What the **** happened to this Damascus Stretch?

[j.tank]

Hey Guys,

I am sorry for the time it has taken for an update.
I appreciate all of the advice you have given me.

(At the suggestion of personal friend of mine) I ended up using a pencil eraser to start. I rubbed it pretty well and here was the initial reaction:




When i got a moment, I went to visit a freiend at my local shooting range, he put some FITZ knife + rifle wax on it.
Then when i got home i wiped it down with a silicon gun cloth and left it unfolded on to of my safe until this morning.

Before work, I took some CLP (G96), sprayed the blade, let sit for 60 seconds, and then wiped it. And throughout the day i have rubbed
on and off with the pencil eraser.

Here is how it currently looks:









I am pressed for time. I will be back on soon. Agian thank you all for your help.
I want your feedback.

[j.tank]

Sal, I will gladly send this to you for your professional opinion!

[Blerv]

I think that looks like some dang nice handy-work. :D Kudos on the success!

[Knutty]

^ What he said. It's iron oxide; rather than going at it physically, go at it chemically.

[ManixFan]

I have the exact same knife (in blue) which so far is a safe queen. I will definitely put it into rotation some day but I am enjoying too many other Spyderco's at the moment which are keeping my pockets filled.

But it is certainly an interesting occurrence and something that I will take extra care to protect against with more religious use of mineral oil when I finally break that one out into usage. Please keep us updated on what finally worked for you or Spyderco's findings if you send it in.

Of course, since Sal expressed an interest in the knife if there is something more going on than just light surficial rust then I am sure we will all hear about it. That kind of response, along with the great selection and high quality of product from Spyderco is what keeps me buying more and more of them.....despite my lack of 30 pockets.

Perhaps I will just start slinging my large Spyderpac over my shoulders on the way out the door for an EDC carry - just so I have all my options open :D

Later Edit": :o Oooops, I didn't see your post before posting myself. I was looking at on older unrefreshed web page - but it looks like you got most of it off. Great work......perhaps not as pristine as a safe queen .....but a used knife also has a certain character too. I think sending it in would be redundant at this point myself since you pretty well cleaned almost all of it off. It was probably just a little damp and you just didn't notice before putting it away. When you do something habitually (wipe it down) and then forget to do it properly just that one time.....you will likely remember doing it properly because the memory of doing it over and over is likely going to stick in your mind rather than the reality of what happened.

[j.tank]

Yes she is not as pristine, but i like her for her character and not her looks

So far, 7 days later, no real perceptible change other than some corrosion like marks on the
black decals (spider, etch) on both sides. I'll try to post a pic later, I couldn't get a good one
here for some reason.

Sal,

Would you still be interested in taking a look at this knife? I will send it immediately if so.

[Doc Dan]

Yeah, CLR works too.

[phillipsted]

I would echo the caution in using anything abrasive like the rust eraser or scotchbrite pads. You can polish out the contrast between the different layers of the steel. This is purely cosmetic and can be fixed with a little bath in some etching solution... but that entails more steps...

I would just use a little silver polish and a soft cloth or toothbrush.

TedP

[sal]

Hi J.Tank.

Actually it looks really good in the photos. Good job. We couldn't tell anything from the knife now that it's clean. Keep up posted if there is any re-occurance.

sal