
What to look for when buying knives (2007) - Tomte
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2007/04/never-a-dull-moment/305689/?single_page=true
======
abakker
Ugh - Carbon steel is not easy to sharpen because it is soft. It is because it
contains fewer carbides. Typical stainless steel alloys used in production
knives are hyper-eutectoid, and the excess carbon (anything > .77%) ends up
forming carbides with the alloying elements. These carbides - Tungsten,
Chromium, and Vandium carbides, are harder than the surrounding matrix of
hardened and tempered steel, and can only really be "cut" with a diamond
stone. If you only have a water stone, the high proportion of carbide in
stainless knives makes it difficult to sharpen because the exposed bits of
carbide in the matrix are harder than the stone and don't get removed.

Another issue with commercial knives altogether is that frequently the mass
market ones are soft by design (<58 HRC). This saves costs in the post-heat
treatment grinding into final form. (knife blanks are oversized when heat
treated so that any slight warpage during quench/temper can be ground away).
handmade knives are usually not done this way, and so many hand makers are
comfortable going much harder since they are less worried about the economics
of hard material removal at mass scale.

(Source: Have spent several years learning to make knives)

For good browsing, check out hypefreeblades.com

~~~
abtinf
Pardon me if I use the wrong nomenclature or if this question is wrong in some
fundamental way: Would the higher hardness of the carbides mean a high-carbide
knife needs less frequent honing/sharpening when used in regular cooking
tasks?

~~~
abakker
Carbides are a double edge sword. On the one hand they impart "wear
resistance" but only if the heat treatment is done right (read: very
precisely). Frequently, that is not how commercial stainless is done, though.
On the other hand, they can make it harder to sharpen.

Usually, good heat treatment can lead to fine grain carbides, while bad heat
treatment does not get the carbides into solution very well prior to quenching
and they get too large. (This is not the same thing as grain growth). When
they are big, they impart roughness to the edge and difficulty of sharpening
with no benefits in wear resistance as the steel matrix around them wears
away.

If you are interested in this, I can't recommend John Verhoeven's "metallurgy
for bladesmiths" enough. It is a free PDF if you search for it. (If you like
open source things, I recommend reading the foreword especially).

------
peterwwillis
"Carbon steel is soft" \- uh, most metal is probably going to be soft if it
isn't heat treated, but carbon steel can become so brittle it shatters when
you tap it.

And Damascus steel isn't particularly good. It's mainly an artsy gimmick. But
that's not to say you can't still have a strong, sharp Damascus blade. The
visual has nothing to do with how the knife performs.

He's right that you only need three knives: A large thick chef's knife, a
smaller thin knife, and a generic serrated knife. None of these have to be
good at all to cook with, but you will enjoy cooking more with purpose-made
cutlery made of hard steel that you can simply re-hone to keep them working
efficiently. A "good" stainless steel is often perfectly fine, but most often
it will not stay as sharp as long.

But if you're new to culinary knives, you should not go out and buy good
knives. You should buy a pack of a bunch of different looking shit knives for
about $30-40, the heavier the better. Practice cooking with them. You will
notice some knives are annoying with certain cutting techniques, and how your
shit knives may actually be too shitty to practice certain techniques.
Hopefully you will learn to take care of your knives, what kind of cutting
surfaces to use, how to hone or sharpen them, etc so when you go to buy a good
set, you get what you actually want to use.

After cooking with shit knives, you may learn you don't mind knives that can't
cut a tomato without poking through the skin first and then slicing from the
meaty part. But that's basically how you choose a knife - whether your knives
are sharp or will stay sharp, whether they "feel right", how much you care
about maintenance. If you don't care about any of this, use shit knives. If
you are a dork like me, make your own knife.

If you do want a good knife but don't want to spend the money, learn about
good manufacturers of older knives and look for some at a local flea market.
You may only need to sharpen it or maybe put a new edge on it, both of which
are easy once practiced. No need to spend $150 on a knife you can find online
or in a flea market for $25.

~~~
douche
Keeping knives sharp is 90% of the battle.

~~~
Neliquat
Knives stay sharp pretty easily, the trick is keeping the edge straight. Learn
to use the stick that came with your crappy knife set and you will get a good
year of daily use out of each sharpening. Additionally, keep your blade dry
after cleaning to avoid pitting, which happens most rapidly on the edge.

------
Neliquat
This guy is clueless about metal alloys, and why they are, omitting the
general shape, the most important quality of a 'good knife', followed closely
by handle and balance. You can re-edge any knife, so talking about how you can
finish a stamped steel blade just as well is missing the point, quite
literally.

------
t0mbstone
I want a knife that is made out of a really strong metal that holds its edge.
I don't mind sharpening my knives. I just dislike sharpening them _all the
time_.

What is the best type of steel or alloy for me?

~~~
szemet
I use ceramic knives for the very same reason. Guess it doesn't cut it for you
if you insist on this: "made out of a really strong metal"

~~~
AstralStorm
Ceramic knives are quite resistant to wear, but once worn you can essentially
toss such a knife into a garbage can, that is how hard they are to sharpen.
They also lack in toughness and are quite brittle so are unsuitable for some
common tasks...

