Rusting steak knives?

N

nadira

Joined
Jul 6, 2014
Messages
1
everytime i put the steak knives thru the dishwasher they come out with spots of rust, what can i do? thanks
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You could not put them in the dishwasher:thumbup:

Dishwashers are not meant for anything with an edge.
 
Hand wash, hand dry when finished. Dishwashers use heat to dry stuff, so your dishes are basically sitting in a steam bath for a while. That's just about the fastest way to get rust from normal water.
 
What kind of steak knives are they? While I agree with others that really no knives should go in the dishwasher, if they are stainless and still rusting badly it could be a sign of a poor heat treat.
 
Dishwasher detergent often contains an abrasive (To "Scrub" the food off of plates/bowls/etc.) and this can and will dull your knives as well. No knives that you value should go through the dishwasher, and also should not be placed in your Stainless Sink (I cringe inside every time I see someone place/toss a knife into the sink).
 
As others have asked, what kind? (i,e., what maker and what steel?)

As noted, the dishwasher is not appropriate for most nicer knives because it can tend to accelerate rusting and staining, can result in impact damage, and can ruin many handle materials like wood.

Bar Keeper's Friend is a light abrasive that will probably be the ideal choice for restoring the finish, but no one can say for sure until they know about the knives. BKF is very common for cleaning stainless kitchen appliances/tools such as stainless cookware, and IMO a must-have in every kitchen.
 
Bar Keeper's Friend is a light abrasive that will probably be the ideal choice for restoring the finish, but no one can say for sure until they know about the knives. BKF is very common for cleaning stainless kitchen appliances/tools such as stainless cookware, and IMO a must-have in every kitchen.
Click to expand...

I love BKF, and second pnsxyr
 
Apophis said:
What kind of steak knives are they? While I agree with others that really no knives should go in the dishwasher, if they are stainless and still rusting badly it could be a sign of a poor heat treat.
Click to expand...

Knives rust in the dishwasher because of the extended exposure to heat, water and the caustic (strong alkaline) cleaning chemicals used in automatic dishwasher detergent; sort of a 'triple whammy' for corrosion. The caustic action of the detergent, heat and water is also what will frost or etch glassware in the dishwasher. Some low-quality 'stainless' steels will rust more due to lower chromium content (chromium at levels at ~12% or more is what makes it 'stainless' in the first place), and some older 'stainless' kitchenware relied more upon chrome plating than a true 'stainless' chemistry. On those older ones, if the plating started chipping or eroding away, the steel underneath would start rusting like any regular carbon steel.

Heat treat is insignificant, when talking about kitchenware anyway. High-carbon steels at higher hardness can be more prone to corrosion than the same steels at lower hardness, but run-of-the-mill stainless steak knives won't have that much carbon or be hardened enough to implicate heat treat as an issue.

Rust spots on relatively modern stainless can be polished off with Flitz/Simichrome or any similar polishing pastes. Bar Keepers Friend will work too; in fact, light rust spots can be virtually wiped off, by using a paste of BKF powder mixed with water, and a Q-Tip. Dab a little of the paste on the spot, wait 30-60 seconds, and wipe it off. There is some abrasive in BKF, but the oxalic acid in the product is what really gets the work done, by chemically dissolving the iron oxide 'rust'. BTW, this same method with BKF works great on the 'rusty' spotting on plates/china/stoneware, left by wet utensils laying on them in the bottom of the sink.


David
 
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