Thread: Stainless blades

That's just not correct.

Current carbon steel may be more consistent common past steel, but the best crucible steel that was pre-bessemer is better than anything with the possible exception of yasuki white #1. Nothing in the diemaking steels (O1, A2, D2) that I'm aware of is as good of a razor steel as white #1, but white #1 is too hard for most people to master, and at high hardness it is a hard sharpening blade for a carbon steel. Good W1 steel is similar to the old steels, but I'm not aware of anyone making it. Old file steel and especially carbon razor steel was a higher carbon version of what would be W1, at least W1 is the closest to those because it is the least alloyed with the common carbides.

Quite a few modern items that rely on excellent quality carbon steel have taken a step backwards (edge tools, files (especially files, old files are both harder and sharper)...) because the demand from craftsmen and machinists just isn't there for the same quality level. I've got a couple swiss NOS file sets that are from the 1910s that are completely unmatched by anything available now. They are a good example of what has happened to the purer carbon steels.

Originally Posted by Mike Blue

My disclaimer in all this is that I am very fond of carbon steels. There are many fewer forging steels (there are some though) in the stainless materials. Even the classic traditional steels can perform surprisingly well and are often under-rated because of the rush after the modern-latest-greatests. Over the years I've seen good and bad examples of both kinds.

I couldn't imagine choosing a modern diemaking steel over the best quality crucible steel, if such a thing were still available. Of course someone would have to work with it for a while to figure out its sweet spot. As you mention, millions of razors were made extremely well with

It would seem like O1 would be one of the better modern steels because it is cheap, predictable, and can take a pretty good edge from almost any abrasive - natural or synthetic. It can also literally be heat treated with a weed torch in open atmosphere and tempered in a kitchen oven (not that any self-respecting cutler would do such a thing) quite well if the light level is low enough to see what's going on in the hardening stage. And it doesn't warp a lot compared to W1.

Its funny that you mention folks complaining that a razor is too hard (but apparently without actually having chipouts). I'd consider that desirable. Someone a while ago told me the chisel makers in japan are making a lot of their chisels softer than they did 30 years ago because more hobbyists are buying them and they complain when they are hard and say they are too difficult to sharpen. So they still describe them as being 65/66 hardness (for the top line chisels) but they make them less hard. People want to spec buy based on numbers, but what they actually want is something different, they just don't want to be told that they're complaining about something that was made properly.