Who is the Greatest Knife Steel Metallurgist of All Time?

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Metallurgists

I have enjoyed writing many articles about the history of different knife steels over the past couple years of this website. It has been very challenging to track down the history of different steels to see where they came from and how. I decided to write an article about some of the greats who have made contributions to knife steel and knife tests. Many of these metallurgists didn’t know they were developing steels that would be used in knives. Some were developing tool steels or high speed steels. However, their steels have since been used in knives or their steel designs influenced other steels which have been used in knives. To keep this article manageable in size I have focused on those that developed steel or tests of knives. In other words, those that studied different aspects of steel are not included. Some notable people that were omitted for this reason include:

1) Marcus Grossman and Edgar Bain who discovered bainite and wrote a couple influential books on steel metallurgy

2) Many metallurgists who are less directly applicable but discovered many fundamentals of steel and general metallurgy, such as Henry Clifton Sorby (microscopy), Dmitry Chernov (phase transitions in steel), and William Roberts-Austen (iron-carbon phase diagram).

3) Metallurgists who studied heat treatment techniques. Taylor and White in the list below are a possible exception to this, however.

4) Influential teachers of metallurgy, some even directly to knifemakers like Kevin Cashen. Some on this list are also known for their teaching, but make the list primarily for other specific contributions.

So that list of categories may mean that some people you may think of as great metallurgists did not make the list. However, even with those omissions I think you will find some interesting information about the contributions of certain individuals and groups that developed the steel products we use in knives today.

Robert Forester Mushet

Mushet developed the first tool steel in 1868 which had several important characteristics. One was that it was the first commercially produced “alloy steel” meaning it had intentional alloy additions including manganese and tungsten to achieve certain properties, rather than being a simple carbon steel. The high tungsten in the steel gave it very high wear resistance for longer tool life. It was also the first “air hardening” steel meaning it could be allowed to cool in air from high temperature rather than quenching in oil or water. This steel was the basis of experiments from Taylor and White that led to the development of high speed steels and the explosion of development in other tool steels. Mushet is actually better known for making improvements to the “Bessemer process” which allowed the production of steel at much lower costs. But for his contributions to the future of knife steel his “Mushet steel” is huge. You can read more in this article.

Mushet

Frederick Winslow Taylor and Maunsel White

These Bethlehem Steel metallurgists started modern steel development in many ways. Prior to their contributions, steel was heat treated in a fairly narrow temperature range, such as 1400-1600°F. Overheating would lead to grain growth and poor toughness. However, they discovered that when Mushet steel was heated to very high temperatures prior to quenching, that it could last much longer as a high speed tool, because it maintained high hardness at high speeds and therefore high temperatures. Their discovery of “high speed steel” was presented at the 1900 Paris Exhibition (a world’s fair) and led to a T1-type high speed steel by 1903. The knowledge developed and the excitement generated led to the development of many other tool steels. Read more about Taylor and White in this article.

Taylor

White

Harry Brearley

While there were several people working on inventing stainless steel in a similar time period, Brearley is credited with being the first to commercialize it. And what type of stainless steel did he commercialize? A knife steel! For several years afterward, stainless steel was known as being for knives and many people didn’t even realize it could be used for other things. The steel he developed was 420 stainless. This steel may have a relatively poor reputation among knife enthusiasts today, but it has been used in as many knives as any steel, perhaps the most used knife steel. And it has very good corrosion resistance. This steel was the basis for all future stainless knife steels, especially those like 420HC and AEB-L with the similar chromium content of 13%. The original name for S90V was 420V because the same chromium content of 420 was used in its development. Read more about the introduction of stainless steel in this article.

James P. Gill

Gill was a metallurgist working for VASCO which is a company largely forgotten by knife collectors now, but made many significant contributions to tool steels. Gill developed the first commercially available high vanadium steels, such as the first 2% vanadium high speed steel in 1937 which evolved to become M2, and also M4 with its 4% vanadium and T15 with 5% vanadium. Many knife steels today continue to have high vanadium contents for improved wear resistance. Gill also wrote one of the first books on Tool Steels in 1934, which continued with new editions up until the 5th in 1998. These books on Tool Steels have been used by metallurgists for decades. Read more about James Gill in this article. Gill also developed the 5% Cr + Mo alloying approach that led to the common knife steel A2 and continues to be used by many non-stainless tool steels.

