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Showing 1 of 11 conversations about:
Daisy_Cutter
1288
Sep 27, 2017
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Anybody have any thoughts on VG-10 steel? I've been hearing conflicting things about it. On one hand Fallkniven seems to be using it on their flagship knives and elsewhere it generally seems to be considered a premium steel. On the other hand there seem to be a lot of others who consider VG-10 only a little better than AUS-8 and inferior to S30V.
Soundtoxin
143
Oct 24, 2017
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Daisy_CutterIt's not bad, but it's not as good as the supersteels like S35VN and M390. I generally consider VG-10 to be the bare minimum on a knife for me to get it.
b.parker1218
12
Mar 31, 2019
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Daisy_CutterMy mileage is generally equal to 154CM depending on manufacturer. Spyderco seems to do a particularly good job with VG-10 and probably outperforms most 154CM. I would describe VG-10 as a solid two steps above AUS-8 in basically every category, but of course a step behind S30/35. My limit is like $25ish for an AUS-8 folding knife (like a RAT-1 which a great tool at that price), but I totally feel like a Spyderco Endura or Delica VG-10 at $75ish is a great value. Certainly someone could be out there doing an exceptional job with AUS-8, but I’d be curious to hear an actual model comparison of the claim VG-10 is “only a little better”
Hatuletoh
850
Mar 31, 2019
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Daisy_CutterMy thoughts are similar to Mr. parker1218: VG-10 is substantially better than AUS 8, which is basically the Japanese designation for 440A or 440B, if I recall. Either way, it's below the minimum quality for what I consider worth spending knife money on, except in the case Boker Kalishnikov autos. I buy them despite their standard use of AUS 8 because they're fun and I love autos, but I also because most only cost about $30.
My assessment had been that when properly tempered VG-10 is on par with an indifferently forged 154 CM, and when expertly tempered can be described as "about as good" as well made 154 CM . Again, from my personal observation, and my controlled, but by no means rigorous enough to qualify as scientific tests, the best VG-10 I've used is on Mcusta blades, with Spyderco's a close second; Boker blades are still decent but a clear step down from the two best, as Boker's VG-10 appears to sacrifice some edge retention and hardness for toughness (I pressume, but wasn't about to wreck my knife to be certain). Probably a good trade-off on something like a kwaiken blade.
I think the very best 154 CM is a bit better than very best VG-10, but maybe that's just because I've used a lot more 154 CM, and own knives from long-time devotees of that steel, like Pro-Tech and Piranha, who know how to get the most out of it.
That said, I'd take VG-10 over D2 in most cases. That's largely personal preference, and maybe if I beat up my knives I'd feel differently. But I don't, and I'd rather have the razor edge I can get on a stainless VG-10 blade over the not-so-razor, semi-stainless but tougher D2 blade.
VG-10 compared to D2 is very much an apples to oranges comparison, but they share the trait, along with 154 CM, of being, I think, the best steels that I would not call "premium". N690 is about in this group too. They're all plenty good, probably a higher quality than most people will need most days, or some people will ever need. But all other features being equal, a knife with a VG-10 should be noticeably less costly than one with S30V, and certainly one with CTS 204P, or M390, etc.
b.parker1218
12
Mar 31, 2019
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HatuletohI agree completely about Boker VG-10. Not a scientific test, but I re-profiled my Urban Trapper when I got it recently and it took no time at all to get it hair shaving perfect. My Endura needs some time and effort to keep that sharp though. The Boker just feels noticeably softer.
Also you got exactly what I was meaning about 154. The best will be better than vg10 (Benchmade?), but many will be inferior. Same for most steels, you just have to get a feel for which type each manufacturer excels at
Hatuletoh
850
Apr 1, 2019
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b.parker1218***SDTL[superdupertoolong]; DR:
It's nice to have a concurring second opinion about the conclusions I've come to running backyard tests on different blade steels. Because it's just not logistically possible to test it in a properly unbiased, scientific way, I've always had a nagging suspicion that any difference in performance between different blade steels was due to either my own biases or the myriad of fluctuating environmental variables that a proper scientific test would control for.***
You know...I appreciate you telling me about reprofiling the Boker, because I feel like I'm never quite sure if I really knoe what I think I know.
Without sensitive equipment to measure characteristics of steel; and multi-step protocol, carefully followed by different people hundreds, or maybe thousands of times and which would specify blind or better yet double-blind tests, something I've thought over and concluded it would require another person dissamenbling my knives as a first step, and then a whole lot more steps following, each less workable than then last--so in other words, without an actual material science testing lab--testing blade steel in an objective, repeatable, and even minimally scientifically rigorous way is impossible. Not to mention many of the tests would damage or at least alter a blade (i.e., reprofiling being a relatively gentle way to kind of of get an idea about elasticity/toughness).
I don't have anything riding on the info I glean from testing blade steel, some friends and I just do it because it's fun (honestly, it's just me as often as not, I'm definitely in deepest with the knife addiction), and in the words of the fictitious yet immortal Emil Faber: knowledge is good. But I can't help but feel at times that it's so subjective I could make the same test cuts with the same knives on the same media, and on another day get info completely different from what I did, just because of a seemingly irrelevant detail that was actually a significantly correlated variable.
Maybe on one day I have a little cut on my right hand subtly impacting my grip and ability to press a cut, maybe another day we do the tests after eating at a buffet, so that my 6'11", 275 lb friend for once isn't impatiently trying to rush the task so he can have his next "snack", maybe one day it's cold and the next hot, which would affect both people and materials, etc., etc. And then of course, a knife maker might consciously decide to change the forging process as he becomes more skilled and familiar with a steel. For example, my mini Sabenza was made in November 2017 and the blade's hardness is 61RC. But the exact same mini Sabenza built in a few months earlier has an blade with 60 HRC. This wasn't something Chris Reeve announced, but some knife nuts apparently detected the change (actual scientist-knife nuts, I'd guess) and were speculating online, so Mr. Reeve admitted that whereas he had long thought S35VN would be too brittle if tempered for a pocket knife above 60HRC, he'd been experimenting and improving his forging skills since he first created S35VN, and had managed to come up with a tempering recipe which produced a sufficiently tough blade at 61 HRC. Once his shop could reliably produce it, that became the standard for his Sabenza blades, instead ofthe 60 HRC .
Wow. That was long even for me and I'll put a TL; DR summary up top. This was a subject that had been kicking around in my brain not fully formed or explored, so taking the long verbal ramble helped me get a better fix on my own opinions and concerns. The summation is, I think: we're all a bunch of amateurs with our "tests", and likely as not any info we get from them is just going to be random noise. But it's a fun thing to do sometimes, so as long as we remember not to put too much stock in our amateur info, there's no harm in some totally subjective examinations, I think.
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