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A new steel<\/strong> developed at the Japanese Institute of Engineering and Metallurgy holds tremendous practical promise for all who use sharp blades, including busy woodworkers. Though not yet ready as a marketable product, it appears to have the potential to be a complete game changer. Here’s the details.<\/p>\n The key feature of this steel is its ability to, in effect, self sharpen.<\/strong> By combining sophisticated powdered metal technology with several unconventional alloying elements, the researchers have been able to produce a unique grain structure<\/strong> in the steel. Whereas a sharp edge in any conventional steel wears by “dropout” of iron, alloy, and carbide grains, which leaves behind a degraded surface and edge, the newly developed steel product wears in an entirely different manner.<\/p>\n The grain structure in the outer few microns of this steel gets compressed just before it wears. When metal wears away,<\/strong> it does so in minute thin “flakes,” leaving behind a surface \u2013 and a cutting edge \u2013 that is as polished and keen as it was before the wearing process started.<\/p>\n In fact, once properly sharpened, the edge actually becomes slightly sharper<\/strong> as it wears in this unique manner. It is as if the wood that is being cut by the blade’s edge acts as a very slow sharpening “stone”. There is a limit to how long this process can persist simply because the volume of steel near the edge is gradually depleted.<\/p>\n However, in personal communication with Dr. I. N. Sano, the lead scientist on the project, he predicts the sharpened edge of a smoothing plane would be expected to last through about one year<\/strong> of regular use in a typical hand-tool-based woodshop! Dr. Sano remarks that, “Woodworkers are going to be amazed at not only how long a cutting edge in this steel can last but how it actually improves with use. The traditional routine of continually resharpening plane blades and chisels is going to become a relic of the past.”<\/p>\n The details<\/strong> can be found in the latest issue of the Institute’s bimonthly journal but a full English translation is not available at this time. A brief introduction is reproduced below, with permission.<\/p>\n \u3053\u3053\u3067\u554f\u984c\u306e\u771f\u5b9f\u306f\u3001\u30b1\u30fc\u30b9\u306b\u3042\u306a\u305f\u304c\u8208\u5473\u3092\u6301\u3063\u3066\u3044\u308b\u3001\u3067\u3042\u308b<\/p>\n \u3042\u306a\u305f\u304c\u3053\u306e\u30ca\u30f3\u30bb\u30f3\u30b9\u306e\u3044\u305a\u308c\u304b\u3092\u4fe1\u3058\u308b\u306a\u3089\u3001\u3088\u304f\u3001\u3042\u306a\u305f\u306f\u3001\u65e5\u4ed8\u3092\u30c1\u30a7\u30c3\u30af\u3057\u3066\u3044\u306a\u3044\u3002\u305d\u308c\u3068\u3082\u3001\u7d20\u65e9\u304f\u3001\u7c21\u5358\u306b\u3059\u308b\u3053\u3068\u304c\u3067\u304d\u307e\u3059\u6728\u5de5\u8a87\u5927\u5e83\u544a\u3001\u305d\u3057\u3066\u78ba\u5b9f\u306a\u3053\u3068\u3059\u308b\u305f\u3073\u306b\u4fe1\u3058\u308b\u3082\u306e\u3060\u307e\u3055\u308c\u3084\u3059\u3044\u6728\u5de5\u306e\u4e00\u3064\u3067\u3059\u3002\u7533\u3057\u8a33\u3042\u308a\u307e\u305b\u3093\u304c\u3001\u305d\u308c\u3060\u3051\u3067\u4f55\u304b\u4ed6\u306e\u3082\u306e\u306e\u3088\u3046\u306b\u3001\u7df4\u7fd2\u3068\u52dd\u5229\u3068\u4e00\u7dd2\u306b\u3044\u304f\u3064\u304b\u306e\u969c\u5bb3\u304c\u304b\u304b\u308a\u307e\u3059\u3002<\/p>\n The development group estimates that the new steel product will be available to tool makers by the end of this year.<\/strong> After a bit more tweaking, it is expected to have very favorable working characteristics for blade formation. I will keep readers posted with new information on this wonderful innovation that really has the potential to change the way we all work in our woodshops.<\/p>\n Sano-san has informed me of a single drawback to the new steel. It will only be produced on a single calendar day each year, namely today, which is named in honor of all those who believe that high quality woodworking is easy, quick, and every step is a sure thing every time.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A new steel developed at the Japanese Institute of Engineering and Metallurgy holds tremendous practical promise for all who use sharp blades, including busy woodworkers. Though not yet ready as a marketable product, it appears to have the potential to be a complete game changer. Here’s the details. The key feature of this steel is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-resources"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3482"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3482\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3489,"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3482\/revisions\/3489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rpwoodwork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}