Gill

John A. Mathews

Mathews worked for Crucible and Halcomb steel in the early 1900s and was highly influential for his steel developments and contributions to steel research. He patented the original T1 high speed steel with a small vanadium addition which improved the properties of early high speed steels. Vanadium additions were basically unheard of at the time but became very popular for various uses afterward. Mathews also developed the first “oil-hardening” steels including the popular O1 in 1905 which continues to be used in knives today. Read more about O1 and Mathews in this article.

Mathews

Harry Johnstin

Johnstin developed the steels Vasco Wear and Vasco Die in 1964. Vasco Wear is probably better known now as CruWear (Crucible branding of the same steel), though it is known by many names such as PD#1, Lescowear, and Z-Wear. Vasco Wear saw use in knives by the 70s and continues to be a popular choice in its various versions. A relatively unknown fact is that CPM-3V is in fact a powder metallurgy version of Vasco Die. Surprisingly, Crucible metallurgists were able to patent the powder metallurgy of Vasco Die despite the composition being previously patented (and expired), because the change to the microstructure and properties were deemed to be significant enough. Vasco Die and Vasco Wear also created the “8% Cr” tool steel category which became future steels like Vanadis 4 (before Vanadis 4 Extra), Vanadis 10, Sleipner, A8 Mod, DC53, Z-Tuff, CD#1, and others. You can read more about these steels in this article.

Johnstin

David J. Giles

David Giles was a metallurgist who developed many tool steels for Latrobe steel. Giles developed several steels which have seen use in knives, including 440A in 1926 [1]. 440A has been used extensively in consumer knives ever since, and served as the basis for the higher carbon 440C, which was incredibly popular in production and custom knives in the 70s and 80s, and continues to be used today. 154CM was originally called “440C Mod” because they reduced the Cr in 440C and replaced it with Mo. Read more about 154CM history in this article. This 17-19% Cr base  composition of 440A/440C served as the starting point for many future steels such as Elmax and S60V. Giles also developed 4-5% vanadium cold work steels A7 and D7 (as opposed to Gill who developed high speed steels) which served as a basis for future steels like CPM-10V. The patent-holder of 10V, Walter Haswell, previously worked at Latrobe steel and was a co-patent holder on several vanadium steels there as well, which used the same carbon-vanadium ratio equations that Giles had previously proposed [2]. D7 became Bohler’s powder metallurgy K190, which was further modified to develop the popular stainless M390.

Giles

Kenneth Pinnow and William Stasko

These two metallurgists were prolific tool steel patenters in the 1990s and developed several significant knife steels. One is CPM-3V, previously mentioned under Harry Johnstin. They also developed S90V [3], which is popular in knives in its own right but also led to S110V which is essentially a modified S90V, developed by Al Kajinic. The biggest contribution of S90V was the discovery that using 14% Cr (as opposed to 17-18% Cr in earlier steels like S60V and Elmax), led to a better utilization of vanadium additions for improved properties. This led to a “14% Cr plus vanadium” basis for several future Crucible steels like S30V. The S90V patent also lays out how they explored different levels of nitrogen in S90V, which wasn’t really utilized in the final composition, but increased nitrogen (~0.15-0.20%) was used in S30V, S110V, and S45VN. Pinnow and Stasko also patented CPM-15V which continues to be one of the highest wear resistance steels available [4]. Stasko was also co-listed with Andrzej Wojcieszynski for patenting CPM Rex 86 and CPM Rex 121 steels [5].

Dick Barber

Barber is best known for developing CPM-S30V steel, which has been one of the most popular steels used in high end production knives for nearly two decades. S30V was the first steel produced by Crucible to have an intentionally increased nitrogen content of about 0.20%. S30V also served as the starting point for the popular S35VN, and the more recent SPY27 and S45VN steels. You can read more about the development of S30V in this article.

Unknown Developer of D3 Steel

“High carbon-high chromium” steels began to see development in the 1890s but saw regular production in Britain during WWI as a replacement to high speed steel, particularly with steels similar to D3 tool steel with about 2.3% carbon and 12% chromium. This steel led to D2, developed by Gregory Comstock, which has been very common in knives for the past several decades. The D7 steel developed by Giles was also a modification of D3 steel by adding 4% vanadium, as mentioned previously, which led to K190 and M390. I would also argue that the ubiquity of high chromium steel in Britain in the early 1900s probably contributed to the development of stainless steel by Brearley.

