Etching my 9 with Celtic pattern for St. Patrick's Day! More pics added!

Ethan Becker said:
Really nice job....... I like it a lot.....

Ethan
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Thank you as well for the "canvas", Uncle E.

dynamicmoves said:
The updates are here!
Looks great.
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NathanJ said:
That came out great, nice job!
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keroscene said:
I like that design a LOT! Very nice ;)
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Chalet said:
That looks fantastic! Nicely done sir. Impressive.
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Darksidedenny said:
That came out pretty nice,good job,great tutorial,thanx
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Dexwithers said:
That's so cool Granite! Came out awesome looking.
Great job man. :)
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Thank you, everyone. This community is such a great group of people....normally I'm not the kind of person who likes to say "look at what I did!", but you folks are all so supportive (read: "enablers") that I can't not share.
tjswarbrick said:
Perhaps not perfect, but it looks awesome.
Keep us posted after you beat on it a bit - I think those minor blemishes will blend right in as the blade starts to show patina and use.
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"the beatings will continue until morale improves" actually kind of makes sense in this forum. I find some beating always improves my morale....so long as I'm not the one getting the beating ;).
 
Looks good, granite! Electo-etching seems to be the way to go. Chemical takes forever to get a nice deep etch.
 
granitestateofmind said:
Thank you for your anticipation and kind words....now some pics of the process and the final results. I'll be self critical and say that it didn't come out perfect....but I'm still pretty damn happy that it turned out at all, and decent enough for photos.

Tried out a new method for a little more coverage...some cotton rounds wrapped around a little piece of Micarta daizee kindly sent me for another project. Worked OK, but messier than Q-tips (and I am using Q-tip® brand swabs):



Went back to Q-tips to make sure the etch was fairly uniform:



Then on to the AC, won't bore you with the details, but this is what it looked like before the rinse:



Rinsed it under some plain water as I didn't want the vinyl to lift. I could see some imperfections, but it looked pretty good and I decided I didn't want to make it worse trying to make it look better, which totally goes against my semi-AR approach to these sorts of things. It was hard to tell if I'd etched deep enough, but I grabbed a pair of tweezers and started unmasking....lo and behold, it was looking pretty cool. So....the moment you've been waiting for:



Definitely some imperfections, the etch got under the vinyl in one or two spots and the AC blacken is not as even as I hoped it'd be. Still, I decided it was time to put on the neused Micarta I got off the exchange and take some photos:



Decided that if the 9 and 16 were going to be riding around together, I ought to take the Micarta off my 5 and dress up the 9's partner in....the woods.



Closeup showing some of the uglier spots, but what the hell. Once I spend some time beating on that 9, who's gonna notice it?



And one last one...'cause it's my thread and I can post what I please:



Now I'm really looking forward to some nice weather as I received the sheath in the dead of winter and haven't carried it....my family gives me funny enough looks with my other steel, much less me walking around the house (or the neighborhood!) with a 9 and a piggybacked 16 strapped to my belt. Here's to the arrival of Spring!

Go n-éirí an bóthar leat
Go raibh an ghaoth go brách ag do chúl
Go lonraí an ghrian go te ar d'aghaidh
Go dtite an bháisteach go mín ar do pháirceanna
Agus go mbuailimid le chéile arís,
Go gcoinní Dia i mbos A láimhe thú.
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Very very cool!! Can't help but notice that awesome patina on the 16 as well. Have you made a thread chronicling that mod? I'm very curious to know how you got that design.
 
Hey Mike that looks really awesome. I like it.

Might I suggest: In order to prevent bleeding of the etch next time, why don't you create a negative of the image to be etched, put it where you want it, then use nail polish to create the barrier by prefilling in the negative space. Then trim up the edge of the postive pace parts of the barrier with a razor blade to clean up the lines. Then take the cut of the actual image to be etched lay it over the barrier like you did, and start your etch. Might take twice as long but I think you'll avoid bleeding next time.

I think that makes sense.
 
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granite, quick tip if you want to try it: give it a very light sanding with a high grit piece of paper, say over 800-1000. You would be amazed at the amount of tiny blems it takes away. Careful in the mid if you want to keep the darker look in the center, but it will clean up plenty at corners and lines. One direction only, from ricasso to tip.

And grind down the hump :D
 
Tdhurl1103 said:
Hey Mike that looks really awesome. I like it.

Might I suggest: In order to prevent bleeding of the etch next time, why don't you create a negative of the image to be etched, put it where you want it, then use nail polish to create the barrier by prefilling in the negative space. Then trim up the edge of the postive pace parts of the barrier with a razor blade to clean up the lines. Then take the cut of the actual image to be etched lay it over the barrier like you did, and start your etch. Might take twice as long but I think you'll avoid bleeding next time.

I think that makes sense.
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Thanks for the compliment. The nail polish is a good idea, I'm just not gonna do it. The reason(s) that the etch got under the vinyl in a couple spots are easily remedied (a little more care and planning before cutting, better blade prep) and this was a learning experience anyway. I The method itself works really well and the vinyl works better than I'd hoped (it's made for those Cricut machines); the parts I didn't screw up came out sharp and overall I'm happy with the result. One of the things that the nail polish method wouldn't solve is the few places I didn't blacken as uniformly as I wanted (that's what stands out the most to me) - and I may be able to fix that anyway by re-masking it and hitting it again with the AC. I'm gonna leave it for now, though, and try some other stuff - like the other side of the blade, for one. It's looks good from one side, but it's like one of those hairdos from the 80's - it only looks good from one side.

zuluninja said:
granite, quick tip if you want to try it: give it a very light sanding with a high grit piece of paper, say over 800-1000. You would be amazed at the amount of tiny blems it takes away. Careful in the mid if you want to keep the darker look in the center, but it will clean up plenty at corners and lines. One direction only, from ricasso to tip.

And grind down the hump :D
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Leave my hump alone. I like it, it's one of the things that made the 9 stand out in the first place (it's my first Becker). IMO it give the knife a very distinct character, and it doesn't impede the use of it (for me, anyway)

Thanks for the sanding idea, I could use an aluminum sanding block to make sure the sandpaper stays on the lands and out of the etch...I think next time I will probably prep with sandpaper rather than just cleaning alone.
 
very cool indeed. nice job. i know for sure that i would eff that up if i tried it.
 
well, you can wrap the paper over anything rigid and flat like a piece of wood.
 
That's awesome looking. I never thought about etching an actual pattern onto a blade. That's super cool.
 
Swampdog said:
Good job, I really like everything you did to it... excellent sheath!
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Thank you. Sheath is an Azwelke...I highly recommend their work.
Cryptyc said:
That's awesome looking. I never thought about etching an actual pattern onto a blade. That's super cool.
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That's funny, since the first I got set up to do it, that's all I've been thinking about. But it took me a while to work up the stones to remove steel from an otherwise perfectly functional knife.
Ray Settanta said:
Very good work. Looks great!
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Thanks, Ray!
 
That turned out great bud!!

For me, Its hard to get the entire image to come out the same depth and darkness, i have yet to get a "perfect" etch.

But i think yours came out great, and after a little use, when a bit of patina forms, you want even notice where it bled through.

It looks great now, but after you scratch it up some more i bet it looks even better!!
 
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