Media Hot Vinegar Patina

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Justin0505

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I've heard folks mention giving new carbon knives a rinse under hot water or vinegar to reduce reactivity, but I never thought of a full immersion in boiling vinegar: [video=youtube_share;DRtEPDzCa2A]http://youtu.be/DRtEPDzCa2A[/video]
- Interesting the way that the vinegar starts to foam and bubble after a few minutes. The first time I saw that, I woulda chickened and yanked my knife out.

I like the results. More pictures here:
http://www.lewisrazors.com/#/41-gallery/
and:
http://www.straightrazordesigns.com...-shop/charlie-lewis-razors/sold-razor-gallery

Have any of you straight razor junkies out there uses any of his work / heard reviews? I really like his style.
 
Have any of you straight razor junkies out there uses any of his work / heard reviews? I really like his style.

Yes, I do have a few razors from Charlie.
Stellar stuff, his work on steel is up there with the very best of them.
His design style is very unique and out of the box.
A Lewis razor is a true work of art in my book:)
 
I've got a Tojiro ITK petty that is getting an overhaul, I think I'll try that tomorrow to see what happens.

Thanks for the nudge....................

R
 
Yes, I do have a few razors from Charlie.
Stellar stuff, his work on steel is up there with the very best of them.
His design style is very unique and out of the box.
A Lewis razor is a true work of art in my book:)

Cool! Good to hear. Ive been thinking about getting into the straight razor world for years, but just never pulled the trigger because all of the really cool stuff that ive liked has been $1000.... But the prices on Lewis's work seems like a bargain for cool-looking hand-forged stuff.
 
I gave this a shot with my Fowler custom poultry killer. I had mirror polished it, but lost the hamon in the process. The chicken & turkey patina wasn't particularly pretty, so I stripped it off and started with clean steel.
I really should have broken out the DSLR to shoot the video, my phone just doesn't handle color on reflective objects very well. The etch / patina is actually much darker than it appears in the videos. I'd say that they pre-cleaned etch is like 85% black. The finished result (after 3 cycles of etch & clean) is a dark, rich silver grey. Call it maybe 50-60% grey. Kind of like the dark grey metalic finish that you see on some cars.
The main thing though is that it REALLY brought out the contrast in the steel. Not only is the hamon clearly visible, you there are all of these little "waves" that run parallel along the blade road. I don't know how clear they are in the video, but they are pretty obvious in person, even after sharpening and polishing the bevel.

Here's the bath:
[video=youtube_share;_MAAaX81iPQ]http://youtu.be/_MAAaX81iPQ[/video]

Here it is right out of the first etching bath and pre-cleaning. -It was BLACK.
[video=youtube_share;LLpfImZ3Fco]http://youtu.be/LLpfImZ3Fco[/video]


After 3 etching and cleaning (w/ steel wool, water, paper towel) cycles. The finish didn't get much darker, but it did get much more even after each round:
[video=youtube_share;l_r3_lB9XnE]http://youtu.be/l_r3_lB9XnE[/video]


After polishing the bevel (w/ j-nat) and sharpening. Again the video doesn't really do it justice; in person, the contrast between the first plane and the blade road/bevel is very high. The first plane or side of the knife where you can see the hamon is dark metalic grey and the bevel is a silver, misty mirror polish.
[video=youtube_share;m5B6Ily4J4c]http://youtu.be/m5B6Ily4J4c[/video]
 
So here's one I did this morning with a Tojiro ITK petty that I had removed the kuro-uchi finish and polished to about 2000. This was 3 trips through the bath, rinsing and cleaning after each with some 0000 steel wool.

I saw another video that added a few drops of dishwashing liquid to reduce surface tension, may try that on the next one, but not sure how it will do with boiling vinegar........

IMG_1193.JPG
 
Looks cool! That ITK petty is a great little knife. Did the etch smooth out the rough, sand-blasted area above the edge or make it deeper?

It will be interesting to see how this finish holds up in use and what it does to reactivity.
 
That is really cool! Why did the table of the blade near the spine etch to match the blade road? Was it finished differently?
 
Looks cool! That ITK petty is a great little knife. Did the etch smooth out the rough, sand-blasted area above the edge or make it deeper?

It will be interesting to see how this finish holds up in use and what it does to reactivity.

