# Maintenance



## Shin71 (Sep 3, 2010)

What can you use to clean up the blade of your knife without scratching it; will 000 steel wool work?


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## David43515 (Sep 3, 2010)

If iit`s bare steel (ie: not coated) steel wool is fine. I`d try a scotchbrite pad and a little WD-40 for most things. In the army my dad said he always used oil and a sliver of wood to clean light rust off rifles w/o marring the finish.

What are you trying to clean off? A little rust? Tree sap? Sometimes if they`re just dirty and gunky the right solvent will pretty much disolve stuff without you having to do much scrubbing at all.


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## jks9199 (Sep 3, 2010)

It'd help if you'd describe both what you're trying to clean and the finish on the blade.  Generally, a paper towel or cloth and some honing oil will clean lots of stuff off without damaging the blade.  If it's more aggressive, try Brasso or Flitz polishes; you can use these with a cloth or 000 steel wool.


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## Bruno@MT (Sep 3, 2010)

Also keep in mind that if your knife is carbon steel and you use it regularly, it is better to let it develop a natural patina. It will act as a shielding against real rust. Of course it will not prevent rust, but it will slow it down and prevent pitting from small droplets if you don't wipe it dry immediately.


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## Shin71 (Sep 3, 2010)

David43515 said:


> If iit`s bare steel (ie: not coated) steel wool is fine. I`d try a scotchbrite pad and a little WD-40 for most things. In the army my dad said he always used oil and a sliver of wood to clean light rust off rifles w/o marring the finish.
> 
> What are you trying to clean off? A little rust? Tree sap? Sometimes if they`re just dirty and gunky the right solvent will pretty much disolve stuff without you having to do much scrubbing at all.


 
I picked up a nice Cold Steel "Hunter" from a garage sale.  Someone tried usind a griding wheel to sharpen it and I dont know what to the body of the blade (sandpaper?).  It looks rough and I would like to try and clean it up before hunting season and then make it razor sharp; that is where I am going with this.

I should have put more detail in to the post, sorry.


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## lklawson (Sep 8, 2010)

Shin71 said:


> I picked up a nice Cold Steel "Hunter" from a garage sale.  Someone tried usind a griding wheel to sharpen it and I dont know what to the body of the blade (sandpaper?).  It looks rough and I would like to try and clean it up before hunting season and then make it razor sharp; that is where I am going with this.
> 
> I should have put more detail in to the post, sorry.


As has been seen earlier, for general "cleaning" a lot depends on what finish is already on the blade (mirror?, gloss?, matte?, epoxy/paint?) and what material is being removed (rust?, glue?, etc.).

But it sounds to me like you aren't in need of "cleaning" the blade so much as re-finishing/re-polishing the blade.

It still depends on what sort of finish you want to put on it but it's all going to start the same.

For large scratches and gouges, you're going to start with a light sandpaper.  Maybe 400 or 600 grit.  Do this by hand, not by dremel unless you've got a lot of experience.  Sand the affected area until it is as smooth as that grit will allow.  Then move to a finer grit.  You may move all the way through 400, 600, 1000, 1200/1500, Wet-Dry, etc.  Once you have a nice smooth matte/semi-polished surface you may choose to use an epoxy refinish on the blade at that point.  Something like Duracoat is popular as are it's competitors.  Some folks will have it powder-coated.  You can also choose to move on to polish.  There are different polishing compounds.  White and Red compound or "Jeweler's Rouge" seem to be the most popular.  If you're careful you can use machine assist for this.  You can polish from a deep shine to a mirror finish at this point.

I've also had good luck using something like Metal Glo at the matte stage.  Metal Glo on a Scotch-bright (plastic) pad can do really well at this point.

For a working knife, I'd say you should be fine stopping with matte finish.

If the gouges are really bad from the grinder you may need to use progressively finer files and then stones or perhaps very coarse sand-paper to start with.

Peace favor your sword,
Kirk


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