Does better steel get sharper?

[iNewbie]

I think it's a point worth emphasizing.

One wonders why they gave it a proprietary name when surely it has a simple trade name like A2. I don't care for A2 but I do appreciate the fact that Lie-Nielsen felt no need to sex it up with something other than the name for which the formulation is commonly known.

I'm sure if I rang up a steel supplier and attempted to place an order for PM-V11 they wouldn't have the foggiest.

If it was simply one of dozens of candidates then what's to hide? Why not identify it by its trade name, ANSI name, or whatever standards organization would cover this.

Sometimes marketing guile can be insulting. We're supposed to just accept that this is a 'better steel' without being able to inform ourselves as to its content or just its regular trade name in the industry. And really then only way to find out is to buy some of it, so, sale made.

Lie-Nielsen, Stanley with its new line, Hock -- no confusion or frustration about what you're buying. You can make an informed decision about the honing media you currently own and whether it will require 'upgrading' and whether it's worth all that plus other factors.

The whole thing leaves me cold.

Is it kick Veritas week, this week?

I'll sit back with my popcorn...

 

[Trafalgar]

Nope, just asking why they won't identify the steel. What's the big deal? None of the other major players apparently have a problem with it.

 

[woodbrains]

I reach back a little in this thread, because I think this is not quite correct. Chrome doesn't make a steel tough, it makes it more wear resistant. Take for example O1, A2 and D2. They have increasing amounts of chrome (0.5%, 5% and 12% resp.). O1 is tougher then A2, which is tougher then D2, and the wear resistance is the other way around. Vanadium has a similar effect. They are also very hard, so they make sharpening more difficult.

Why is this? These elements form carbides and during cooling these clump together in large crystals. Around these large crystals there is tension in the steel and microcracks can appear. Molybdenum has the effect of reducing the grain size so enhances the toughness, Manganese helps with hardening. Every element has its own pecularities.

PMV-11 is a stainless tool steel with more then 15% chrome. So why is it still tough? The steel cools while it is "powderised" so it cools very fast. This reduces the tendency to form large crystals. The smaller grains also make the steel easier to sharpen, but because chromium carbide is so hard, it is not as easy to sharpen as O1.

Hello,

You are right, I should have written abrasion resistance, and have contradicted what I said earlier. The point about trading off one characteristic for another is my main point here, though. Get a bit of extra wear resistance and lose a bit of hardness, gain a bit of hardness lose some toughness etc. etc.

PM V11 better balances toughness, wear resistance, sharpenability and hardness of anything I have come across so far, without losing too much of one in preference for another. It doesn't matter what Veritas choose to call it, The designation A2 or O1 are just as meaningless, it is just a convenient way of labelling and differentiating stuff. What was it Richard Feynman said about the names of things. They don't mean a thing, or tell us anything about that thing and it doesn't make us clever knowing the names. We need to know the nature of things to understand them, I'm paraphrasing, obviously.

Mike

 

[Trafalgar]

"The designation A2 or O1 are just as meaningless, it is just a convenient way of labelling and differentiating stuff. What was it Richard Feynman said about the names of things."

It is probably meaningless with respect to woodworking hand tool marketing programmes. Not at all meaningless if you're an engineer buying steel for a critical application, or a company that makes tool and die products.

They have standards institutes for steel I assume you know. This isn't done just for kicks and giggles.

 

[iNewbie]

Nope, just asking why they won't identify the steel. What's the big deal? None of the other major players apparently have a problem with it.

You're right, they don't - none of the other manufacturers have a problem with what they want to call it. Its only you.

 

[Trafalgar]

Other tool companies call steels by their industry standard name. Why can't Lee Valley? Seems simple enough.

If it's patented/proprietary, fine. If not, what is it?

 

[Downwindtracker2]

If the marketing of powdered metal #7 leave you cold, the price of a chisel will leave you frozen, chuckle.

 

[Trafalgar]

... good one ...

 

[iNewbie]

Other tool companies call steels by their industry standard name. Why can't Lee Valley? Seems simple enough.

If it's patented/proprietary, fine. If not, what is it?

Your not going to buy it either way so why do you even care - apart from the trolling...

 

[bugbear]

Other tool companies call steels by their industry standard name. Why can't Lee Valley? Seems simple enough.

If it's patented/proprietary, fine. If not, what is it?

Surely a "practical" man like yourself just wants to know how well it performs, not what it's made of,
or what the composition and heat treatment of the steel involved?

Or are you going all "theoretical" on us?