Crucible Metallurgists of the 1960s and 1970s

Crucible introduced commercially-produced powder metallurgy tool steels in the early 1970s, which you can read about here. The patent holder for Crucible’s process was Gary Steven [6], who also patented the first steel developed specifically for powder metallurgy production, CPM Rex 76 [7]. This also led to a wide range of previously existing steels which were produced with powder metallurgy for improved properties like CPM-M4 and CPM-T15. However it is unlikely that Steven worked alone on the development of the powder metallurgy process, and other Crucible metallurgists who wrote about it include August Kasak, Edward Dulis, and T.A. Neumeyer [8][9][10].

Kobe Steel Metallurgists 1970s

In 1976 Kobe Steel metallurgists patented high nitrogen powder metallurgy steels by nitriding the powder prior to the “HIP” process [11]. You can read more about this process in this article on nitrogen-alloyed knife steels. This process was used by Uddeholm to develop the Vancron [12][13] and Vanax-series [14][15] of tool steels and stainless steels. These steels have an interesting set of properties because of the high nitrogen additions.

John Verhoeven

Most famous for his research on Wootz along with bladesmith Al Pendray. Verhoeven was not the only metallurgist who studied Wootz, as Sherby and Wadsworth are also known for their contributions. However, Verhoeven should be mentioned, I think, because of his book Metallurgy for Bladesmiths, now re-titled Steel Metallurgy for the Non-Metallurgist, which has been read by many knifemakers. Verhoeven also performed experiments and published research on knife testing such as CATRA testing of Wootz blades [16], analysis of atomic diffusion in pattern-welded blades [17], sharpening experiments, and more.

Verhoeven

Heinz Klemm

Klemm developed the edge stability test [18], later popularized by Roman Landes as discussed here: Part 1 and Part 2. Klemm is best known as a metallographer, however, having developed several etchants for revealing certain microstructures to be seen by the microscope.

Klemm

Solingen Metallurgists

Several metallurgists and scientists in Solingen, Germany, performed significant research in the early to mid 20th century, including Hans Studemann, Franz Hendrichs, and Werner Knapp. Knapp developed an early edge retention test [19] that looks a lot like the more recent CATRA test, and learned many valuable things such as the effects of edge angle. Hendrichs studied cutting ability [20], which is different than sharpness. And Studemann was the head of “Forschungsinstitut Schneidwaren” (Research Institute for Cutlery) in Solingen and published several studies, including some on cutting behavior of knives [21], heat treatment [22], and corrosion resistance of stainless knife steels [23]. Studemann completed his PhD dissertaion at the age of 77!

Takefu Metallurgists 1950s

VG10 was developed some time between 1954 and 1959 by Takefu Steel, and is ubiquitous in kitchen knives and many Japan-produced folding knives. You can read more about VG10 in this article. The incredible popularity and longevity of the steel means it warrants a mention.

E.A. (Ted) Oldfield

Oldfield was the director of the CATRA organization during the development of their now famous edge retention testing machine [24]. He started at CATRA as a Graduate Metallurgist. Oldfield published papers about cutlery steel as well [25]. The CATRA edge retention tester has been used by many major knife companies to compare different types of sharpening, edge geometries, and steels, and surely has affected the knife design decisions the companies have made in those areas. These include industry giants like Buck, Spyderco, Case, Benchmade, J.A. Henckels, Global Knives, Victorinox, and more [26].

VSG Metallurgists

Metallurgists at Vereinigte Schmiedewerke GmbH in Germany developed the “Pressurized Electroslag Remelting” technology used to add the high nitrogen (~0.40%) to LC200N/Cronidur 30 [27]. LC200N/Cronidur 30 was then developed by Pratt & Whitney and FAG Bearing Co. as a bearing steel with a combination of high corrosion resistance, toughness, and hardness. You can read a bit more about LC200N and nitrogen steels in general in this article.

Bohler Metallurgists Late 1980s

In the late 1980s metallurgists from Bohler developed M390 steel [28], which is significant for its relatively early date for a powder metallurgy stainless tool steel, because the steel has become steadily more popular over the years since, and the steel has been copied by at least two other steel companies. Alfred Kulmburg is the lead person listed on the patent and several of the papers on the steel that I have read. M390 was a modification of their K190, which in turn was a powder metallurgy version of D7 developed by David Giles, as mentioned under his heading. Read more about M390 in this article.

