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An expensive, traditional style Japanese laminate. Hard, high carbon stainless forms the core and edge of the blade, while two layers of tough, spring tempered stainless support and strengthen it. The resulting blade possesses the best qualities of both types of steel. Due to its low carbon high chromium content this steel is an excellent choice for making tough (bends instead of breaking), shock absorbing knife blades with excel lent resistance to corrosion and moderate edge holding ability. It is an ideal candidate for knife blades that will be subject to a wide variety of environmental conditions including high temperature, humidity, and airborne corrosives such as salt in a marine environment. This extreme resistance to corrosion via its high chrome content also makes it a perfect choice for knife blades which are carried close to the body or in a pocket and blades which will receive little or no care or maintenance. An exclusive carbon alloy steel, formulated and extensively treated to achieve exceptional properties. Carbon V was developed and refined by using both metallurgical and performance testing. Blades were subjected to the "Cold Steel Challenge" as a practical test, and then they were sectioned, so that their microstructure could be examined. In this way we arrived at the optimum steel AND the optimum heat treatment sequence to bring out the best in the steel. We buy large quantities of premium high carbon cutlery steel with small amounts of elemental alloys added in the smelting stage. These elements enhance the blade's performance in edge holding and elasticity. The steel is then rolled to our exact specifications to establish optimum grain refinement and blades are blanked to take full advantage of the grain direction in the steel.
The words "stainless steel" are misleading, because, in fact all steel will stain or show discoloration if left in adverse conditions for a sufficient time. Steel is made "stainless" by adding Chromium and reducing its Carbon content during the smelting process. There is a serious performance trade off with stainless steel: As the Chrome increases and the Carbon decreases, the steel be comes more "stainless". But it also becomes more and more difficult to sharpen and the edge-holding potential is seriously impaired. This is usually why most stainless knives are rarely razor-sharp and quickly lose the little edge they have. In contrast, Cold Steel uses AUS 8A a high carbon, low chromium steel that has proven, over the last l5 years, to be the ultimate compromise between toughness, strength, edge holding and resistance to corrosion.
San Mai III
This laminate is 25% stronger than the incredibly tough AUS 8A stainless in the original Tanto. The tell-tale sign of genuine San Mai III is a thin line near the edge that runs the entire length of the blade. This line is created in the grinding process as the layers of steel in the blade are exposed. The distance the line is from the edge varies from knife to knife because every piece of San Mai III steel is unique.
Like AUS 8A stainless, San Mai III is treated in modern, precise conveyor furnaces and subjected to a sub zero post hardening process. This improves the microstructure of the steel by eliminating retained austenite. The resulting blades are more elastic and have better edge holding characteristics than standard stainless steels.
"San Mai" means "three layers", it is the term given to the traditional laminated blades used by the Japanese for swords and daggers. Laminated construction is important because it allows different grades of steel to be combined in a single blade. A simple way to think of this type of construction is to imagine a sandwich: The meat center is hard, high carbon steel and the pieces of bread on either side are the lower-carbon, tough side panels. The edge of the blade should be hard to maximize edge holding ability, but if the entire blade was hard it could be damaged during the rigors of battle. For ultimate toughness, the body of the blade must be able to withstand impact and lateral stresses. Toughness is generally associated with flexibility in steel, so that surprisingly, if an entire blade was made "tough" the edge would not be hard enough to offer superior edge holding. San Mai 111° provides a superior blade with hard (higher carbon) steel in the middle for a keen, long lasting edge and tough (lower carbon) steel on the sides for flexibility.
420J2
Carbon V
The blanks are heated in molten salt, quenched in premium oil and tempered in controlled ovens. Then they are ground. The new blades are then subjected to expert heat treatment, involving rigidly controlled austenizing temperatures, precisely defined soak times, proper selection of quenching medium and carefully monitored tempering times and temperatures. This heat treatment sequence results in blades which duplicate and often exceed the properties of the most expensive custom forgings.
Premium U.S. High Carbon
Cold Steel's Premium Carbon Steel is used in a variety of our low cost highly functional knives. Chemical content and microstructure from the mill is specified by Cold Steel and each lot is subjected to the same metallurgical examination before being used in production as our world famous Carbon V.
The Steel is a very clean,fine grained material with a high carbon content for toughness and response to heat treatment. Cold Steel has designed a special heat treatment for this material which maximizes toughness in combination with more than acceptable edge holding ability, resulting in a blade which will satisfy even the most discriminating user.
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