Carbon Blade Rust

[Memphis Tiger]

I keep picking up light rust on my carbon blade GEC's. Two questions:

1.) has anyone tried coating a carbon blade with super glue to seal the blade and block rust. Would that work? (Obviously leaving the edge exposed.)

2.) Suggestions on quality traditional folders with stainless steel?

Thanks.

 

[eschwebach]

I try to keep mine oiled with mineral oil (food safe version). Otherwise you can also force a patina which will help protect against rust. There a many ways to do this, vinegar, mustard, ketchup, sticking it in a potato overnight, etc... Lots of videos and posts about it.

Case makes a lot of stainless steel traditionals, Ka-Bar has some, the Northwoods Indian River Jack is CPM-154, and I just ordered a GEC #47 Viper in 440c.

I have not tried coating with super glue, but I know some guys use a wax to prevent rust when storing. Not sure how well it holds up while using.

 

[pinnah]

Suggest reposting in the Traditional forum where I think you'll find more experienced voices with carbon steel.

Are you getting rust when the knife is stored in when carrying your pocket.

For the former, I think the answer is coating the blades with oil or wax and finding a less humid storage place.

For the latter, different body chemistries seems to produce different amounts of salty, rusting sweat. Some people force rust faster than others. Allowing or forcing a patina of oxidation will help minimize surface rust. Warm vinegar and yellow mustard are one way of doing it. Use google's "site:bladeforums.com forced patina" to look for threads on the subject.

Opinel #8 by Pinnah, on Flickr

Still, some folks need stainless. Case, Queen, Canal Street, Northwoods all have stainless options (I believe) and will mostly competitive with GEC on styles. Again, you'll get much better feedback in the Traditional forum, so much so, I would suggest that you ask the mods to move this thread there.

 

[not2sharp]

I keep picking up light rust on my carbon blade GEC's. Two questions:

1.) has anyone tried coating a carbon blade with super glue to seal the blade and block rust. Would that work? (Obviously leaving the edge exposed.)

I haven't tried it. But, I would expect that it would exacerbate the problem by allowing rust to form under the epoxy where it would be hard to do anything about it.

n2s

 

[Horizon_Seeker]

I've tried this but with rather disappointing results. I just found an old knife that I tried this on last time I was rummaging through some old stuff and rust has formed underneath the sealant (I used a clear one so I can see the tang directly). I haven't decided how I'm going to remove the sealant and clean the rust yet.