Natural patina on GB2 after one month of use. Forced patinas stay out!

A

AwayFromMySpydieHole

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Jan 30, 2017
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Figured I'd show you guys what the natural patina on m GB2 is looking like. Been carrying this knife for a little over a month. Mostly doing typical EDC tasks, and some food prep. (like cutting apples each day)

IMO, the patina that M4 gains is beautiful! There are a lot of different colors in there, dark greys all the way to bright blues.

Carbon steel has a certain walk and talk that SS will just never have. There's a soul in the patina that forms. Each one is different and tells a unique story!

This thread is dedicated to natural patinas of all types. We don't need no stinking forced patina in here!

Cheers guys. :D



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Very cool thread idea! I really dig the natural patinas as well, no two are the same. :thumbup:
 
A lot of natural patinas you see around here result from folks "accidentally" forgetting to clean their knives for awhile after they cut something acidic. I'd wager the majority of folks that are so enamored with the beauty of their patina that they are posting pics of it on knife forums have done something (or not done something) along the way to "help out" the process. I will unashamedly admit that I have anyway. :rolleyes:

Hehe, that's mostly a tongue in cheek response to the patina elitism theme...which I'm pretty sure was made in jest to begin with. Likely true though. Anyway, enough of my derailing...bring on the pics. Everybody likes a good looking natural patina. :cool::D
 
Surfingringo said:
A lot of natural patinas you see around here result from folks "accidentally" forgetting to clean their knives for awhile after they cut something acidic. I'd wager the majority of folks that are so enamored with the beauty of their patina that they are posting pics of it on knife forums have done something (or not done something) along the way to "help out" the process. I will unashamedly admit that I have anyway. :rolleyes:

Hehe, that's mostly a tongue in cheek response to the patina elitism theme...which I'm pretty sure was made in jest to begin with. Likely true though. Anyway, enough of my derailing...bring on the pics. Everybody likes a good looking natural patina. :cool::D
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Maybe I'm guilty of that, maybe I'm not.

In this thread, we don't let a little bit of facts and reality get in the way of our elitism though! :D
 
Surfingringo said:
A lot of natural patinas you see around here result from folks "accidentally" forgetting to clean their knives for awhile after they cut something acidic. I'd wager the majority of folks that are so enamored with the beauty of their patina that they are posting pics of it on knife forums have done something (or not done something) along the way to "help out" the process. I will unashamedly admit that I have anyway. :rolleyes:

Hehe, that's mostly a tongue in cheek response to the patina elitism theme...which I'm pretty sure was made in jest to begin with. Likely true though. Anyway, enough of my derailing...bring on the pics. Everybody likes a good looking natural patina. :cool::D
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100% agree. The only truly unintentional patinas I've seen in person have been Opinels. Heck, I was originally going to keep my Mantra 2 nice and shiny, but then some wild apples really did a number on the blade and I stopped being so meticulous.
 
Not as satisfying as the full blade patina of the SB Calys (which I forced and so won't post photos of here), but Hap40 is finally starting to get some (natural) color.

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Also a few spots on Air but tricky to photograph in bad lighting.

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& Jade PM2 has some natural color, too. Oldish photo for reference since I don't feel like going upstairs to get it and trying to take another photo in bad lighting.

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& Speaking of forced patinas, crinkle cut pickles make an interesting stripey pattern if you let them sit on a non-stainless blade. Photo from when I was experimenting with patinas and textures on Caly 3 SB.

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(Sorry :o)
 
I feel like not using some sort of protectant (oil, silicone, tuff cloth etc) on a steel like M4 is creating a "conducive environment" for a patina, not really forcing it but not taking precautions. A friend of mine had his third child in a similar manner but I digress...

I like the natural blue/grey tone that the Super series develops, not so much the spotty one that my M4 did. On my GB2 I ended up forcing it with vinegar and got it almost black, very uniform and almost looked like DLC.

Currently using a Rat-1 I D2 with no protectant, no patina so far after a couple weeks of fairly frequent use.
 
Knifeoholic said:
Here's a few of mine, sorry for the poor picture quality...



Gotta love that Super Blue spine patina!

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OMG!! Your edges aren't perfectly even your knife is garbage! You look like you used the blade how utterly n00b of you.

On the real though if I clean my knives after use they never seem to develop much patina. For the record if I wanted to force a patina how long do I leave the knife in vinegar, mustard, lemon juice or exposed to some such acidic material. If I an going to go for a natural patina how long is it safe to leave my knife uncleaned after I slice a few apples or oranges?

Sorry for the million questions but how is Hap40? I see it is very similar to M4 in composition except for the large ammount of cobalt. (I like steels I've tried that have cobalt in them. They all seem to want to take a screaming edge.)
 
Surfingringo said:
You know I like that hap40 regrind. ;)
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:thumbup: What a great idea! I posted pictures after doing it to give credit to the super smart fella that thought of it! :D
I EDC a Stretch most of the time, and my only complaint about it (in certain situations) was that it didn't do "inside out" or "upside down" cuts very well...... Problem solved! Absolutely love it! The pointier tip has proven itself quite useful as well, though I still really enjoy the drop point. Plus it just looks badass! It shall forever be known as the "Surfingringo Mod" ;). I'm tempted to try it on the new Stretch 2 as well.
 
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Lapedog said:
OMG!! Your edges aren't perfectly even your knife is garbage! You look like you used the blade how utterly n00b of you.

On the real though if I clean my knives after use they never seem to develop much patina. For the record if I wanted to force a patina how long do I leave the knife in vinegar, mustard, lemon juice or exposed to some such acidic material. If I an going to go for a natural patina how long is it safe to leave my knife uncleaned after I slice a few apples or oranges?

Sorry for the million questions but how is Hap40? I see it is very similar to M4 in composition except for the large ammount of cobalt. (I like steels I've tried that have cobalt in them. They all seem to want to take a screaming edge.)
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Sorry for my noob-ness. :D Excellent questions! Firstly, just for clarification of the whole forced vs natural patina thing, here is the way that I think of it. To me, a "forced" patina covers the whole blade and is usually very uniform, where as a "natural" patina is less uniform and usually has more colours and patters from the different items being cut. Again though, this is only my opinion. With that said, I've only ever forced patinas on a Kukri and some tomahawks. I've used both vinegar and mustard. As far as how long to leave them, I suppose it can vary depending on how dark you want the patina and what your using to make it. (Hopefully someone more knowledgable than I will chime in on this). As for natural patinas, I actually try to rinse them off right after using them, I just use them a lot. Also, some steels just seem to take on a patina much quicker than others.

As far as HAP40 goes, I absolutely love it! Probably my favourite steel at the moment. It doesn't seem to hold an edge quite as long as M4, but in my experience it's easier to sharpen, and it gets extremely sharp!

Hope that helps ya!
 
Thanks! Those are good answers. That is what I noticed about steels with cobalt in them, that they seem to want to take a screamin' edge fairly readily.

When I asked about the ammount of time to leave a blade in acidic medium I meant how long can I keave it in before I risk damaging the blade?
 
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