"Guiding" patina?

[SVTFreak]

Not sure what to call it

I want to allow my knife (1095 gec) to form a natural patina without rust. How can I do that? I oil it well with white oil fairly often. It's used for everything including food. South Louisiana is hot and humid and sweaty so I don't want real rust to form. How often should I oil? It gets cleaned well usually before and after cutting food and oiled very quickly after that. Seems to be starting to develop a little bit of grey.

Am I on the right track?

It's amazing how fast rust pepper spots form. One day of sweating, it was still decently oiled and a spot formed. Didn't even leave my pocket that day.

 

[black mamba]

Yours is the exact situation that induces me to force a patina for protection. 15-30 minutes with some hot vinegar, dipping and wiping the blades, will get you what you want. Or a couple hours sticking the blades in an apple will do the same thing, but doesn't give as much control. Once that base layer of patina is present, simple use will smooth everything out and nobody will know the difference. I go with the protection of a forced patina on a sweaty user.

I used the vinegar on this one, and an interesting pattern turned out, completely by chance.

 

[r redden]

Jell in the picture it almost looks like Damascus.

 

[black mamba]

Yeah, I'm not sure how or why it happened, but it does look pretty good. I did the sheepfoot exactly the same way, and it looks normal. ???

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

A 'natural' patina will still happen, even if you force a patina initially. Giving it a boost at the beginning, under controlled conditions, simply helps the protective oxide form and protect the areas that might otherwise rust first (with the associated pitting), if just letting nature take it's course. I personally don't get why the worry over letting it only happen 'naturally'. The forced patina serves a useful and protective purpose, and it'll be gradually changed & replaced over time by all the things the knife gets used for, and exposed to. I'd prioritize protecting the steel first with a controlled patina, and then use the knife as you will. If the knife is getting used, especially with foods & such, the 'natural' patina will still happen, no matter what.

Below is a pic of my Opinel's 'carbone' blade. I'd originally dipped the blade into a 50/50 mix of white vinegar and hot water (~170°F), which left the blade very evenly BLACK. Since then, I've used it for fruits & such (peaches, most recently), which quickly began to replace the dark black with various shades of grey, blue and violet. The dark black adjacent to and within the letters of the OPINEL logo is what's left of the originally forced patina. Didn't take long to let the 'natural' fill in:



David

 

[mnblade]

I want to allow my knife (1095 gec) to form a natural patina without rust. How can I do that? I oil it well with white oil fairly often. It's used for everything including food. South Louisiana is hot and humid and sweaty so I don't want real rust to form. How often should I oil? It gets cleaned well usually before and after cutting food and oiled very quickly after that. Seems to be starting to develop a little bit of grey.

Am I on the right track?

It's amazing how fast rust pepper spots form. One day of sweating, it was still decently oiled and a spot formed. Didn't even leave my pocket that day.

As I've said before, I've had great luck with the Miracle Cloth. Rub down your knife each night and the Miracle Cloth will A) remove any micro-corrosion and pepper spots from that day, and B) leave a very thin layer of protection.

Also, it's a good idea to carry around a handkerchief or tissue or paper towel in your pocket, and occasionally wipe the blades on your knife. Keeping carbon steel DRY is more important that keeping it oiled, I've found.

Honestly, though, if I lived where you live I'd just do like this guy (and my grandfather, who worked out of doors in Miami for years and years and only carried carbon steel knives), and just stick that sucker in a potato.

A 'natural' patina will still happen, even if you force a patina initially. Giving it a boost at the beginning, under controlled conditions, simply helps the protective oxide form and protect the areas that might otherwise rust first (with the associated pitting), if just letting nature take it's course. I personally don't get why the worry over letting it only happen 'naturally'. The forced patina serves a useful and protective purpose, and it'll be gradually changed & replaced over time by all the things the knife gets used for, and exposed to. I'd prioritize protecting the steel first with a controlled patina, and then use the knife as you will. The 'natural' patina will still happen, no matter what.

David

This! A thousand amens to what David wrote. :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

-- Mark

 

[The Zieg]

As much as I try to rotate others into my edc, and as much as I love my SAK Trekker/GAK and Bucks, I keep coming back to two carbons, the Opinel N°10 and a Malanika puukko. I forced patina on the Opinel early on, boiling the blade in white vinegar until it was deep black. But I use my carry knives daily for opening bales, slicing cardboard boxes to recycling size, slicing apples, and other tasks that abrade the whole blade. The black Opinel lost its color within two days. It has reverted to this:

I've tried refreshing the forced patina, but it just doesn't keep. Now, I live in Colorado, where we max out at about 60% humidity in the rainiest seasons, and it's easy in my job to wipe a wet blade on my sleeve. So dry isn't a problem. But I think regular use is better for a keeping a carbon blade rust free than a forced patina. I also realize that before I found myself in this outdoor life as a career, I had to look for things to use my knives for and that a forced patina was in my knives' best interest.

Zieg

 

[Macchina]

On a user knife I have found to not worry too much about the little specs of rust that show up on a blade. I do occasionally put some mineral oil on the blade and scrape my nail across any specs of rust and if done somewhat regularly the specs will smooth out and you're left with standard patina (black instead of red corrosion) under the specs. What pits blades is leaving rust on them. Still, once you remove the red rust from a pit you just have a depression in the steel that doesn't hurt anything. On heavy users I don't mind the pits at all and if it's possible to wire brush the steel then you know all the red corrosion is gone and you're left with a perfectly acceptable piece of steel that will not continue to erode away. I like the look on older knives.