Pavel Anosov

Anosov was a Russian metallurgist in the 19th century [29] and made several contributions to metallurgy and steel, including publications on metallographic observation of steel structures in 1831. This is notable because usually Sorby is credited with developing microscopy methods for steel, and while his investigations were independent of Anosov, he did not publish until three decades later. But the real reason that Anosov is in this article is because he is credited with successfully re-creating Wootz damascus, publishing his findings in 1841, which is certainly impressive given the early date and how much knowledge about steel was being generated in that time period. Anosov’s work being done in Russia perhaps reduced his influence somewhat but it seems he was an excellent metallurgist ahead of his time.

Anosov

Honorable Mentions

Paul Novotny developed XHP stainless steel, a “stainless D2” that would probably be more popular if Carpenter steel would get their act together. Read more here.

Daido and Hitachi metallurgists developed ZDP-189 and Cowry-X, very interesting steels because they offer very high hardness (>66 Rc) along with being purportedly stainless (though I am not sure if they are), and also containing only chromium carbides (as opposed to vanadium carbides) for easier sharpening. Read more here.

Takefu metallurgists developed Super Gold 2 (SG2), probably the most popular powder metallurgy stainless steel used in Japanese knives. Read more here.

Swedish metallurgists developed 12C27 and AEB-L, developed for razors and knives to offer a combination of high toughness and hardness while also being stainless. These are some of the first stainless steels that used careful composition control to maximize hardness and wear resistance of a stainless steel while keeping the carbide size small for high toughness and edge stability. Read more here.

Al Kajinic developed S110V as mentioned under Stasko and Pinnow. S110V was the first major foray into niobium alloying for Crucible which was also used in S35VN and S45VN. S110V also used a cobalt addition which was added because otherwise the steel wouldn’t harden. Kajinic also explored niobium additions to improve 3V steel though that steel has never been produced commercially. I wrote about this “3V mod” steel in this article. Kajinic also pushed Crucible steel into computer modelling-based steel development through the use of Thermo-Calc software which he used in the development of S110V and 3V mod.

Many Others

There are many metallurgists who I don’t know about because of the poor record keeping when it comes to who developed what steels and who studied certain areas with knives. If you know about any metallurgists who should be mentioned please let me know in the comments!

Who is the Greatest?

I think all of these metallurgists made significant contributions to tool steels and knife steels, which is why I have included them. It may not be possible to pick one who made the biggest difference. Taylor and White created the most excitement for steel development but they did not contribute much in terms of composition of steel. More recent metallurgists have large bodies of prior work to draw upon in developing new steels. I think that Robert Mushet and Harry Brearley may have made the biggest contributions. Mushet single-handedly created the idea of an alloy steel, tool steel, and air hardening steel, which is very impressive. Brearley developed one of the first steels advertised specifically for knives, created the entire category of stainless steels, and his steel continues to be used in large amounts in knives despite it being over 100 years old. So I call it a tie between Mushet and Brearley.

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[1] Giles, David J. “Steel alloy.” U.S. Patent 1,650,707, issued November 29, 1927.

[2] Fletcher, Stewart G., and Walter T. Haswell Jr. “Ferrous alloys and abrasion resistant articles thereof.” U.S. Patent 3,692,515, issued September 19, 1972.

[3] Pinnow, Kenneth, William Stasko, and John Hauser. “Corrosion resistant, high vanadium, powder metallurgy tool steel articles with improved metal to metal wear resistance and a method for producing the same.” U.S. Patent 5,679,908, issued October 21, 1997.

[4] Stasko, William, and Kenneth E. Pinnow. “Prealloyed high-vanadium, cold work tool steel particles and methods for producing the same.” U.S. Patent 5,238,482, issued August 24, 1993.

[5] Wojcieszynski, Andrzej L., and William Stasko. “High-speed steel article.” U.S. Patent 6,057,045, issued May 2, 2000.

[6] Steven, Gary. “Sintered steel particles containing dispersed carbides.” U.S. Patent 3,561,934, issued February 9, 1971.

[7] Steven, Gary. “High-speed steel containing chromium tungsten molybdenum vanadium and cobalt.” U.S. Patent 3,627,514, issued December 14, 1971.

[8] Kasak, A., and E. J. Dulis. “Powder-metallurgy tool steels.” Powder Metallurgy 21, no. 2 (1978): 114-123.