I didn't polish all of that out, and you can see it if you look close. The etch didn't do anything to it except maybe even out the color.
 
That is really cool! Why did the table of the blade near the spine etch to match the blade road? Was it finished differently?

Eamon,

Nothing different about the areas, all done the same. It really looked weird before I buffed off the black, quite the contrasting colors........ You'll have to tell me why it did that, I don't know. Is that where it's folded over itself? Maybe the HT makes that thicker area different?
 
I have another Tojiro ITK 150 petty that I'm going to polish up and etch, maybe try something different with this one. If it goes well, the next will be the 210 gyuto, with a rehandle.
 
And I should have clarified that the 2000 polish mentioned earlier is P2000, not JIS2000.

R
 
is 'etching' a functional patina? as in does it work to reduce reactivity? i ask because i am seeking the best way to patina for maximum blade protection. i dont care how it looks.
 
is 'etching' a functional patina? as in does it work to reduce reactivity? i ask because i am seeking the best way to patina for maximum blade protection. i dont care how it looks.

I acid etched my Konusuke Fujiyama yanagiba and the white #1 doesnt react at all now. The blade is definitely duller with a blue hue to it, but I can cut through citrus or any of the lilies and it never reacts. I noticed it doesnt really rust anymore either. I had a really busy night on the line and left a it of water on it without realizing. As soon as I realized what I did, I dreaded the rust that I knew was going to be there. But there was no rust, I just wiped it down, dried it off and it looked the same as before.
 
that's exactly what i want, how do i go about doing that?


I did it a completely different way than what it is posted here. I heated up some cider vinegar and then soaked a cloth in it. I then wrapped that around the blade and wrapped rubber bands around it to hold it tight. I left it like that for about an hour, then I cleaned the blade off and repeated everything again. Because of the cloth, it ended up having a really cool pattern on the blade. I assume that you can use different texture cloth for different patterns.
 
is 'etching' a functional patina? as in does it work to reduce reactivity? i ask because i am seeking the best way to patina for maximum blade protection. i dont care how it looks.
The only time that I was satisfied with the reactivity of the cladding on the zakuri that I had was after a few trips through a hot vinegar bath. After which the reactivity was little to none.
 
The original Fowler honesuki that I hot vinegar patina'ed is still goin strong with not even a hint of rust despite long sessions being coated in chicken carnage. I also just gave a new shig a few soaks in hot vinegar and I've had 0 reactivity issues.
If you really want a deep, long lasting finish, its important to clean the loose black oxide off the the blade in between baths. While the vinegar is re-heating, I first rins the blade under clean water and scrub with a rag and dish soap, then I lay it flat and use 00 steel wool and finally a thorough rub-down with paper-towel and acetone to remove any debris and oil before returning it to the bath.
 
The original Fowler honesuki that I hot vinegar patina'ed is still goin strong with not even a hint of rust despite long sessions being coated in chicken carnage. I also just gave a new shig a few soaks in hot vinegar and I've had 0 reactivity issues.
I love to see picture of your hot vinegar etched shig if is possiable...:knife:
 
I don't have any pics of the new nakiri yet, but here's my old gyuto that was done with the circuit board etchant
20120301-IMG_0082.JPG

IMG_0107.JPG

The etching solution creates much greater contrast between the metals, where the hot vinegar leaves a less obvious, more natural look that's closer to the contrast created by the polish that the shigs come with.
Neither the hot vinegar nor the etching acid impart any color. The color down near the edge you see in the pics came from where the etched layer was thinned due to sharpening and thinning and a natural patina took root. The etched metal is still just slightly reactive and it will take on some colors over time, just much, much slower than un-etched.
 
I decided to try this today on a couple of my Masakage knives, my petty and gyuto. I found out that the vinegar bath stripped off the finish on the petty so now it's completely naked. I kind of like it though. I think the gyuto came out the best. Really like the contrast in the transition and I noticed on the gyuto that you can see the metal grains on the cladding pretty well.

Gyuto
IMG_1462_zpsb3ac8cd1.jpg

IMG_1460_zpsc0245965.jpg


Petty
IMG_1464_zps9b1cdc60.jpg

IMG_1465_zps5eaf1ccf.jpg


This is a fun way to get a cool effect on your knives for very little work.
 

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