Mule Team™ Z-Wear BQ™

In the cutlery industry, a “mule” is a test blade used to evaluate the performance characteristics of a specific steel or heat-treatment protocol. Spyderco’s groundbreaking Mule Team™ project takes this concept to all-new levels, offering knife enthusiasts a consistent fixed-blade platform for their own testing of different blade steels. Mule Team blades are also an elite source of “kit” blades for novice knifemakers to practice crafting their own handles. The MT44 Mule Team blade showcases Zapp Tooling Alloys’ Z-Wear BQ™—a “blade-quality” expression of Zapp’s Z-Wear PM® tool steel. Z-Wear PM is a particle metallurgy cold work tool steel created to offer wear resistance superior to standard tool steels with the added benefits of increased toughness and resistance to chipping. The BQ form of this steel further enhances these qualities to provide optimal performance in knife blades and other cutting tools. To allow an even broader scope of testing and real-world applications, the MT44 is available in both PlainEdge™ and fully serrated SpyderEdge™ configurations. Available in limited quantities and sold consumer direct only, Mule Team blades do not include handle scales or a sheath.