New and Really Need Some Help

S

SuckLead

Joined
Jul 28, 2007
Messages
18
Hi all. So glad I found this forum! I just signed up and I am hoping someone here can help me save my favorite knife!

I like knives, but I will admit I am a newbie and know very little about them. But I am very willing to learn. Especially now.

About a week ago my purse got soaked in the rain. And when I say soaked, I mean it couldn't have gotten wetter if I'd tossed it in a lake. I always carry my favorite knife with me in my purse because it always comes in handy when I get myself in screwy situations. It is a CRKT Desert Cruiser.

I got stuck in the rain and when I returned home I was so concerned about the shotgun I'd been carrying that I forgot all about my poor knife. Well, I was talking to someone about this brand of knife today and I suddenly remembered it was in there. I pulled it out and...

Rust. Everywhere. This poor knife has seen every possible horror I could put it through and I have always been able to fix it. I am reasonably sure it didn't completely rust out because I'd coated it with a Tuff Cloth not too long before I hit the woods. But here's the trouble:

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It functions wonderfully still and has a fresh coat of grease on the moving parts. It still makes a weird half click half grind sound though. Can my knife be saved, and if so how do I go about saving it?

My knife supplies at home right now consist of only a Sentry Solutions kit (with the mini sharpener, Tuff Cloth, grease, and some cleaning swabs) and a set of large Lansky crock sticks.

Please help if you can. I would greatly appreciate it!
 
I would do the same with a few drops of oil to help lift the rust off and smooth the finish.....

I am not sure of the scales material but I would use a can of carb cleaner on the knife it they are metal or a material able to stand the chemical assault. You will need to lube it after the carb cleaner as the cleaner will remove all oil and grease. That should clean out any rust or dirt in the knife.
 
Looks like light surface rust, hit it with the scotch brite pad and WD40 or oil as already suggested. I think you will get most if not all of the rust off.
 
try some fine 0000 steel wool with some wd 40. this might remove the rust without messing up the finish. if a gun has light rust, i do the same thing to remove the rust.
 
richard j has the right approach. Give it a go and it should fix things right up.
 
Welcome to the forum, Sucklead,

As the others said, I think WD40 or, better yet, a light oil and fine or finer steel wool will take care of the rust. For the pivot area, flood with WD40 followed by compressed air, as much as it takes to get it smooth. Sounds like you may have some gunk in there. If you can, and you're daring, take the pivot apart (or at least loosen it) to flush it. If it's rust in the pivot area, you should take it apart to smooth that area down, otherwise it will just cause wear on the washers.
 
tuff cloth might work I use a silicone cloth you can find at a local gun shop and it works great to remove surface rust. I would also suggest taking the knife completely apart for a full cleaning.
 
Welp, that looks cosmetic to me. It isn't hurting anything and if you keep it dry it won't progress. If you try to sand it off you may create an even worse cosmetic issue by removing the finish coating. Maybe just use a metal polish to lightly abrade and polish off the stain.
 
Thanks everyone! I don't trust myself to take it apart and get it back together again correctly, so I may be taking it to a pro to clean out the guts. It's probably due for a good cleaning anyway, it doesn't appear that it's previous owner treated it too well. The Tuff Cloth got the crust off, but the rust itself is still there. I am mostly worried about weakening the blade so I'd like to get it off. But I'll hitting the local hardware store this weekend and getting some goodies to clean it.
 
Likes others have said,some oil soaked 0000 still wool,with light pressure will usually knock off light rust with out doing much damage to the finish.
I wouldn't worrie too much about the pivot,unless it was really ruff after a good cleaning and oil.
 
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