made of...
 
I've thought about this before. I wouldn't be able to tell unless it was like 440a vs. S30V or something.
 
I couldn't tell you what specific alloy a given blade is, but I do push mine hard enough to tell the difference between alloys. The Spyderco Mule Team project has been great for that. As far as telling if a blade was mislabelled, I probably couldn't say whether it was the wrong alloy or a bad heat-treat without hardness testing and chemical analysis, but I could tell if it was performing to my expectaion for the steel it claimed to be.
 
I can tell a difference between a poor steel and an average steel and a super steel (in regards to edge retention). I can tell after some use and to a lesser extent after sharpening. I actually find the super steels easier to get really sharp though it may take longer on the stones. Cheaper steels are easy to grind and get sharp, but not as easy to get scary sharp, if that makes sense. I think I can also tell a difference between the vanadium super steels and some of the other high end steels that use other alloys to form carbides. And of course the difference between stainless and non stainless eventually becomes evident. However, when 2 steels are in the same class then telling them apart is a lot harder if not impossible. Telling apart 440C, 154CM, and VG10 would probably not be very easy. I might be able to tell a difference in say 420HC or AUS8 from the previously mentioned group but that could be hard depending on heat treat. And I have used softer M4 and M4 with a really good heat treat and I would not know they were the same steel as they act quite different, even though both had fairly acute grinds and thin edges. So yes and no. I can detect different classes of steel but probably not similar types of steel. I'm usually surprised when I read that people are fine with 420HC or AUS 8 blades because the lower end steels seem to lose their edge really quick and I think I would be able to tell with just some light use where as the super steels keep on going and going though some may lose that hair popping edge quicker than I would like.
 
420HC and AUS8 are inexpensive steels, and when a manufacturer designs by dollars not by performance they often give less attention to the heat treatment. My stainless Condors (420HC) take and hold a fantastic edge that touches up easy and doesn't take damage from hard impact. My older CS X2 Voyager and my Boker Wharcom (both AUS8) likewise strike a great balance between edge retention and all-around toughness. No complaints here. :)
 
I fiddle with edge retention testing and I have access to a Rockwell tester. I'd know.

For the general knife using population, I'd expect most experienced knife users to be able to notice any drastic difference between alloys, say between 440A and 440C.

I'd also expect folks to notice the difference between 440C and any of the uber PM steels. It is a robust difference.
 
Probably couldn't be exact but I might get a few, one thing I can do is judge the quality of HT from sharpening with my diamond hones. Don't know why but they give a feel that other stones don't.
 
With all the testing that I do and getting the steels Tested for hardness I could tell the difference between them.

For most people, normal users a lot of the steels are really very close in performance so I would say no most wouldn't be able to tell the difference because it really takes controlled testing to tell a lot of them apart.

That's given the same blade shape, grind, edge profile, and finish cutting the same media.

With enough testing some of us can tell the difference in how the steels cut, even steels that are extremely close in performance.
 
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I'd notice. Not between D2 and S30V. But between 440a and 440c for sure. Edge retention and brittleness are a dead giveaway.

This being said, Most of my favorite knives are AUS8. I can't tell the difference between s30v, 154cm, cpm 154cm, d2, vg-10, 440v, ats34, s60v etc. They all are just to brittle for me.
 
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