[9] Dulis, E. J., and T. A. Neumeyer. “Particle Metallurgy High-Speed Tool Steel.” In ISI SYMPOSIUM ON MATERIALS FOR METAL CUTTING 1971, 112-118, 170-180. 1971.

[10] Kasak, A., G. Steven, and T. A. Neumeyer. High-speed tool steels by particle metallurgy. No. 720182. SAE Technical Paper, 1972.

[11] Kawai, Nobuyasu, Katuhiko Honma, Hirofumi Fujimoto, Hiroshi Takigawa, Minoru Hirano, and Masaru Ishii. “Nitrogen containing high speed steel obtained by powder metallurgical process.” U.S. Patent 4,121,929, issued October 24, 1978.

[12] Roberts, William, and Borje Johansson. “Cold work steel.” U.S. Patent 4,936,911, issued June 26, 1990.

[13] Damm, Petter, Thomas Hillskog, Kjell Bengtsson, Annika ENGSTRÖM SVENSSON, Sebastian Ejnermark, Lars Ekman, and Victoria Bergqvist. “Cold work tool steel.” U.S. Patent 10,472,705, issued November 12, 2019.

[14] Jönson, Lennart, and Odd Sandberg. “Steel alloy and tools or components manufactured out of the steel alloy.” U.S. Patent 8,440,136, issued May 14, 2013.

[15] Ejnermark, Sebastian, Thomas Hillskog, Lars Ekman, Rikard Robertsson, Victoria Bergqvist, Jenny Karlsson, Petter Damm et al. “Corrosion and wear resistant cold work tool steel.” U.S. Patent Application 14/917,521, filed July 28, 2016.

[16] Verhoeven, John D., Alfred H. Pendray, and Howard F. Clark. “Wear tests of steel knife blades.” Wear 265, no. 7-8 (2008): 1093-1099.

[17] Verhoeven, John D., and Howard F. Clark. “Carbon diffusion between the layers in modern pattern-welded Damascus blades.” Materials characterization 41, no. 5 (1998): 183-191.

[18] Klemm, Heinz. Die Vorgänge beim Schneiden mit Messern. Akademie Verlag, 1957.

[19] Knapp, Werner. “Über Schneidfähigkeit und Schneidhaltigkeit von Messerklingen.” PhD diss., Buchdr. der Bergischen Zeitung, 1928.

[20] Hendrichs, Fr. “über ein Verfahren zur Prüfung der Schneidfähigkeit von Messerklingen.” Maschinenbau 7 (1928): 1012.

[21] Stüdemann, Hans. Influences of the test conditions on the results of cutting property tests on knives. Springer publishing house, 1962.

[22] Stüdemann, Hans. Heat treatment of the steels. Hanser, 1960.

[23] Stüdemann, Hans. Procedure for testing the corrosion resistance of knife blades made of stainless steel. Springer publishing house, 1956.

[24] https://www.catra.org/about-us/60-years/

[25] Oldfield, E. A., and G. B. Graves. “Effect of Hardening and Tempering on the Corrosion Resistance of 13% Cr Steel.” Metal Treatment and Drop Forging (1956): 211-215.

[26] https://www.catra.org/testing-equipment/knives-blades-cutting-edges/sharpness-and-life-tester/

[27] Chin, Herbert A., Roger W. Bursey, D. D. Ehlert, R. Biroscak, E. Streit, and W. Trojahn. “Cronidur 30‐An Advanced Nitrogen Alloyed Stainless Steel For Advanced Corrosion Resistant Fracture Tough Cryogenic Bearings.” In Advanced Earth-to-orbit Propulsion Technology 1994: Proceedings of a Conference Held at NASA George C. Marshall Space Flight Center, Marshall Space Flight Center, May 17-19, 1994, vol. 2, p. 321. National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Marshall Space Flight Center, 1994.

[28] Kulmburg, A., J. Stamberger, and H. Lenger. “Use of an Iron-Base Alloy in the Manufacture of Sintered Parts With a High Corrosion Resistance, a High Wear Resistance as Well as a High Toughness and Compression Strength, Especially for Use in the Processing of Synthetic Materials.” European patent 348,380, issued November 19, 1992.

[29] Feuerbach, Ann. “Damascus Steel and Crucible Steel in Central Asia.” American Society of Arms Collectors Bulletin 82 (2000): 33.