My first shot at a restoration ...

Okay... barely a month after I got my first straight, I sniped this Wade and Butcher off of Ebay a week or so ago. I received it friday and removed the scales... the buffalo horn was in really bad shape. I put the blade in the ole brass vibrator with some new media and some polish and let her run til Sunday morning. Sunday morning I took the blade out, and it had cleaned it up a bunch but there were still some marks on the blade and spine. Hit it on the buffing wheels for about 2 hours ... started with emory, then diamond white, red jewelers rouge, and then just a finishing wheel. So far I am pretty impressed with how it looks. Really hard to take good pictures and get the light / focus right. So far I am please with my first try at this. It was paramount to me NOT to mess up the Masonic etching on the blade. Also, all I can find information wise about the age is that it is most likely pre-1891 since it does not say ENGLAND on the blade. Any help in that regards would be appreciated :) I plan on mounting this in a bone scale but am open to suggestion there as well. Many thanks to these forums because I wouldn't have known where to begin without you guys :)
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Looks very nice. I have been picking up the odd SR here and there that will need working on. I will have to try on one of the real bad ones and see what I can do.

well that has worked out fairly well. Bone scales would be nice. I just started plating with bone as a scale material. I have to say it heats up fairly quickly on the sander and if you get a burn mark on it, it takes a lot to get it out. I guess the method is slow and easy.

Love the finish that you got from the Tumbler and Polishing,,,

They really do work well for saving and defining the etched blades, I would vote Bone, IMHO it is a nice classy look :tu

May be try darkening the groves of the etching/engraving - basically you develop a black oxidation/ patina across the whole surface with a weak acid and then lightly sand the surface to shine leaving black in the grooves only.

Mr. Gugi,

What acid would be appropriate for that ... would muriatic acid work, or would it take something stronger ??

No, that would be too strong, you're looking at vinegar level stuff. Warm vinegar can work, play on another blade first see what you can get with the color.
I'm only a casual amateur that toys with stuff every now and then for fun, so I can't really give you very precise instructions, just point you in a general direction.

Look up past forum threads from this section as well, there are people who have experimented with this a fair bit. Or start a thread about it and somebody will probably help.

If you are interested in darkening the etch here is a Spazola video on vinegar use
Etching A Blade With Hot Vinegar - YouTube

Here you go, see you get a real tutorial from one of the best forum members. You probably don't want to oxidize the whole blade to dark level like charlie does, so you'll have to modify it but you have a working example you can start from.

Very nicely done!!!

pretty cool video with the vinegar ... I may have to give that a try :)

I have not used the vinegar, I have used bluing and bleach to get a patina effect on a blade though. Charlie has quite a few videos and they are worth watching, if for no other reason than to watch a skilled craftsman at work.