- Joined
- Sep 27, 2004
- Messages
- 3,041
Those lines are the transition points between differing crystalline structures in the steel that are caused during heat treating. When a blade is heat treated under the right circumstances, you end up with differing hardnesses in the steel, with a hard edge, and a soft spine. Those differing harness structures polish and etch at different rates, allowing a knifemaker to acentuate those zones and transitions through etching, polishing, etc. The transistions on this particular knife were very very subtle above the main transistion line (the lower one). As a result, it required a very delicate polishing and etching process. The finish that resulted was beautiful, but was very fragile. Since the transistions above the main transistion line were so subtle, something as simple as pulling it in and out of a sheath or cutting cardboard would have deteriorated that delicate pattern. The result would have been a blade that lacked the beautiful pattern AND looked worse than if the whole blade was polished to a shine....not sure if that helps...