Calculator › Steels › 1095
1095 is the higher-carbon sibling of 1084. It can get a point or two harder and holds an edge a little longer, but it is shallow hardening and has a very short window to get below the nose of the curve, so it needs a fast quench — Parks 50, or brine for anything over 1/8 in — to reach full hardness. Canola will leave it soft.
| Good for | Stock-removal knives where you have a fast quenchant; kitchen and hunting knives; hamons. |
|---|---|
| Forging | Up to ~2100 °F; stop at 1500 °F. Cracks if worked cold. |
| Normalize | 1650 / 1500 / 1350 °F (NJSB); Cashen uses a single 1575 °F |
| Austenitize | 1450–1475 °F, 5–15 min — no higher |
| Quench | Fast — Parks 50; brine or water for sections over 1/8 in. Canola will not fully harden it |
| Temper | 400 °F twice → 60–61 HRC |
| Working hardness | 59–63 HRC |
Typical shop values. Confirm against your supplier's datasheet.
Widely sold as annealed flat bar and as precision-ground stock in 1/8–1/4 in; often the cheapest 'knife steel' at general suppliers.
Suppliers: New Jersey Steel Baron Alpha Knife Supply Jantz
Stock removal: the bar is cut to blade + tang + clean-up, so the tang section and forged thickness below only change the finished-weight estimate. Switch to Forged and they change the stock length too.
Tang dimensions are estimated from the tang style until you change them. Measuring yours is worth doing — a forged blank's length depends on the tang's cross-section, not on what the tang is called.
Stock removal: fill factors only change the finished-weight estimate here. They set the stock length when the method is Forged. Grinding loss has no effect at all in stock removal — the bar is cut straight to the profile, nothing is drawn out.
The fraction of the blade's and tang's bounding box that is actually steel once the bevels are ground. Distal taper is factored in separately now (see "Distal taper" below, under What this assumed) and isn't editable here yet — these two fill factors are the ones worth replacing with your own measurements: weigh a finished blade, then adjust until the finished weight below matches the scale.
Steel is only part of the cost. Add abrasives, handle, heat treat and your time, and see the price that actually pays you.
Copy link to this calculation1084. 1095 only beats it if you have a fast quench oil and a kiln; in a forge with canola, 1084 will come out harder and more consistent. Austenitize 1095 at 1450–1475 °F, not higher.
Bar sizes for ten common knife patterns, weight per inch for every standard flat bar, and quick heat-treat numbers for the usual carbon steels. Print it, tape it to the grinder.