A few years back I bought got an 870 Remington shotgun for dirt cheap ($80 and it came with about $80 of ammunition) because it was left in damp case and had a lot of surface corrosion on the side of the receiver and barrel. A bit of wire brushing and some cold blue and the gun has worked like new for the past few years. Don't be afraid or rust, just take care of it when it occurs. The whole side of this receiver was red with rust. You couldn't even read the stamped model name...

 

[The Zieg]

That's good advice, above. I left an Opinel out in the snow all winter long one year (well, lent it to bro in law, who did, but my bad, right?), and I was shocked at how the rust cleared out with a scotchbrite pad. Now it has the rust free pitting you're going about. I'll get a pic in here sometime.

Zieg

 

[r redden]

I have a new Opinel # 6 That I'm going to tape a pattern on the blade and put it in a jar of vinegar just to see what happens. It may be a bit interesting. I'll post a picture when it's finished.

 

[Wurrwulf]

As a fellow South Louisianian, I understand all too well the effects of humidity on 1095. This is what my poor GEC 14 looked like after 3 days in my pocket working outdoors during the Summer. I just use Flitz to touch it up. My problem is more with spots that form in the well and the nail pulls/nicks. Those are a pain to take care of, in my opinion.

 

[fishcakes]

As a fellow South Louisianian, I understand all too well the effects of humidity on 1095. This is what my poor GEC 14 looked like after 3 days in my pocket working outdoors during the Summer. I just use Flitz to touch it up. My problem is more with spots that form in the well and the nail pulls/nicks. Those are a pain to take care of, in my opinion.

Thats just plain awful. Id be afraid to carry anything but stainless if my knife looked like that after just three days. And i agree about cleaning out the nail nick. Ive found that using one side of sak tweezers gets in there pretty well.

Any pics of the knife after removing the rust spots?

 

[Wurrwulf]

It's tough to get a good picture of this sort of thing using just a cell phone. You can still see where the pepper spots were after a quick Flitz polish. If I worked on it longer, it would look better, obviously. Thanks for the tip about the SAK tweezers, I'll try that.

It is a pain, especially because it's my "nice" knives that are 1095. I only have a couple CV Case knives, but CV doesn't pepper spot like this for me. If you aren't incredibly diligent about wiping down and oiling everyday (I'm not), you pretty much have to force a full blade patina. I haven't done that to any of my GECs, though.

 

[arrowhd]

A tooth pick works good to clean out the nail nick.

 

[mnblade]

If you aren't incredibly diligent about wiping down and oiling everyday (I'm not), you pretty much have to force a full blade patina. I haven't done that to any of my GECs, though.

Why not?

-- Mark

 

[fishcakes]

It's tough to get a good picture of this sort of thing using just a cell phone. You can still see where the pepper spots were after a quick Flitz polish. If I worked on it longer, it would look better, obviously. Thanks for the tip about the SAK tweezers, I'll try that.

It is a pain, especially because it's my "nice" knives that are 1095. I only have a couple CV Case knives, but CV doesn't pepper spot like this for me. If you aren't incredibly diligent about wiping down and oiling everyday (I'm not), you pretty much have to force a full blade patina. I haven't done that to any of my GECs, though.

That cleaned up pretty good though. I can understand itd go that fast in Louisiana. Im traveling through right now and its been incredibly humid these past 2 days.

 

[Wurrwulf]

Why not?

-- Mark

I guess I find a 5 minute Flitz session once or twice a week to be less of a chore than carrying around water, soap, mineral oil, and a couple of rags all day. Pepper spots form while I'm at work. Soapy water and mineral oil once a day isn't going to stop that.

My foray into GEC knives started at the beginning of this year, so maybe I'm in the wrong with how I treat my tools, but I'm of the mindset that I shouldn't have to pamper and baby a tool 24/7 to keep it in perfect working order. I don't think about resale on the knives I carry, so I'm not worried about someone wanting $xx off of my asking price because of the remnants of pepper spots.

 

[r redden]

It's tough to get a good picture of this sort of thing using just a cell phone. You can still see where the pepper spots were after a quick Flitz polish. If I worked on it longer, it would look better, obviously. Thanks for the tip about the SAK tweezers, I'll try that.

It is a pain, especially because it's my "nice" knives that are 1095. I only have a couple CV Case knives, but CV doesn't pepper spot like this for me. If you aren't incredibly diligent about wiping down and oiling everyday (I'm not), you pretty much have to force a full blade patina. I haven't done that to any of my GECs, though.

Shawn there was a thread recently about cleaning that type of rust and the OP was talking about the Super Eraser one place it's available is that South American River site. It's less than $10 so I thought what the heck at that price what have I got to loose. It works and works well. I don't like patina in most cases I like nice shiny steel so I clean and oil my knives obsessively I use a combination of Flitz and Mother's for polish I will also sand a blade with 1200 grit sandpaper if called for. Anyway just wanted to mention that Super Eraser to you.

 

[Wurrwulf]

Thanks, Randy. Sorry to hijack your thread, SVT.

I forced a patina using warm lemon juice on my Opinel No. 8, and I made a point to cut up a bunch of fruit with my CV Sodbuster Jr in order to get rust protection. Both have held up very well against rust formation. On the Sodbuster, it does not looked "forced", but the Opinel looks too uniform to be natural. If I used it more in the kitchen, though, I've no doubt that it would adjust and look more natural.

 

[Mumbojumboo]

Just use it and wipe it off. No need for anything special. Humans have been using steel for a long time. I can't imagine our grandfathers worrying much about it or taking pics of tools to put in the internet. It's just a knife. We've become pretty wimpy.


mumbo 4_10_16 by mumbojumboo, on Flickr