Quote Originally Posted by gssixgun View Post
I went back and really looked at the pic Bart, The lines you are talking about I can't really make out, but I think if they are rather fine and pretty straight, that Kevin might be right and you are looking at a initial heat treating issue... If the lines are rather squiggly then I think I might be right, and this is a corrosion issue.... After you did the bread-knife strokes and reset the bevel could you see the lines more easily????
The lines are extremely fine, and strikingly straight. I can see them, but they're too fine to photograph (I shoot pictures through one eyepiece of the stereoscope, which is really not ideal). Some good news: In a failed attempt to shoot a picture after all, I have noticed that they are only present near the apex, while they were occurring further up the bevel when I started working on this one. So maybe, I'm almost through the bad steel. At the part that develops well, there are no such cracking lines present. It's a thin straw I'm holding on to here. That blade has a lot of pitting, with higher concentration near the bevel at the problem spot, so it could easily just be that.

Thanks to all for offering advice.
Bart.