The most important aspect about a knife is the quality of the heat treatment it went through. I explained heat treatment in my review of Esee Knives because I believe their heat treatment process is second to none, but thought it would be useful to give it its own article. Not exactly sure what heat treatment is or does? Don’t worry, from my experience, plenty of people don’t. Heat treatment determines the quality of the steel used by companies like knife manufacturers. It accounts for various characteristics such as how tough a knife is, how hard it is, and how well it holds its edge. The steel is exposed to extreme temperatures for a precise duration in order to alter the characteristics of the steel. For this reason, you can have two identical steels, but when they each go through their different heat treatments, you can end up with vastly different knives. The following video is an excellent explanation and illustration of how heat treatment actually works:
Featured image courtesy of Applied Science YouTube Channel
