Scalpel Sharpness?

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You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.You should upgrade or use an alternative browser. scalpel sharpness?

• Thread starter Thread starter Hydraulicman
• Start date Start date Jan 29, 2005

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Hydraulicman

Joined Oct 20, 2002 Messages 134 I was wondering what you fellas think about the sharpness of scalpels? I have never had to chance to test one out. Do you think they are just razor blades... Or possibly sharper? Or do you think the sharpness is over hyped? Just curious, Hydraulicman

Harry Callahan

Fresh outta warranty

Gold Member Joined Mar 17, 2002 Messages 1,755 Factory new Spyderco knives are sharper than scalpels. No bull. K

Knifeclerk

Joined Jul 16, 2004 Messages 1,083 A scalpel is essentially a razor blade. They are not sharpened, just disgarded once used. M

Mies

Joined Jan 1, 2005 Messages 67 Dunno about hardness, but scalpels are scary sharp. in my work I use them daily to cut up human tissues. Scalpels are no where near as sharp as the blades we use in a cryostat, a machine to slice frozen tissues as thin as 3 microns. Touching the edge of those is out of the question! Once a students thumb was caught on the blade in action, she fainted and lost a pint of urine...and some blood ;-( Luckily she was alright after a while. H

Hydraulicman

Joined Oct 20, 2002 Messages 134 so generaly the sharpness of a scalpel is over rated? hydraulicman

Dirk

Joined Mar 19, 1999 Messages 2,277 I was told by the microsurgeon that worked on my hand that the knife blade that cut my fingers was a lot sharper than his scalpels. He said he could tell under the microscope by how clean the edges of the cuts were compared to his scalpels. He was somewhat of a knife collector and was rather interested in how I got my knives that sharp. I explained that I reprofiled the edge of the knife to make the edge thinner and blend better with the primary grind of the blade. Then I explained how an edge pro works. He was very impressed and always thought scalpels were some of the sharpest blades available. He said he was going to look into seeing if he couldn't get even sharper scalpels. Also, did anyone see the article in one of the knife mags about the flint knapper who made a set of scalpels from obsidian for his surgeon. Apparently the guy needed surgery on his shoulder and convinced his surgeon to use obsidian. The article went on to say that the surgeon was very impressed by the sharpness of the obsidian and felt that it was potentially superior to a scalpel. M

Mies

Joined Jan 1, 2005 Messages 67

Hydraulicman said: so generaly the sharpness of a scalpel is over rated? hydraulicman Click to expand...

Compared to our knives at home I think scalpels are way sharper. A Spyderco VG-10 doesn't come near I guess. Compared to other high-end surgical blades, scalpels are not that sharp. B

bob bowie

Joined Jul 24, 2001 Messages 4,374

Dirk said: Also, did anyone see the article in one of the knife mags about the flint knapper who made a set of scalpels from obsidian for his surgeon. Apparently the guy needed surgery on his shoulder and convinced his surgeon to use obsidian. The article went on to say that the surgeon was very impressed by the sharpness of the obsidian and felt that it was potentially superior to a scalpel. Click to expand...

That fella is Errett Callahan, he teach a lot of primitive survival skills also. Googling his name leads to some interesting reading.

Roodog

Joined Apr 9, 2004 Messages 466

Mies said: Dunno about hardness, but scalpels are scary sharp. in my work I use them daily to cut up human tissues. Scalpels are no where near as sharp as the blades we use in a cryostat, a machine to slice frozen tissues as thin as 3 microns. Touching the edge of those is out of the question! Once a students thumb was caught on the blade in action, she fainted and lost a pint of urine...and some blood ;-( Luckily she was alright after a while. Click to expand...

A fellow histotechnologist, nice! I also use them daily and they are basically razor blades. I dont know about Rockwell hardness but I can attest that they will dull very quickly when cutting specimens with alot of fatty tissue. The cryostat and microtome blades that Mies mentioned are scary sharp, but very delicate. I wouldnt want such a fragile edge on any of my knives. I would estimate the bevel angle to be 15 degrees or less. If you are seriously curious as to how sharp these microtome blades really are, email me your address and Ill mail you a sample of one. [email protected] Scalpel blades are not as sharp for a reason. The razor edge cuts cleanly but not as cleanly as a highly polished blade (sharpened with an extra fine stone). This is a good thing if you want to reclose the cut which in most surgical cases is the goal. The roughness helps blood clotting giving it better binding sites and speeds up healing. Mies, I had a guy slice off the tip of his thumb while I was training him on a Leice 2155 automated microtome. He didnt follow my first rule which is dont touch anything unless I tell you to. We spent 4 hours in the ER. I got the pleasure of spending the next day filling out incident reports for hospital administration. H

