Is Spyderco the only production maker running knives so hard?

[dj moonbat]

I browse around a lot, and for any given steel, Spyderco always seems to heat treat a couple HRC points higher than other big production makers. A few questions:

1. Has it always been thus? Has Spyderco/Sal ever said that they do this as a matter of deliberate practice?
2. The only non- knife I have in VG-10 is the same as Spyderco's hardness, and I don't have any non- S30V, so I have no way to make a comparison: are those couple of points noticeable, either in terms of increased toughness on the soft end or increased edge retention on the hard end?

[KardinalSyn]

I once saw a documentary for another knife maker in the States who sent the blanks for heat treatment and did the final grind after getting them back. They only made fixed blades. Seeing that sought of fueled my knife addiction.

I would really love to see how Spyderco makes their knives and the steps involved. Including the heat treatment process. Possibly as a documentary.

[sal]

We try to use optimal hardness for each steel.

sal

[DCDesigns]

We try to use optimal hardness for each steel.

sal

In other words YES. I have had benchmades in s30v, and theirs cannot touch the spyderco HT. Spyderco seems to be the only knife company putting performace above all else.

[Donut]

I think that it is different from the knife producing company's point of view. If they lower the hardness a couple points, the steel will be tougher and it will respond better to abuse. From what I see, many knife users do abuse their knives.

[DeathBySnooSnoo]

Spydercos heat treats do seem to be much better than a lot of others...and I like that they are always tweaking for different steels. Seems that a lot of other production companies just pick a range and stick to it for the most part.

Speaking of HT...Sal can you push M4 up to about 64? Love to see it that hard on the Air in particular!

[lambertiana]

The only other company from which I have knives that pushes the same hardness is Buck. Paul Bos set up their S30V at 59.5-60. In my testing of S30V blades, my S30V Para and an S30V Buck were pretty much tied; both were noticeably better than the BM S30V blade used in the same test. And all three of those were head and shoulders above another knife that cost three times what I paid for my Para (to remain unnamed to avoid the flames that I always get from that particular fan club).

Some companies heat treat to lower RC to get "acceptable" performance while still ensuring plenty of toughness so they don't have to do much warranty work on their expensive blades. Spyderco and Buck seem to target a higher RC to give better edgeholding performance, which is what I want in a knife.