Thread: help needed - whats going on with this blade ????

ok im feeling like the bad luck fairy has visited me with a 20 ton truck.

i tend to clean all new razors i purchase with a simple bath of almost boiling water to help put my mind at ease about the risk of the blade carrying any nasties. (i know its not 100% guaranteed way to clean it but that and normal washing with anti bac agents keeps me from freaking out)

anyway i boiled the kettle made a cuppa, and left a cup of water to cool a little on the side, dipped the blade in and wandered off for a shower, when i returned about 5 - 10 mins later and removed the razor this has happened..



now there was no obvious marks on the blade before hand, except for my fingerprints that wiped off cleanly, here is a pic of the same side of the blade before i hot water dipped it.



whats going on ? does anyone have any suggestions or ideas and is there anyway i can remove it? i have tried two diff metal polishes so far and neither have removed the marks yet, and im now terrified that i have perminantly marked the blade. two other razors that i have hot water dipped have had no reactions like this..

I hope for your sake and the razors that one of the pros chime in on this for some info/suggestions on how to fix the problem, that looks like a nice razor. I have no idea what you can do to fix it. I have run into a discoloration problem on some scales when I boiled the razor to kill germs, but I don't do that any more.

In the mean time I have found that simply spraying a razor down with Scrubbing Bubbles and letting it soak for a while, scrub the loose crude off with a toothbrush and pipe cleaner between the scales and finally rinse with very hot water to be suficient for killing germs and good for most of the cleaning. Most of these razors sit in a drawer, box, etc. for many years and any germs or other nasties should be dead by now, any thing left should be eliminated using the Scrubbing Bubbles/hot water rinse.

Good luck on getting the problem solved. I know how you feel thinking you may have ruined a good razor.

Thanks for the reply mate I'm keeping my fingers crossed that someone spots this thread and can advise me on what's gone wrong

I don't see how hot water could hurt it. Looks to be white deposits. Maybe it is calcium deposits? I would proceed to polish it with fine metal polish to see if it comes off. Your fingerprint seems visible in it as well. I suspect there was oil on the blade and in your fingerprint and it reacted badly with the water and minerals therein.

Instead of a metal polish, try to hand polish the blade with a polishing compound like turtle wax polishing compound as it's a little more aggressive. It looks like some sort of mineral deposits like Sharpton mentioned. Just keep working backwards until you get the spots removed. It may take something as course as some 2K sandpaper, then you will have to work back up the compounds to remove the small scratches. Just a dip in isoprophyl alcohol will take care of any coodies IMO, but to each their own as it's your life.

yea looks like either some type of deposit or maybe the previous owner had some kind of coating on it and the water affected that. I would go the polish route. Start conservative at first and see what happens.

There is another possibility, but I think sharptonn is closest to the mark. Some people are simply more acidic in sweat and body oils, than others. The more-or-less neutral at room temperature oils in the fingerprints may have become just slightly more aggressive in the heat of the water. Sometimes to get an acid to cut faster a little heat can do wonders. In this case, a surprise. I agree that something more aggressive for a polish may be needed.

And hopefully that chip I see is an illusion. Hope this helps. Next time you try the hot water thing, use a degreaser first and don't touch the bare steel again until you're done.

Originally Posted by Mike Blue

There is another possibility, but I think sharptonn is closest to the mark. Some people are simply more acidic in sweat and body oils, than others. The more-or-less neutral at room temperature oils in the fingerprints may have become just slightly more aggressive in the heat of the water. Sometimes to get an acid to cut faster a little heat can do wonders. In this case, a surprise. I agree that something more aggressive for a polish may be needed.

And hopefully that chip I see is an illusion. Hope this helps. Next time you try the hot water thing, use a degreaser first and don't touch the bare steel again until you're done.

thanks everyone for the help regarding the marks, im going to order myself some Mass metal polish and give that ago, TCut is working but i may wear my thumbs off before getting the marks out.

as for the nick in the blade sadly its not an illusion, its real i have a diff thread on here about the best ways to remove it, im a bit of a noob when it comes to honing and was hoping to remove it myself. but i think i might just pay to get it professionally sharpened.

My first thought was also that it etched the blade. But, is the blade more shiny/clean in the after the bath shot? See if you can tell if it's an etch, or is the fingerprint, etc. above the blade surface like an emboss. I can see the same marks in the before shot and was thinking that the oils/fingerprints are probably old and may have reacted with the patina of the blade making it harder. It could be that the hot water washed some of the old dirt patina away, but couldn't cut these areas. Hope that's the case, and then maybe a solvent, alcohol or other may cut it. Just a thought. Best of luck!! Howard

ok so just an update, i managed to find a fairly high power lens that i had from an old image scanner. its powerful enough to be able to show you the dirt between the ridges in your fingerprint so i figured i would take a look at what these marks are on the blade.

and.... it looks as though Mike Blue is correct in his diagnosis of the blade, the marks appear to be very minor etches into the blade, so it looks like the oils / acids off my hands mixed with the heat of the water has managed to etch these marks into the blade

so my next question, how can i go about rectifying my mistakes ?? i have pretty much no knowledge in this area and very limited tools to try and rectify this problem, i am also a little concerned about the writing on the blade as this is also etched on (although slightly deeper than the marks).

i was looking at the professional hone / polish cleaning service that TheInvisibleEdge offered and wondered if they might be able to cure this, has anyone had any experience with there blade cleaning service?

any thoughts or help are always appreciated.