HoB

Joined May 12, 2004 Messages 2,611 I looked at some under the microscope (from Swann-Morton to be precise) and they are like the ubiquitous cheap razor blades. Whether that is considered sharp or not is a bit a question of definition. They are definitely not very refined. The blade is very thin so it has to displace very little material. The edge bevel angle is relative small which aids the cutting ability. It is also quite toothy and has a good bit to it, but they don't compare (meaning: they don't even come close!!) to a blade that is mirror polished on an UF Sharpmaker rod let alone one that was polished on a high grit waterstone. If you have further refined the edge with a few strokes on CrO loaded strop you are not even in the same ballpark anymore. Any good straight razor is also leagues sharper. Not really a surprise here, surgical blades are mass produced and not hand finished one at a time on a leather disk like a Dovo razor for example. Actually I would bet that even the blades of a Mach 3 (or whatever) is much better refined than a surgical blade, but I haven't looked on one under the microscope. Mies: The steel has only influence on the maximum achievable sharpness, and especially VG-10 is according to Sal Glesser among the top performers in that regard. I am also pretty sure that Spyderco finishes off their blades to at least the same degree as a surgical blade, but you have to consider that the blade thickness is much greater on a pocket knife and the edge bevel angle might also be larger. H

Hardman

Joined Dec 27, 2004 Messages 108 This is my two cents as a surgeon. A scalpel blade is about as sharp as a razor blade. I'm also a spydie fan, but I think scalpels are sharper. Mike W

Wasz

Joined Oct 2, 2002 Messages 353

Dirk said: Also, did anyone see the article in one of the knife mags about the flint knapper who made a set of scalpels from obsidian for his surgeon. Apparently the guy needed surgery on his shoulder and convinced his surgeon to use obsidian. The article went on to say that the surgeon was very impressed by the sharpness of the obsidian and felt that it was potentially superior to a scalpel. Click to expand...

Obsidian flakes to an edge of 1 molecule, this is the sharpest edge attainable. Sharpest edge cleanest cuts so it makes a lot of sense to use obsidian as a scapel as long as you can steralize it properly and keep it from fragmenting. obsidian fragments in a wound would be a bad bad thing.

ERINT

Joined May 19, 2002 Messages 353 I too have heard plastic surgeons praise the obsidian blades since they leave such a clean cut. But they are expensive as hell and if you screw up, holy hell you just opened that poor soul up like a keg at frat party. B

Boozoo Chavis

Joined Oct 18, 2003 Messages 1,592 Here is a link to some pretty interesting info on "stone age scalpels" sometimes used for special applications. You might also check out the top of the line "diamond scalpel" in the product section. http://www.finescience.com/fst/ScalpelsKnives/10110-01.html A

AndersP

Joined Jan 5, 2005 Messages 127

Boozoo Chavis said: Here is a link to some pretty interesting info on "stone age scalpels" sometimes used for special applications. You might also check out the top of the line "diamond scalpel" in the product section. http://www.finescience.com/fst/ScalpelsKnives/10110-01.html Click to expand...

The link doesn't seem to work. H

Hydraulicman

Joined Oct 20, 2002 Messages 134 I was not expecting this level of feedback... But i guess that's silly of me to think... I mean we are all knife nuts That's pretty much what I figured... like a razor blade. but thin enough to get that "opinel" effect of awsome cutting preformance in a cheap blade. hydraulicman

