Stonewashing a Blade, Good Idea or Not?

[Foehammer]

Hi all, thinking about putting a stonewash finish on my old s30v pm2. While I am aware that this will void the warranty (not too concerned about that because the knife has been flawless for 4+ years) I am wondering if it is a good idea to do it. Maybe an acid etch would be better for the blade/action. Does anyone have any success with stonewashing (or acid etching) their Spydie, and if so please share details and how you like it. Thanks.

Joe

[Evil D]

Aesthetics are subject. It technically makes the blade more prone to rust. Make sure you paint the pivot and lock area with nail polish so the etchant doesn't eat away steel where you need it most.

[Foehammer]

Will keep that in mind about the pivot and lock area. Rust is not an issue where I live.

[JRinFL]

Someone here has done a stonewash on their blade, though I cannot remember who it was. Hopefully they see this and reply.

If it were me, I would heavily tape the pivot and lock face areas before stonewashing. Heavily as in many times around.

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Do you intend to acid etch the blade first? I fail to see the point of stonewashing blades with no etch unless you really like how it looks or you're a maker and want a quick easy finish, a good satin or polished finish takes time. I agree with David that a plain stonewash will make your blade more susceptible to corrosion if that's a concern, this should not be the case if you acid etch first however. I will be acid etching and stonewashing my PM2 tomorrow or Friday when I have the time, I'd be happy to let you know how it goes for me and what I use.

[Foehammer]

Hi Flyfishing Rick, thanks for the response and I’ll look forward to hearing how it goes! Thanks

Joe

[Fly Fishing Rick]

I did finish yesterday but did not have time to sharpen the blade and get things put back together until today. I am really happy with the way that it turned out. The most important part of acid etching and where so many get it wrong is preparation, making sure the surface is clean and degreased is essential. I started out by disassembling the knife with my handy Wiha driver then scrubbed the blade under hot water with a tooth brush and dawn soap and dried on a clean cloth. The next thing I did was soaked the blade in acetone, pulled it out and scrubbed it with a brush, then soaked it again to be sure it was completely clean. After the blade comes out of the acetone don't touch it again without gloves to keep it clean and use nail polish or the like to mask off areas you don't want etched, like where the washers and the detent track are. Once dry put the blade into a 1:1 mix of Ferric Chloride and distilled water, the duration will depend on the steel being etched so I recommend pulling it out every 2 minutes or so to rinse in water and check the etch until you have the desired darkness, again, being sure not to handle the blade without gloves. After I had my blade as dark as I wanted it I put it right into my plastic container that I had filled half way with stones, added a generous squeeze of dawn soap, filled 2/3-3/4 with water, put on the cap and shook the container for 5 minutes at a time until I had the look I was after. The idea behind the soap is that it helps keep things lubricated during the tumbling process and it neutralizes the acid on the steel but there's a bunch of ways that people stonewash, this is just the one I use. After I took my blade out of he stonewash I dried it then gave it a generous rub with water displacing oil. If I was going to do it over again, the only thing I'd do differently is make sure I had things a little more generously masked off, nothing got etched that shouldn't but it was pretty close for comfort once the polish was removed. I may still do the liners and remaining hardware, I haven't decided yet.

[JSumm]

Very nicely done!

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Very nicely done!

Thank you

[JRinFL]

Nice detailed post and the blade looks great! That blade treatment really works with the scales.

[Manixguy@1994]

Very impressive project . Quite remarkable how nice the blade looks against the Micarta scales . Dan

[Foehammer]

That turned out nicely! Thanks for the detailed post!

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Thank you everyone!, I really like the contrast between the blade and scales as well. I'm not sure I'd like it with the darker scales on my other folders so I'm not even going to try with those, maybe in the future if I get another with light scales.

[Eli Chaps]

Why create potential drag?

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Why create potential drag?

Once stonewashed the surface is quite smooth, I'm not even slightly concerned with drag. The reasons I chose to do it are additional corrosion resistance and aesthetics.

[Eli Chaps]

Why create potential drag?

Once stonewashed the surface is quite smooth, I'm not even slightly concerned with drag. The reasons I chose to do it are additional corrosion resistance and aesthetics.

Okay that 's good, thanks. A lot of the finishes I've encountered have had a texture and you don't that.

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Why create potential drag?

Once stonewashed the surface is quite smooth, I'm not even slightly concerned with drag. The reasons I chose to do it are additional corrosion resistance and aesthetics.

Okay that 's good, thanks. A lot of the finishes I've encountered have had a texture and you don't that.

Yea some manufacturers like ESEE use a kind of durable paint to coat their blades to protect from corrosion and they can be quite rough. I generally acid etch the the laser etchings on painted blades then strip the paint with chemicals. I wish I knew of a more efficient way of removing other factory coatings like DLC and whatever the black stuff Spyderco uses is. I like my carbon blades to patina so I just rub them with bar keepers friend or baking soda until the coatings are gone. If BladeHQ still offered their uncoated M4 Sage 5 I'd already have one, been on the fence about grabbing the coated version because I don't feel like removing the coating and dying the scales, hope I don't wait too long and wish I didn't lol.

[Ranger_Ike]

Looks awesome! Did you dye those scales? They look a bit more orange than normal. Looks really good.

Also, did the tip of the knife get damaged at all in the stone wash process?

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Looks awesome! Did you dye those scales? They look a bit more orange than normal. Looks really good.

Also, did the tip of the knife get damaged at all in the stone wash process?

No dye, just lots of handling/use. I was actually concerned about that myself but no, there was no damage to the tip whatsoever, and I shook it pretty good; but CruWear is pretty tough stuff.

[Fly Fishing Rick]

Looks awesome! Did you dye those scales? They look a bit more orange than normal. Looks really good.

Also, did the tip of the knife get damaged at all in the stone wash process?

One thing I did forget to mention in my write-up is that I took a 600 grit ceramic stone and dulled the edge slightly before starting, just to be sure that no minor chipping occurred since this is kind of a crude stonewash method. This precaution probably wouldn't have been needed with CruWear but it might be a good idea for steels like S30V, a good sharpening is going to be needed after the etch anyway. I'm not certain it makes any difference one way or the other but it was a small simple thing to do that gave me a little extra peace of mind at no cost.