How knives get dull...

[ecos]

hso,
do you have some links or organization names i can look up? after our last few posts i think i recall years ago the knifemakers guild hosting a cutting comp, any idea if they still do?

I don't think that forged blades have an advantage over stock reduced blades. I have seen that the carbon steels with good grain refinement (because of normalization and heat treat) with a slight convex grind to the blade do better overall. If you threw out the idea of "stainless" and looked at geometry and heat treat you'd have 90% of what makes a good cutting competition knife..

i agree completely. although i tend to do a flat ground blade with slight convex edge. its easier to control when grinding making it more affordable for the average person and works nearly as well imho.

 

[hso]

Yep, the Guild cuts. Local and state organizations cut also. I'll try to pull a more extensive list together, but off the top of my head I've seen cutting comps at National Knife Collectors Association shows/meets in Ohio, SC, NC and GA, but they are very informal (as the ABS events usually are).

Blade, ABS, Guild are the biggies and all seem to have cutting. I've not looked at the Professional Knifemaker's Association events (seem to be mostly out west).

The guys that cut well tell me that the concave grinds tend to stick in the 2x4 cutting. They seem to be gravitating toward a more classic Morseth or slightly modified Morseth (flat grind feathered into a high convex) so that there's better performance on the chopping without too thick an edge interfering with rope slicing and cutting.

 

[RyanM]

I think the only real advantage of forging over stock removal is being able to more easily put a distal taper on a blade. That's really only an issue with very long blades (shortswords and up), so there's not much difference. And Angus Trim makes extremely nice swords (with distal taper) via stock removal, so it's certainly possible either way.

A lot of guys that do forging say that beating on the steel does something to the grain or relieves stress or compresses the metal or whatever, but thorough analysis has shown that there is no difference. The steel's crystalline structure is 100% dependent on the alloy, heat treat, and temper, not how they're made..