It usually doesn't bother me when my knives get scratched, dinged and generally beat up in the course of things. These marks show character and the history of the knife. I do hate to see accidental scratches, the ones that come from carelessness when you aren't even using the knife.
A few days ago I was sharpening my M.U.D.D. with my Lansky system. It was going fine until my hand slipped and the alignment rod dinged into the DLC finish, leaving an ugly scratch that just looked out of place on the uniform void of the DLC. I groaned but went to finish my sharpening, only to have it happen two more times. Seeing as this was a new knife the scratches nagged at me, I tried a few different things to try to remove them without damaging the finish.
A little steel wool-nothing.
Some vigourous scrubbing with soap and water-nada.
A little polishing with cardboard-nope.
After doing a little research I found that it is generally accepted that there isn't really any way to remove the scratches without altering the underlying finish.
Bullocks to that, I thought, digging in deeper. A little more research found some posts that posited that most "scratches" on a DLC finish are not actually damage to the finish but are really metal left behind from the item that rubbed into the finish.
A few hours go by and my brain percolates before a little light bulb goes off and I check my workshop for my ol' trusty Ballistol.
Ballistol has some excellent uses as well as some lofty claims that just don't really pan out. But, what it does advertise it that it will remove traces of some metals and generally soften carbon build-up on firearms. Doing some mental arithmetic I decided to see if it out remove the scratches from my DLC blade. I applied a generous amount to the scratches and went to work for a few hours.
Our example RAM folder with DLC finish and the offending Lansky rod:
Application.
After work (@6 hours) I took the RAM, applied dishsoap and scrubbed the area with a toothbrush, rinsing it clean with hot water when I felt I had removed as much as possible. Behold! the scratches are gone!
On my M.U.D.D. you can very very faintly see where the scratches were if you know where to look. The rod had not damaged the finish but had rubbed the surface down a little bit, changing the appearance when viewed at certain angles. The Ballistol did remove almost the entire mark(s), it was a very obvious shiny silver before and now it is so faint as to be unnoticeable in regular viewing. Good work!
If appears to me that whatever is in the Ballistol (mineral oil and some other stuff) loosen the deposits enough to let them be scrubbed/washed away. Other chemicals of similar nature may work, but I don't have any other reason to test them right now.
So there we have it, a little tip to keep you from being down when you ding up your new $120 knife.
*This may or may not work with some of the scratches on Black Oxide tools, I don't have any to test right now. I'll post results when I get around a chance.
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