'Blade' magazine suggests mustard for your blades

[verax]

What kind of oil should I seal it with? Any suggestions?

 

[ddean]

Originally posted by ddean ...... (picture soon, before I overlay with another etch)

2nd treatment working now. Pix to follow.

Here's a quick pix after the first mustard treatment.
Evaporust made no difference in appearance.

 

[Red]

That looks pretty good, Dean. I can't see doing that to my new Kobra, I'll wait to try a Villiger Khukuri when I get one.

 

[Ripper]

That's looking real good.

 

[ddean]

Originally posted by verax
What kind of oil should I seal it with? Any suggestions?

Almost any oil or wax will work......
I think.
It may mix/combine/attach to the material of the patina/steel surface.
I think it's more than just a covering, but......

[For iron skillet 'seasoning' you create a carbon coating then add oil/grease
which I understand 'attaches' to the carbon,
this might be thought of as a patina of sorts,
the result is a surface coating that protects from rust somewhat
and also gives something of a non-stick surface,
if the cooking temperatures stay in a proper range.]

Come to think of it, I guess the patinas we're talking
about here is a carbon layer remaining after the iron portion
of the steel is removed by acid or oxidation,
so adding a lipid like oil/grease is going to work
as the skillet seasoning does.

Not an area I'm well versed in, but:

Usually I see recommended that one use a kitchen oil for blades to be used for food.
Or, for wax you could use almost anything.
Although I might hesitate to use floor or car wax on
a kitchen blade---other ingredients are unknown to me.

Renaissance Wax is well known and once dry would be food friendly.
Beeswax or parrafin or carnuba should work.

I'm rambling, sorry, tired

 

[Yvsa]

Originally posted by ddean
New to me!

I'll do a search.

here is one reference to the mayo finish. I know I described it once as well, but dayumed if I can find it.

 

[firkin]

Evaporust made no difference in appearance.

That's a good sign.

It seems a little tougher than I would have thought (though what I think is often worth little)--I evened things out a bit between applications by polishing with 0000 steel wool. I think the thinner the coating and the smaller the "peaks" the finer the pattern.

 

[ddean]

Originally posted by firkin
I think the thinner the coating and the smaller the "peaks" the finer the pattern.

Of course too thin, and there's not going to be
enough difference between the peaks and the valleys
to result in a pattern.

Maybe a sponge instead of fingers to make a smaller pattern.

 

[ddean]

Second treatment finished, but no change (after 7 hours).

I thought I had rinsed off the Evaporust well enough,
but I guess rinsing is not enough.

Scrub down with the Softscrub and try again.
Lesson learned.

But I now I can take a closeup of the first treatment.
Til then I'll put a placeholder pic.
------------------------------------

Uhhhhh........
Well.
Seems I have this distractability problem.
SoftScub'ed the blade & was getting ready to apply
the 2nd mustard for the 2nd time;
then some other ideas occured to me.

As a result (bottom line of a long story, with no point)
I ended up doing a lemon juice etch
of the whole side of the blade.

So it turned to all grey by the time I was done.
So Now I have the 1st etch working again on a lemoned grey base.
I used a heavy brass wire kitchen pot-scubber
to distribute the mustard over the blade--
much better for me than using my fingers.
Got a better distributed, smaller pattern, thinner application.

OK, here's the second time first treatment with mustard.
Before and after Softscrub cleaning.
Hard to see the pattern in SScrub cleaned area near handle,
so inset is enhancement of that area.
The pattern is basically the same all along the length of the blade.
Pix don't do it justice.
More pix of 2nd try of first treatment to follow soon.

 

[Daniel Koster]

Originally posted by ddean
Maybe a sponge instead of fingers to make a smaller pattern.

Excellent suggestion!