How to preserve an old knife.

Q

Quartermaster

Joined
Dec 4, 2011
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Hey guys, I received my grandpas old hunting knife for my birthday, and I want to preserve it so it can be in be in the family for years to come. I do not want to make it like new or use it just stop the deterioration of it. The knife is in pretty bad condition and is from sometime between 1950-1965. I did some research on it and it is a high carbon knife, full tang, and for reference it looks like a shrunken down drop point buck 119(It is not buck). Any feed back to stop the rust and or deterioration would be great.

Thanks
 
Id clean all the rust off and then oil it occasionally to prevent more rust from forming.
 
I'd get some flitz and polish it up, then apply a thin coating of mineral oil to prevent rust.
 
Please, please, please do not polish off that patina. Grampa put that on there when he was hunting. Its part of him.

Keep a light coat of mineal oil on the blade, don't store it in the sheath.

That's all you need to do other than treasure it.
 
marcinek said:
Please, please, please do not polish off that patina. Grampa put that on there when he was hunting. Its part of him.

Keep a light coat of mineal oil on the blade, don't store it in the sheath.

That's all you need to do other than treasure it.
Click to expand...

^+1. metal polish will remove the patina and the history that went along with it.

quartermaster, post a pic of the knife.
 
I'd recommend a paste wax like Renaissance wax. It will seal the blade off. While you are rubbing the wax in you will notice it does a bit of polishing and a bunch of gunk will come off onto the rag. I've taken old pocket knives with some tarnish and made them look like new with just a good rubbing and waxing.

If the rust is a bigger problem I'd use a good oil on it, then clean it off paper towel dry before waxing. I have knives that have kept years in the house with just that one coat of wax. There are thinner, liquid spray on waxes available for situations where striations, grooves or whatever makes the paste wax hard to apply over everything. It takes longer to dry, and isn't as pretty looking as paste wax but it works as well.
 
Good info here - I have an old Finnish hunting knife that is probably more than 50 years old. I plan to use it occasionally, carefully, and keep it for future generations. Will try also to come up with some sort of "aged" leather sheath.

Steve
 
I might have misread the original post, I thought rust was an issue. If there isn't any rust then just apply a thin coating of mineral oil, keep it out of humid environments for extended periods and you're good to go.
 
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