Josh Muller

Joined Jun 22, 2003 Messages 3,049 a few notes on sharpness and what it actually means. theres a lot of factors that go into how sharp an object is 1 cutting edge angle 2 amount of material directrly behind the cutting edge 3 the angle of the rest of the knife 4 the thickness of the spine of the knife (or possibly only the tip if that is the only part being used) 5 the grit at wich the cutting edge is finished 6 the steels ability to attain and maintain the level of sharpness desired 7 the stiffness of the blade (not so much though... this is more of a personal preference in performance rather then an indicator of sharpness) if you put a 10 degree angle included (both edge angles added to gether, meaning 5 degree's on both side (wich is insane. thats thinner then most knives are capable of getting given how thick knives tend to be) at a 4000 grit mirror polish, and your knife is 1/16" thick and then put the same cutting edge conditions on a 5/16" thick survival knife, they will both initiate the cut equally as easily, but the 5/16" thick survival knife will be a lower performer in the overal act of slicing. while the added weight of its thickness aids in a lot of tasks, its technically not as sharp. when you have a knife that ground like a puuko, meaning there is no edge bevel, it goes from spine to edge in one straight v grind, vs. a knife that is 1/16" thick right behind the edge, the second knife has no chance against the puuko given that they are finished in the same way at the direct cutting edge (high polish or same grit). you will have to push things apart much farther at the very begining of the cut with the second knife. if you knife is brought to a 6000 grit polish, compared to the exact same knife brought to a 100 grit polish, both will be intensley sharp, but in a totally different way. if your cutting flesh with it, the 6000 grit polish will slip into it (push cut) like it wasnt there, where as the 100 grit polish will tear into it like bread knife into angel food cake. wich is pretty much what your accomplishing, a knife with a great deal of serrated edges, just in a very small form. so.... why are scalpels so sharp (seemingly?) - they are very thin. thats about it. you can have a dull scalpel compared to a normal knife (scalpel at 45 degree's at 600 grit polish, your normal knife (say crkt m16) at 17 degree 6000 grit polish,) the scalpel will still slice better simply because its only got about 20 percent of the thickness of the crkt m16. you push the material apart 5 times as far with the crkt then with the scalpel. same with the hemostat knife, even if its not sharp (wich normally it is because they are replaced regularly), its still going to slice better then any normal knife, because its so incredibly thin. unusably thin in a normal knife (it would be a like a sheat of paper), but do to the small size of the blade used in the machine, it can keep its stiffness maintained. so to answer your question of "is a scalpels sharpness overated" yes and no. a scalpel made of m2 (or d2) sharpened to a 10 degree angle, 6000 grit polish will destroy any regular scalpel in an extended cutting conpetition. but, the geometry of a scalpel makes it inherently good at slicing. when people say "insanely sharp" they normally mean that the edge of their knife has a very good fit and finish. its 17 degree's and it has a completly consisten 3000 grit polsih, or a 100 grit polish, and as such it cuts better then any other knife they have ever handled. thats understandable. but insanely sharp to me is an example that cliff said once, that he got a knife down to 10 degree's included on a 100 grit slack belt. a knife at that angle is unusable. it would roll, dent, and mash emmediately upon use on anything harder then butter, but if you were cutting flesh with it - it would be like the flesh wasnt there. insanely sharp = unusably sharp = truly impressive in its performance from a cutting stand point. but there is more that goes into a knifes ability to cut (and maintain) in daily activities hope that helps

Josh Muller

Joined Jun 22, 2003 Messages 3,049 you can copy and past the link into the url box of your browser and it will work. the hyperlinp portion just doesnt have any info in it, but the url is correct. M

Mies

Joined Jan 1, 2005 Messages 67

Roodog said: A fellow histotechnologist, nice! I also use them daily and they are basically razor blades. I dont know about Rockwell hardness but I can attest that they will dull very quickly when cutting specimens with alot of fatty tissue. The cryostat and microtome blades that Mies mentioned are scary sharp, but very delicate. I wouldnt want such a fragile edge on any of my knives. I would estimate the bevel angle to be 15 degrees or less. If you are seriously curious as to how sharp these microtome blades really are, email me your address and Ill mail you a sample of one. [email protected] Scalpel blades are not as sharp for a reason. The razor edge cuts cleanly but not as cleanly as a highly polished blade (sharpened with an extra fine stone). This is a good thing if you want to reclose the cut which in most surgical cases is the goal. The roughness helps blood clotting giving it better binding sites and speeds up healing. Mies, I had a guy slice off the tip of his thumb while I was training him on a Leice 2155 automated microtome. He didnt follow my first rule which is dont touch anything unless I tell you to. We spent 4 hours in the ER. I got the pleasure of spending the next day filling out incident reports for hospital administration. Click to expand...

Off topic: Hi Roodog, Yeah, the risk of contamination with a cut like that is far more dangerous that the cut itself, once had to take blood (vena punction) in a very stressful situation, and i put the used needle in my labcoat, unprotected..... 15 minutes later i put my hand in the pocket and OUCHH!! Bye Let me tell you quickly about my work. I work in a experimental pathology/oncology institution and get to cut testis and prostate samples......, both fresh frozen and paraffin embedded. We do some histological stainings on a non-routine basis, but the research mostly involves genetic techniques. Bye P

pmel018

Joined May 12, 2004 Messages 909 Hi Guys I posted about an amputation knife a few weeks back, that sucker is sharper than any of my Spydies, on both edges !!!!. Not a scalpel I know, but used in a similar arena. I would like to know how such things are sharpened, ground, honed, stropped or something else???? Phil

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