BugBear

 

[Trafalgar]

If the steel is not completely proprietary to Lee Valley I'd like to know the name by which it is known in industry -- powdered metal grade or whatever.

 

[iNewbie]

There you go: http://www.leevalley.com/US/home/Contact.aspx

 

[Jacob]

If you can be bothered to google PMV 11 you discover it is entirely a fabrication of Veritas - possibly in both senses of the word.
You will find no objective information about it at all except as derived from Veritas's own web pages and repeated by their fans and various retailers selling their products.

Take it or leave it! :lol:

 

[iNewbie]

If you can be bothered to google PMV 11 you discover it is entirely a fabrication of Veritas - possibly in both senses of the word.
You will find no objective information about it at all except as derived from Veritas's own web pages and repeated by their fans and various retailers selling their products.

Take it or leave it! :lol:

The old 'fan (boy)' comment always raises a larf. If someone posts something a detractor gets irked about your a "fanboy" - not just someone with an open mind and no agenda...

LV own no-one anything. They put $250,000 into their research and they can tell you what info they like as far as what steel it is. Its their research - if you don't like it, don't buy it. Simples.


The objective info Jacob is, that it does what it says on the tin...

Another fanboy finds it works for him, too - and what would he know, eh? :roll: :

http://sauerandsteiner.blogspot.co.uk/2 ... m-v11.html

 

[Corneel]

The only one outside the Lee Valley factory who really tested the iron in a controlled manner is Derek Cohen. He did some tests on endgrain. And if I understand his reports correctly, then he didn't yet see much difference between an LV A2 iron and a PMV one in the LV shooting board plane after 60 strokes on a nasty piece of Australian concrete. In the LN 51 shooting board plane (which has a higher cutting angle) he saw that the LN A2 iron performed worse then the LV PMV.

http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ToolReviews/LVShootingPlane.html

Derek isn't 100% independent, because he has a close connection with them, but I don't think he would be lying.

 

[Trafalgar]

End grain schmind grain. Good Gawd fellas, how wide of an incised line does one need to saw? If a cut needs more than a couple of passes what's needed is better sawing technique, not some super steel. The worst plane you've ever owned ought to handle it with no problem.

 

[Corneel]

Dereks test was an effort to do a controlled comparison of toolsteels. Whatever you th think otherwise, the test itself certainly wasn't a bad one.

 

[Jacob]

The only real test is to indulge in long periods of planing on a variety of real projects (not test pieces), with all the intermittent probs of sharpening. You gradually get to prefer certain planes and find others just don't get used.
For me the big users are Record 5 1/2, Stanley 7 (with laminated blade), record 5, Stanley 220, Stanley 78. Could just about dump the others - in fact have done most of them after suitable trial period. Clifton 4 next to go - it doesn't earn it's keep and simply couldn't compete in term of value for money

 

[Trafalgar]

Dereks test was an effort to do a controlled comparison of toolsteels. Whatever you th think otherwise, the test itself certainly wasn't a bad one.

It actually highlights how ridiculously esoteric all of this really is -- the 'best' test is doing something one shouldn't have to do much at all. But it's supposed to 'extrapolate' I suppose.

 

[iNewbie]

The only one outside the Lee Valley factory who really tested the iron in a controlled manner is Derek Cohen. He did some tests on endgrain. And if I understand his reports correctly, then he didn't yet see much difference between an LV A2 iron and a PMV one in the LV shooting board plane after 60 strokes on a nasty piece of Australian concrete. In the LN 51 shooting board plane (which has a higher cutting angle) he saw that the LN A2 iron performed worse then the LV PMV.

http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ToolReviews/LVShootingPlane.html

Derek isn't 100% independent, because he has a close connection with them, but I don't think he would be lying.

From his summing up:

"Another notable area of excellence is the blades, either the A2 or, better still, the PM-V11. Both take an edge well and hold it a longer time than any other blade used in this test."

"Since there was a comparison with the LN #51 a comment or two about that plane is important. My respect for the LN is not diminished at all. It was and remains a superb plane for shooting. It is balanced and powerful – more powerful than the Veritas – and works exceptionally well. The main factors highlighted here are that the set up (blade insertion and positioning) is not as sophisticated and as easy to do as the Veritas, and that the blade does not hold an edge as long as either the two Veritas steels in this review. However the blade does get sharp and it does perform well – just that the steel is not in the same class as the Veritas'. It will dull sooner and then begin to underperform. Maintain a sharp blade – with more frequent honing – and you will be rewarded with a top notch performance."