Thread: Hand forged resto

Thought I'd clean up this old J. Allen & Sons hand forged wedge.
Didn't look like a big job but after initial sanding the pitting seems out of all proportion to it's original state.
Never had a hand forged blade before & I'm wondering if the 'texture' is not just pitting.

Any experience or ideas on this.

Thanx .

Os:
That almost looks like some sort of scale and not pitting.. Hard to tell from the pics, is it flaking away at all when your sanding???

Lots of sanding. 120-220-400-600 and then either.

• http://straightrazorpalace.com/works...tials-faq.html

1. 1. http://straightrazorpalace.com/works...ing-howto.html

or

• http://straightrazorpalace.com/works...tml#post182487

Glen ~ It's not flaking. Hard as hell actually. It's the texture of the steel. The little shiny dots are obvious pitting but the short lines parallel to the spine look like an open grain. I'll keep sanding and see what comes of it.

Mark ~ Thanx. I like how you think. Less work is good. I use a 6" buff & various compounds which work great for the final stages. Just hate all that low grit work.

Well, 5 hours of hand sanding with 120 grit and numerous passes on the wet grinder shows the 'texture' was all a bunch of pitting.
Seems I have some more work ahead of me.

does the tang have hammer marks? i think that looks kinda cool.
bummer on the pits

Originally Posted by kevint

does the tang have hammer marks? i think that looks kinda cool.
bummer on the pits

No man - Just pits on the tang but easier to clean up. Nowhere near as hard as the blade.
Ah well, back to it.

I may have jumped the gun in the previous post about the texture on this blade.
Pitting is now yielding but the grainy surface is back again.
120 Grit was like watching grass grow. Way too slow on this critter.
Dropped to 80 grit for a couple of hours but this time smoothed things up at the end with a hard Scotchbrite buff.


Keen to see what it looks like when I call it finished. Almost tempted to stop here and patinate it.

I'm gonna call this done as far as pit removal & polish goes.
Still pitted but much improved. The orange peel texture is still there but more subdued after the 2000 grit.
Sorry the pic is not so great but daylight's gone.
Patina & honing tomorrow. Fingers X'd.