how'd you force a patina?

Mustard or Lemon juice.

Soaking a towel (paper or otherwise) in vinegar and then wrapping the blade is a good way to get a purty pattern.



This is a Hyde 510, wrapped overnight in a shop towel.

Done by my 7 year old. Scales too.

Is patina purely cosmetical or does it have a practical use?

P.B.Walsh said:

Is patina purely cosmetical or does it have a practical use?

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If you give a good long soak and have a thick even patina (an oxide coating) it will act as a slightly protective layer against corrosion.

...the primary function is to keep oneself from looking like a noob.

Cool, I'll have to try it out on the next one I make!

Unless you've got a specific pattern in mind, just using a carbon blade will create an interesting and unique patina. I just used my brand new Fiddleback Hiking Buddy to cut up a dozen lemons for lemonade and quartered some spare ribs. Went from shiny and bright to a slight dull gray. Looks great

I have made several swirled patterns by wrapping a blade in a muriatic acid soaked towel, rinsed, buffed, and repeated several times before neutralizing the acid with sodium bicarb, finding, drying, and giving a final oil. Really deep, dark, etch.

I like to microwave coke so it is about 120*-150*F. Suspend the blade in that for a while. Heating it seems to make it react better.

I don't worry about "forcing" a patina on carbon steel blades. I just use them for slicing fruits and vegetables and they develop one all on their own.

mdauben said:

I don't worry about "forcing" a patina on carbon steel blades. I just use them for slicing fruits and vegetables and they develop one all on their own.

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+1. Forcing a patina is like buying pre-ripped jeans. Marks you as a poseur.

Liver of sulphur

I left a carbon steel Mora sitting in a glass of grapefruit juice overnight. This gave it a nice even charcoal grey patina; but it wasn't very deep or very useful as a protective coating. It is now a mix of use patina (various spots from cutting things, rust) shinier spots from cutting fibrous things/having light surface rust cleaned off, and the original charcoal grey. I mainly use it as my gardening knife, some of the plants I cut with it etch the blade and apparently our soil is slightly acid since it will leave marks on the blade if not immediately cleaned off.

A nice long vinegar soak can also useful to get a look at the heat treat and remove surface rust.

I plunked this wee axe into a bath last night to illustrate:

Looks good Sam.

Deltaboy said:

Looks good Sam.

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Would you believe I found that while cleaning out a sinkhole full of garbage?

The bit is haaaaaaard. It will skate a file like Johnny Weir.

Piraticalbob said:

+1. Forcing a patina is like buying pre-ripped jeans. Marks you as a poseur.

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I'll agree. Some nice wear can look good on something, but to me its only good if the item has "earned" that wear.

Forcing a patina is like buying pre-ripped jeans. Marks you as a poseur.

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I agree in that I've always let it develop naturally - I like the look of doing it that way.

For steel, hang in a box above a bowl of bleach, observe often.
For brass, hang in a box above a bowl of ammonia.

DO NOT PATINA BRASS AND STEEL AT THE SAME TIME!

Depending on the size of the project, a foot locker on end works well.

The problem with liquids and pastes is that they can look splotchy and it is easy to tell. Vapors patina evenly and look authentic.

I disagree about forcing patinas being lame. I love wearing my Levis 501s to death and that's half the fun but when it comes to knives in my experience a patina that is forced can help prevent light rust.

I use my sodbuster Jr for food prep a lot and the occasional (inevitable) light rust gets cleaned off but without the deep, relatively even patina it seemed harder to clean off, as if the rust penetrated farther.

I like to "patina" carbon steel blades and French's yellow mustard is my choice.
I wipe the blade with Acetone to remove any oil/fingerprints, coat the blade with mustard and let set 15-20 minutes, Rince in VERY hot water,dry and repeat the process 3 or 4 times.

I use rust remover (naval jelly whatever) and a little bit of zinc added. For zinc I use either scraps of plated steel or hot dipped nails. You dont need a lot of zinc. The mix works fast but I do several reps with rinsing in water in between. Sorta like cold Parkerizing. Very durable finish and works fast so I watch it closely not to overdo it

On my smaller, traditional pocket knives, I just fill a cup with vinegar to the point it leaves nearly the whole blade submerged, and let it set overnight. The result is a blacker than night patina, that'll ward off rust like crazy. I've found the patina can "crawl" though, and usually I leave about half of the tang stamp exposed so, I don't corrode the bolsters. Opinels are awesome by the way, and everybody needs to try one IMO.