Dear Mr. Glesser, how about some REX-121?

[Trevitrace]

Been reading up on this a little, seems intriguing. Think it would shine as a Mule. Thank you, sir!

Adam

[Strong-Dog]

I'll second that! Although it would be a pain to grind in a production setting, and expensive as well. But I would buy one.

[The Mastiff]

Hey Trevitace.

Looking at composition charts is great reading. Looking for performance is a favorite past time here. As far as the Rex 121. It's around if you know where to look. Farid Mehr from the UK works with it and some here have got some of his work.

I recall him talking about grinding it. Annealed it was over 50 rc. He was up in the 50 or more belts used range grinding his knife at the time.

Despite it's great wear resistance it never seemed to really take the knife world by storm. It's got way too high carbide fraction to take great, sharp, lasting edges. If you like moderately sharp knives that go on forever but aren't tough this might be for you.

I wouldn't ask any friends or anybody I liked to work with it, nor would I particularly want to pay for it's less than spectacular cutting edges.

Still, I'm not in charge of anything but me. I had the chance to get one of Farids but passed.

Better reports of the steels performance than mine can be found. Hopefully someone will step in. As for me about as high wear as I need to go can be found at the 10V/S110V/K390 levels. Those steels I truly find still useful and have enough strength and stability to keep me happy.

There are some of Farid's mules on the boards every now and again . They do pop up.

Joe

[Trevitrace]

Hey Joe, thanks for chiming in with some first-hand experience. I came across Farid Mehr and that he uses this and other "exotic" steels from time to time, but not much regarding the performance of the it. Thought I'd throw it up for discussion and see where the thread takes it.

Cheers,
Adam

[chuck_roxas45]

I hope mad.rookie chimes in. I think.he's got one or two knives from Farid.

[MadRookie]

Hi:

The CPM Rex-121 is a real biat*h to grind, but once there you can sell your sharpening gear.....

Looses the scary sharp shaving edge rapidly, but then stays at this level (still push cutting paper) like forever.

Some pics:































[video=youtube;gLyIo7xIIPU]https://youtu.be/gLyIo7xIIPU[/video]

[Blerv]

I thought Sal commented once on this saying the grinding costs would be very very high. In turn the customer would have to absorb the cost for the price of the mule.

I'm sure the quote is around somewhere. I hope that my memory is accurate but leave a 5-10% bs margin in there for safety :) .

[phillipsted]

Dang it, MadRookie! You have to warn people before posting gorgeous food porn like that! I just drooled all over my computer! :rolleyes:

Beautiful edge. I can't imagine how long it took you to get that mirror...

TedP

[Evil D]

I came really close to buying one of those mules when they were made, but at the time I had nothing that could come close to sharpening it so I passed. Even now I would be really hesitant.

[hunterseeker5]

You have no idea what you'd be getting into with such a knife. :P


Honestly, if you want to experience something like it, you might try buying one of those ceramic kitchen knives.