Best Vinegar for Patina

Sulaco

Sulaco

Joined
Nov 15, 2003
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What vinegar works best to patina the 1095CV on the tweeners? I've used hot (heated in the microwave) apple cider on some other carbon steel and it gets really dark, black. I've seen some nice gray patinas and was wondering what folks are using?
 
I am curious as to how a wine would work. Not just Any wine, but one of those ones from a bad batch of home brew wine flavored vinegar like ones...
 
Here's the method I've been using for most of my forced patinas. I just use this on knives I end up using hard. For my traditionals and other small carbon steel blades, I let them patina naturally with use.

This method has kept my carbon Mora's from rusting even a little bit in some pretty severe usage and environments, including salt water. Of course I dry them before putting them away and oil them every so often, but it still works really well.

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/s...A-Deep-Even-Black-Patina-On-1095-Carbon-Steel
 
I used old apple cider vinegar cuz it's what I had.

It's the acid in vinegar that creates the patina. Anything acidic will produce a patina.

IIRC, distilled white vinegar has the lowest ph (~2.5) and apple cider vinegar the highest (~5.0). Anything higher is technically not a 'vinegar'.

So distilled white vinegar should produce a patina the fastest.
 
I use straight-up acid. Sure, it dissolves the blade, but the resulting puddle is a nice deep black.
 
for me...i use burger king ketchup....i swear its not regular ketchup. patinas my knife reaaaaaaal good.
 
Potatoes seem to work pretty good too. :D I was cutting up spuds a couple of years ago for planting and got a phone call. Left my Kabar 1237 stuck in the potato. Got distracted inside digging up old paperwork needed as a result of the phone call. Got back to the gardening shed about 2.0 hours later. The tip half of the blade had a really dark gray patina. Over time, it faded a little with use/standard cleaning, and the guard half has darkened up with use, but you can still see a significant difference between blade halves.
 
I use Mustard. I do it in layers with about 4-5 hours between layers. I put it on (It sticks well for trying different patterns), let it sit for 4-5 hours, wash it off, dry it then apply another layer. I have also tried applying a light cold bluing on top and achieved some case color like patterns. Will try to post some results once I get some photos.
 
If you're wanting something more acidic but still relatively available and safe make some citric acid. Go to the cleaner aisle at your local grocery or squal-mart and look for a product called Lemi-Shine. There also may be some off brands but its basically a bottle of citric acid crystals used to boost and clean your dishwasher or whatever. Mix the crystals with some hot water and you'll have some very reactive stuff. I have even used it to etch stainless steels like aus8 and Kershaws Sandvik, or to remove bad rust from axe heads and old knives.

Neat thing is you can bottle the solution up and reuse. You'll just have to play around and find a concentration that works for you. They also make citric acid powder for canning but have yet to test that stuff out yet.

Just something different from all the regular stuff you hear about.
 
I used white vinegar and toilet paper. Paper towels seem to leave the pattern of the divots and looks unnatural to me. The toilet paper kinda wrinkles up and leaves a nice pattern.





This is a 12, same method...



I did these the same night. I patted the vinegar on the paper while holding it on the Blade. I used rusty steel wool for the application. They sat til almost dry. Then scrubbed with mineral oil soaked rag.

I do agree with the acid, its real nice if you want a dark even finish.
 
NCSlice said:
I used white vinegar and toilet paper. Paper towels seem to leave the pattern of the divots and looks unnatural to me. The toilet paper kinda wrinkles up and leaves a nice pattern.





This is a 12, same method...



I did these the same night. I patted the vinegar on the paper while holding it on the Blade. I used rusty steel wool for the application. They sat til almost dry. Then scrubbed with mineral oil soaked rag.

I do agree with the acid, its real nice if you want a dark even finish.
Click to expand...

That looks nice!!
 
This is more white vinegar but a different method. I scrubbed it down with vinegar soaked paper towel, let it dry, repeat. It dries quick because its a light coat. Just kept it up over and over until I like it...

 
panchithatimus said:
Is it necessary for the vinegar to be hot? Can you use just plain old room temperature white vinegar?
Click to expand...
You can.
Other methods may give darker results more quickly. But any acid works.
I've started patina on carbon steel with mustard, ketchup, potato, grapefruit, 3 kinds of vinegar, both hot and cold, and combinations of the above.
Haven't picked a favorite.
All work. And after a couple years of mixed use, all tend to start to look similar.
 
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