Help! Bluing disaster!

K

K-Mcman

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Dec 3, 2021
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Hello my name is Kirk and I messed up pretty bad. Here is the rundown, I had two awesome decorative hatchets gifted to me by my wife, they had both got rust on them so I decided to fix them up, I decided to cold blue them. Here is where I screwed up, I assumed they were regular steel because they had rust on them, well turns out they were not. Now I have two hatchets that are patches of blue/green, silver, and little bits of black where the rust was removed. What can I do now? I have to fix them, they have a lot of meaning behind them, if I have to remove the heads and have them hot blued I'll do it, but I need the right plan.
 
You will need to buff/sand off all of the bluing with high grit sandpaper or really fine steel wool or scotchbrite (oil works nice when doing this). It’s slow and a little painful, but you said they’re decorative, so low grit sandpaper sounds like it’s not an option.

Then you need clean the HECK out of the surfaces. Like soap and water and sponge THOROUGHLY. Or alcohol soaked cloth, like, dripping-soaked. You absolutely must remove all the oils from the surface of the steel. Absolutely do not touch it with your hands.

Then you need to cold blue, ideally with a super super fine mist spray gun for a more even look. Wiping it on is always splotchy. It’s really hard to get a gorgeous finish with cold blue and that’s where hot blueing is a lot nicer… or parkerizing solution
 
RadialBladeworks said:
You will need to buff/sand off all of the bluing with high grit sandpaper or really fine steel wool or scotchbrite (oil works nice when doing this). It’s slow and a little painful, but you said they’re decorative, so low grit sandpaper sounds like it’s not an option.

Then you need clean the HECK out of the surfaces. Like soap and water and sponge THOROUGHLY. Or alcohol soaked cloth, like, dripping-soaked. You absolutely must remove all the oils from the surface of the steel. Absolutely do not touch it with your hands.

Then you need to cold blue, ideally with a super super fine mist spray gun for a more even look. Wiping it on is always splotchy. It’s really hard to get a gorgeous finish with cold blue and that’s where hot blueing is a lot nicer… or parkerizing solution
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So cold blue does nothing, and I figured out that the discoloration came from the rust remover that was on it, go figure. As you said I will need to remove what I can and retreat it with a better method designed for stainless steel.
 
You’re going to need to have a better idea of what type of metal you have there.
Typically speaking stainless won’t darken with cold blue.
On the other hand, typically, stainless won’t rust either.
 
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Also, welcome to the forums.
Please post a picture or two as well so we can see what you have there.
 
Cold blue is for touching up small spots.
Everyone has a "secret" method of applying it to make it look great. Trouble is, it doesn't. It stinks and in many cases it promotes rust. And it always looks like cold blue.
It sounds very much like your hatchets are chrome plated.
 
White vinegar will remove bluing and help return a patina. Or you can buy Birchwood Casey Bluing remover at a sporting goods store.
 
Ok, so I'm pretty sure it's stainless steel, I was able to remove most of the discoloration. There is still some patina left, but it may come off with some more elbow grease. Now for the bigger question, what are my options for darkening the blades? I know hot processing is probably the best option but is there any others? Also how do you post pictures?
 
Maybe I missed something but once you get all the discoloration off why not bring it to a polish and just protect the surface leaving it polished, you did say your initial problem was rust spots not color.
 
ANY bluing will not hold up well on a knife that is used. It's a microscopically thin coating that is soft.
The only way to darken steel and have it hold up for any length of time is nitriding.
Again- pictures will help us help you.
 
The axes are decorative and I don't know how to post a picture I tried to make a link on Google but the site did t allow me to, so if you could tell me how you post pictures I would be grateful.
 
If the steel truly is some form of stainless I'm not sure you can do much to chemically color it, at the same time nothing you have done chemically should have permanently discolored the metal. Some stainless steels will form patina spots, really poor grades may even form rust spots, the patina spots I've experienced on a few knives seem pretty much indelible, I consider that an "it is what it is" condition. Perhaps some form of electroplating might be an option.
 
K-Mcman said:
So cold blue does nothing, and I figured out that the discoloration came from the rust remover that was on it, go figure. As you said I will need to remove what I can and retreat it with a better method designed for stainless steel.
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Ah, yes, I should not have assumed it was carbon. As others have already mentioned, stainless will need to be either Cerakoted, PVD-coated, or DLC-coated. Cerakote is the easiest and cheapest, but least durable. If you can spend the money, you should shoot those heirlooms off to get a DLC coating, in my opinion
 
K-Mcman said:
The axes are decorative and I don't know how to post a picture I tried to make a link on Google but the site did t allow me to, so if you could tell me how you post pictures I would be grateful.
Click to expand...
You will need to put you pictures on an image hosting site. Imgur and post image seem to be the most popular here. While it is possible to host your pictures on google. It is very complicated to do so and probably not worth the trouble. (Google's fault.) Here are some links to threads on posting pictures. And another one.

O.B.
 
I post pics from my phone using an app called “Lower”. It’s “freemium” - it’ll make very low res pics for free or you can get “custom” sizes for $$. It’s a little buggy and there are adds but it works… good luck!
 
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