Why Knife Steels Don't Matter... as much as you think 

Larrin is a genius. I have said it once I will say it 100000 times about geometry vs steel. I have fallen victim to the steel hype. But, when it comes down to brass tacks, Edge geometry all day. What a great video! Thank you gentleman for the educational video.

Ok, the “toothy edge” demonstration, was eye opening to me 😳. Over the last couple of years I’ve worked to get a small collection of knives, I enjoy rotating through. And now getting more serious about sharpening to keep enjoying them. This video was a nice broad spectrum of knowledge to point me in the right direction. Well done!

The music playing while you are talking does nothing to enhance your video.

Larrin is amazing! We also need more with Dan Doval! Just picking a fraction of his brain is amazing, the things he has said have stuck with me forever. One thing Dan Doval said was: ''There are thousands of applications and billions of users. The edge or edges that work well for a master Itamae isn’t going to work well for your local butcher or fisherman. And neither of their edges are effective at cutting down a tree.'' More with Dan Doval, please! :)

Thanks for the toothy edge advice. Been working on that.

I just got my 4th field sharpener. I tend to smooth out the little honing rod on some 20CV and S90V pretty rapidly. But holy moly I get them nice and keen. I need a diamond honing rod or something. The strop cleans up the micro bevel burrs, but it’s that last little hone that ensures the apex is uniform all along. The 300 and 600 grit diamond plates have impressed me though on not tearing out or contaminating. I’ve got one for the wife, one for me, one for work, and one I keep nice for later. Cruwear is the best though.

As a custom knife maker, sharpness is a primary factor in customer satisfaction tion. As a visual factor, a highly polished edge adds wow factor. My customers seem to prefer powdered metals, and I ablige.

You guys have great topics and great ideas.But it would be great to hear you. Seriously. Go pick up a couple of lavs for cheap like those new shures and drastically improve the production quality of your videos. Hell just one boom mic would do the trick. Great video guys, love seeing the experience be backed up by the "new" guy lol

Very good. You clarified and muddied things up a little, leaving room for more development but you guys.

There's a few type of knives where you unfortunately can't play with the angle. Chisel and Scandi grinds come to mind. You can sharpen them to a more obtuse angle, but you're changing the geometry away from their intent (an edge down to 0 without a secondary bevel). Mostly I'm annoyed with a 14C28N Scandi folder I have where the edge rolls way too easily and the only remedy is to put a funky secondary bevel on it. 14C28N is some tough stuff, so I'm guessing the heat treat on it is on the very low end (55-57 HRC) But there's plenty of chisel grinds out there like high end Japanese kitchen knives. the less impactful chisel grinds would be the plain portion of combo edged knives (half serrated) where you can change the angle without much issue

Where to find 1 of the mats on the table? I have to Ken Onion Edition & attachments. Also the guided field sharpener.

Very good video. I do have one question though. If you are only really using the coarse grit on one side wouldn’t you need to continually swap which side you use it on to avoid an offset angle?

This has been the talk for a while now, and while the statement from Dr. Thomas is absolutely true, I still think steel and heat treatment is a WAY more important decision because thats the one thing 99% of people cannot change or do anything about. Anyone with basic sharpening skills can play around with geometry until they find the perfect fit on an existing knife, or even take it to a professional and have it perfectly done for a few bucks. If the steel isnt suited for what you are doing, theres no way you are replacing it unless theres a drop in replacement for that particular knife, which basically never happens. And if the heat treatment is known to be poor, chances are you dont have 10'000 dollars worth of industrial grade equipment, knowledge and experience at home to fix the treatment on your new super steel. For me personally, if im buying a new knife my prio goes from whats hardest for me to do anything about, to what I can do something about myself. So at the top is heat treatment (because even "lower grade" steels can be really good if the treatment is spot on), then steel type, then blade shape (just because you can doesnt mean you want to grind half the metal off a new blade), then handle/ergonomics and if all that is good then what sharpness/edge geometry it has out of the box means about the same to me as the box it came in. I mean, yeah its a nice gesture and all that, but it literally takes me 5 minutes to touch it up, which im very likely to do on a brand new blade anyway. I mean, its not uncommon for new knives to need to be sharpened a couple of times before they perform as intended due to decarb and all that. Yes, alot of people out there are emphasizing the latest and greatest steels way, way too much and seem to think anything else is garbage. But at the same time, I do think its probably THE most important choice the average consumer makes when selecting a knife.

Always amazed by this new information all stuff murray carter said years ago

Yup!!!!! A proper 440C / 420C with a specific geometry will outlast S30V at 17 degrees or VG-10. 20 years using knives and I’m still learning haha. I got sucked into the knife nerd blade steel stuff and everything changed with a friggen $8 temu knock off

Thank you guys for a great informative video. What steel and angle would you recommend for skinning and quartering wild game like deer and hogs?

Great video

Phew, that is too deep of a deep dive for me.

First for me and "toothy." Sharpen one side coarse, finish (de-burr) just the other side. Wow, my experiments will begin asap. Thanks!

My favourite steels; 1095 52100 Japanese Super Blue 80CrV2 Cpm 3V CruWear My favourite grinds; Slicey Convex Scandy My favourite Brands; Mora Bark River Green River AG Russell LT Wright Helle Finnish knives Pathfinder knives

You guys need to really ditch the pull through sharpeners. They cheapen your other great products. I cant take anyone serious selling these things. Constructive criticism only. 😊

Dude seems like he knows his stuff but it seems like he’s in actual pain whenever he’s not talking. It made the video kinda labor intensive to get through.