01 steel abrasion resistance

[bluesman 7]

The subject of 01 steel being tougher to hone came up in another thread and I decided to start a new thread rather than going of topic.

147_Grain posted;
"Does a higher tempering temp alleviate this, or is it rich enough in carbides that it's going to take about as long at 58 HRc as at 63? "

I don't know the answer to this. It should help some though as there would be considerable difference in honing plain high carbon steel at those hardness levels. The Chromium and Tungsten carbides in 01 would still be the most abrasion resistant components and would not be effected by the tempering temperatures.

The quantity,type and size of the alloy carbides are effected by the composition of the 01 (which varies from different vendors) and the time and temperature of the soak prior to quenching as well as the condition of the steel prior to heat treating.


Personally I feel that the alloy carbides in 01 cause more problems than good in a razor and moved to 1095 steel before I did much experimentation with 01.

 

[147_Grain]

Thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience with the rest of us

 

[eKretz]

Not sure if they are problematic in O1 - but they definitely are in M2. I have a Filarmonica that is late production (from what I understand, Pakistani steel - unknown composition) that also has a lot of carbides causing issues when honing. The main problem with them is that they can't be cut very effectively by anything but diamond or CBN, so they tend to be undercut and torn out, leaving a bit of a ragged edge. One surefire solution to this is to use diamond hones up through DMT 8k then hit a few licks on a diamond or CBN pasted strop. This works pretty well for any blade with carbides causing issues.

 

[bluesman 7]

[MENTION=77140]eKretz[/MENTION] How is that M2 blade doing?

 

[bluesman 7]

I've never experienced carbide tear out on 01 to my knowledge. But the abrasive resistance slows the honing and seems to kill the feedback. Brooksie once described 01 as feeling dead on the hones and after getting away from it for a while and then honing 01 again, I can see what he was talking about.

 

[eKretz]

How is the swarf production compared to 1095, any different? If it's the carbides, there should be noticeably less swarf coming off while honing. I don't have an O1 razor right now, but I do have some O1 laying around. Maybe that will be my next project, now I want to see the difference myself, lol.

The M2 razor is still doing great, no breakdowns yet and still giving a clean smooth shave. It only has about 8 shaves ATM though as I've been using a few other razors too.