A customer use update.
"First, I have been using the stiff filet knife more, and not just on fish. I have found it's a very good knife for deboning pork shoulders when I make sausage, and close enough for keeping at hand when I am grinding to make the chunks of pork and venison that do not fit into the grinder a little bit smaller. It filets jumbo (1 pound or so) perch nicely. I think were I still fishing Nipigon a lot it would be the knife I carried day in and day out for gutting and gilling big trout and fileting fish for camp meals.
Secon, I have got another deer done on the little M4 blade and it's still shaving sharp, so that makes three so far. I am planning on a minimum of three more deer this fall and maybe five more. I will keep track of it for you, but my suspicions are it will at least match the VG-10 blade I did nine with before I sharpened it. I do nothing to protect the blade, no oil or anything. and I leave it sitting in water for extended periods (like over night) and never has shown any sign of rust. I still has a slight patina to it so maybe that oxidation is protective? Crucible might could tell you about that, but I am not worried enough to take the time to ask. As far as I am concerned, the difference between it and the Japanese super steels is mainly that M4 seems to be a little "tougher" and that seems to make it a little harder to sharpen. That's a very, very small down side I suppose but for that to make any difference a person would have to be foolish enough to try sharpening that kind of steel without diamond stones. M4 does have a Very different feel to it when it comes to putting it on ceramic rods. I may still set the edge on it to 10 degrees when I get around to sharpening it again, something I would advise you to try because I think it will work and be a slicing sonofabitch. (isn't that what knives are for?) Make yourself a steak knife and see how long a 10 degree edge edge lasts when cutting meat on a ceramic plate. I can say for sure that a 15 degree edge with this M4 holds up. It has gutted, skinned, dismembered and stripped the meat off the carcass on three deer without needing sharpened so far."
Thanks for the report.
Tim
Last edited by michiganroadkill; 09/22/20.
