Damascus Buck

Hunting knives…What steel do you like best and why?

I have had a couple Damascus steels, a couple 440C SS, and lately, purchased one with AUS 8 steel and one with San Mai III steel. I like the last 2 the best since they sharpen well and hold an edge very well, but is all the ‘carbon’ hype or whatever the new alloy name is, really worth the big bucks? My Cold Steel Hatamoto was almost $300 and just curious if the steel is worth all of that ching. Thanks everyone!

Alright brew, good question that I can most definitely help you with.

Firstly, I try to avoid stainless steels, even the 440C pales in comparison to mid/high carbon steels such as 1075 in edge holding/durability. All of the knives I’ve made were from O1, W1, W2, 10XX series steels, 5160 (my favorite… leaf springs!!!), 52100 (PITA to work, but it’s like 5160 with attitude), and finally L-6.

I love the plain “non-hype” steels that people don’t like because they aren’t “shiny” and aren’t popular unless their yuppie friend has one and they want one exactly like it. I don’t think the prices Cold Steel asks for their knives are too fair to tell you the truth. Hell, all of the damascus I’ve done was usually with L-6 (high nickel), and 1095! Great color contrast between two different steels (high nickel leaves bright bands and low carbon is eaten away, leaving the “etchings” from the ferric chloride, or etchant of choice).

Aus 8 is a great steel, a bit of a pain to work with, but nonetheless, is wonderful as far as edge holding goes. I found that it can be brittle sometimes.

Look for a Ka-bar (original USMC). 1095 will do all the same as the others, at far less the cost of all of that “hype” stuff.

Better yet, get a worn out file (old Nicholson or Welkd files are great), sit it in a wood stove overnight (in the embers… it will be annealed by the time you pull it out in the morning… trust me), sit down with a bench grinder, belt sander, files (non-worn), what have you… and make a nice blade from that. Files are usually 01, W1, W2… and will hold an edge a hell of a lot longer than everything else out there (providing you heat treat it correctly… oxy torch and can of oil for that). It’s the way I started, and guess what? I still have a couple of those knives.

I’d like to continue on, but I might start rambling… plus I told my darlin’ that I’d take her out to dinner (time for me to get my checkbook…)

Take care.

Using Damascus?