All About Pocket Knives

I've been reading all the old forced patina posts but can't find whether you immerse the whole knife to protect the tang and springs too or if that's a bad idea.
If not, how to protect the tangs under the bolster and springs on the inside of the handle?
If vinegar patina protects from rust then I'm guessing the whole knife can be immersed in it and blown dry after.
Has anyone ever immersed the whole closed folder in vinegar or anything else?
What happens if you soak a blade in vinegar for too long?
Any patina accidents out there that I can benefit from knowing about? (sorry about that last question but I need to know. )

I made the mistake of immersing my entire knife in vinegar as I was putting on a forced patina. I left it overnight and the next day when I rinsed it off and wiped it down, a lot of the dye in the red bone handles of my very nice Tidioute knife left. I ended up with funky orange colored bone handles.

I think it's a mistake to submerge the whole knife. Unless you can remove the scales on a fixed blade. On a folder, let the springs and such get their own patina.

I like to stick the blade in an onion and let them sit for 48 hours. Here is my Randall.

eveled,
That's pretty neat! Looks almost like Damascus but there are the rings/layers of the onion. Now a technical question, wonder if it makes a difference what variety of onion to achieve that effect? Vidalia's are sweet, logically they might not have the acid of a regular yellow onion that would taste hotter? Just a thought?
Treefarmer

This was a big old sweet Vidalia onion. I degreased the blade stuck it in didn't move it at all for 48 hours. When I pulled it out, I was so happy it had a double center, and I hit the center perfectly. It is good to be lucky! Even the spine looks cool, almost tiger striped. I did a Mercator cat knife in the same onion, the same way, not it did not turn out the same way.

Then I cut up the onion, fried it in butter, and had lunch.

philco wrote:I made the mistake of immersing my entire knife in vinegar as I was putting on a forced patina. I left it overnight and the next day when I rinsed it off and wiped it down, a lot of the dye in the red bone handles of my very nice Tidioute knife left. I ended up with funky orange colored bone handles.

If your knife's steel parts suffered no ill effects then I suppose that immersing a whole knife with delrin scales would be alright.
Did you blow dry or does vinegar not rust steel?
My knives tend to get rust on the tang before a patina develops and I have to be pushing Q-tips and toothpicks down in the handle to treat the springs.

Edgewise wrote:

philco wrote:I made the mistake of immersing my entire knife in vinegar as I was putting on a forced patina. I left it overnight and the next day when I rinsed it off and wiped it down, a lot of the dye in the red bone handles of my very nice Tidioute knife left. I ended up with funky orange colored bone handles.

If your knife's steel parts suffered no ill effects then I suppose that immersing a whole knife with delrin scales would be alright.
Did you blow dry or does vinegar not rust steel?
My knives tend to get rust on the tang before a patina develops and I have to be pushing Q-tips and toothpicks down in the handle to treat the springs.

After I removed it from the vinegar I rinsed it well with tap water then wiped it off with a rag. After that I used my wife's blow dryer to dry it completely.

Eveled - that is a very cool patina on your knife. I have never thought about how an onion could do that. I have put a patina on a knife blade or two by neglecting to wipe the blade after eating a pear or peach: never tried doing it on purpose.

Edgewise - a full immersion in vinegar should not be any worse for the steel than what my pocket knives go through just in the course of a week or two. They are exposed to sweat and fruit juice and the brine from Conecuh sausage and bacon packs. But after reading Phil's post I guess I will try not to get vinegar on any nice bone handles.

Sounds good, Dinadan.
philco, the scales may be funky orange but that overnight patina looks to me like 100 years old.
eveled, it's a brave man who experiments with a Randall. Lucky it paid off this time.

eveled wrote:I think it's a mistake to submerge the whole knife. Unless you can remove the scales on a fixed blade. On a folder, let the springs and such get their own patina. I like to stick the blade in an onion and let them sit for 48 hours. Here is my Randall.

Love the patina and love the Randall. I have a Randall coming in the mail today and I can't hardly stand it.... pacing.... pacing.

Theres only one time I have ever "soaked" a blade to patina. The backsprings were already a fully dark patina so I put a vinegar soaked rag on the blades one at a time and let each sit for about half a day. The blades were scratched and had the grinder treatment so they needed a good cover up, but it wasn't so bad that I needed to sand the blades down. I did tape up the handles during the process. It turned out well.

If I were going to patina springs I would just tape up the whole knife really well except the outside of the springs, then roll the knife up in a vinegar soaked rag. If I wanted to patina the inside of the springs I suppose I would open the blades and stuff a soaked rag in the blade well.

Usually the only time I force a patina is to even out an existing one.

Thanks for the compliments guys.

toungueriver, did you get your Randall?

Edgewise, it was not that big of a risk, patina will clean off with a scotch Brite pad and oil. The patina from use method wasn't working, it was getting weird spots.

Almost any fruit or vegetable that is acidic can be used.

I accidentally left a triangular piece of potato on a knife for a couple of hours while I was distracted with other tasks. Ended up with a dark gray triangle on the blade.

Onions, tomatoes, tomatillos, oranges, grapefruit and Mustang grapes have all contributed to patinas on my uncoated users.

zzyzzogeton wrote: Onions, tomatoes, tomatillos, oranges, grapefruit and Mustang grapes have all contributed to patinas on my uncoated users.

Rhubarb also does a good job.

leave them alone unless you are covering flaws - they rust anyway---I heard throwing the whole thing in battery acid works well if you let it sit a few days..