Visible grooved patterns on non-Damascus knife, good or bad?

cotdt

cotdt

Joined
Oct 2, 2006
Messages
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While cleaning the patina off a 52100 blade, I noticed this pattern on the side, bumpy and clearly visible:

Edit: Posted a picture in Post #3.

Is the steel defective?
 
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Is that the right picture ?? If it's a blade why pearlite instead of martensite ? If those white areas are carbides you have crappy steel , if they are ferrite you have big decarburization problems.
It should be moved to Knifemaker's section.
 
mete said:
Is that the right picture ?? If it's a blade why pearlite instead of martensite ? If those white areas are carbides you have crappy steel , if they are ferrite you have big decarburization problems.
It should be moved to Knifemaker's section.
Click to expand...

That was just a google picture because I was too lazy to take a real picture. Here is the real picture:

mule52100.jpg


The patterns showed up when I started to polish the knife. It was over the entire blade on both sides. Some of it I managed to polish out but it's deep. Is there anything wrong with the steel?
 
Typical appearance of a blade that has decarb that hasn't been completely removed.Those are not "grooved " patterns .There is a pattern of parallel lines sometimes but that is 'alloy banding' which occurs sometimes with certain steels.
 
Yup it's defective and you should send it to me :D

Seriously I doubt anything is wrong and its just a carbonization issue.

Sweet polished edge on that thing!
 
Nice edge on that Cotdt! Looks good.

I've seen that on a lot of older style carbon steel blades that aren't highly or mirror polished and get tarnished/dirty/oxidized, whatever it is.

If the edge is performing as it should, and I imagine it is or you wouldn't put that good of a job on the edge, stop worrying.

You can clean it off the normal ways and continue using it, or leave it as it is, and continue using it. I usually clean my old carbon steel knives up out of boredom more than a real feeling they need it.
 
mete said:
Typical appearance of a blade that has decarb that hasn't been completely removed.Those are not "grooved " patterns .There is a pattern of parallel lines sometimes but that is 'alloy banding' which occurs sometimes with certain steels.
Click to expand...

That explains a lot of things, thanks for the info. It's the first time I've ever noticed this so I was worried for a moment.

lazerboy2000 said:
Yup it's defective and you should send it to me :D

Seriously I doubt anything is wrong and its just a carbonization issue.
Click to expand...

The Mastiff said:
Nice edge on that Cotdt! Looks good.

I've seen that on a lot of older style carbon steel blades that aren't highly or mirror polished and get tarnished/dirty/oxidized, whatever it is.

If the edge is performing as it should, and I imagine it is or you wouldn't put that good of a job on the edge, stop worrying.

You can clean it off the normal ways and continue using it, or leave it as it is, and continue using it. I usually clean my old carbon steel knives up out of boredom more than a real feeling they need it.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I keep all my edges polished to prevent rusting. The sides still rust very easily so I'm preparing it for a nickel plating.

The knife does perform well so I guess nothing is wrong with it! I've been using the knife to cut fiberglass and it holds up an acute 10° degrees per side edge that bites right into the fiberglass. Of course the fiberglass wears out any knife so that's why Mule owners can notice that 3mm of steel is gone. I don't care, it sharpens real fast for a 62 rc knife.

It took a while to remove the decarb lines but they are finally gone now, and I will proceed to the nickel plating:

mule521002.jpg
 
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