Nine months in a bag of wet rope!

[Dunc]

Around 3 years ago when I was still on a lifeboat crew I donated my Spyderco Atlantic Salt to them. It was mounted in a Kydex sheath on the boats console.
   Two years ago I left the lifeboat as most of you know to become a Rescue Officer in H.M Coastguard but my old Spyderco remained in service on the boat until September last year when it was involved in a high speed accident while training in the dark , I was actually called to the incident and was on scene with the Coastguard Rescue vehicle and team in a matter of minutes. We were in contact via radio with the now smashed and disabled lifeboat and requested them to put up a flare to pinpoint there position which by now was at the foot of the cliffs being battered in the surf. The crew had managed to swim the short distance to shore and we done a medivac for one of the crew who was injured while another lifeboat recovered and secured the damaged boat.
  Low water was early next morning and a tractor was taken to recover the boat from the beach and bring it the 5 miles by road back to its station. The knife was no longer on the boat  and we just presumed it was lost overboared in the accident.

Fast forward nine months to last night , we had just completed an evenings training when we stopped in to the lifeboat station for a mug of tea and to see how the preparations were going for the naming ceremony of the new boat which will be officially launched this Saturday when someone found my old knife at the bottom of a bag full of wet rope. It must have been put in there when all usable equipment was salvaged off the old boat.

I took it home to clean it up as it was in a bit of a state  It cleaned up alright except for the screw holding the pocket clip on had corroded through. The coxswain of the boat told me to keep the knife as a keepsake as they have now bought all new equipment including a knife for the boat.
  I contacted Spyderco this morning and they are sending me out a new pocket clip screw assembly 

You've just got to love H-1 Steel , I bet Defs Wingman would have rusted away all together by now 

[jerseydevil]

Damn, that's impressive!  I can't imagine one of my Kershaws holding up very well in those conditions.....

[derekmac]

Wow that's really impressive! 

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

[Steinar]

Cool! I'm impressed, I must bring my Dragonfly Salt to play next time I am doing something involving salsmurfer.

[powerring]

That is completely and totally awesome.  Now if Tim Leatherman will make Grant a Wingman in H-1, all will be right with the world.   

[Ashley]

Nice H1 is wonderful at rust prevention but holding an edge is a totally different story.

Sent from Ash forum mobile

[powerring]

Nice H1 is wonderful at rust prevention but holding an edge is a totally different story.

Sent from Ash forum mobile

I've read the following about H-1, which i thought was pretty interesting:

"Sal (founder of Spyderco) has written that H-1 outperforms all their other steels in SE, with a Rc of ~68 at the edge.... Edge retention on plain edge is about AUS-6 (less than ATS-55 by 25%). Serrated edge retention is very good, up there with the exotics, (better than ATS-55).”  I've lost the source but I'll take his word for it.

Since H1 is work hardened, serrations make a world of difference in edge retention.  If you prefer a plain edge, H-1 is definitely not your best choice on that count.

[Ashley]

Thanks for the info I didn't know that as I've only had the pe version. Thanks again! good info

Sent from Ash forum mobile

[powerring]

The whole PE vs. SE thing blew my mind when I read it.  I had avoided H-1 because I heard edge retention was bad but with this info, I gave it a shot in SE.  I've been pleased with it on the Ladybug 3, which is now my daily carry.