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freefalltheyounger

Joined
Jan 10, 2018
Messages
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I have a Western W49F that has some nasty scratches that look as though someone tried to sharpen them on a piece of concrete. What should I try to do about them? Ignore them, or block sand them out starting with 200 gr, then 400, then 800?
And I have to say, this site is THE biggest PITA i have ever tried to acess.
 
https://postimages.org/
Upload a decent pic here, hit the blue icon at the hotlink for forums to copy it, then paste it here.

We need to see the extent of damage in order to give you the best idea on how to deal with it.
 
freefalltheyounger said:
I have a Western W49F that has some nasty scratches that look as though someone tried to sharpen them on a piece of concrete. What should I try to do about them? Ignore them, or block sand them out starting with 200 gr, then 400, then 800?
And I have to say, this site is THE biggest PITA i have ever tried to acess.
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I'd sharpen them out the same way you'd sharpen any other knife.....if that isn't too much of a PITA.
 
Your 1982 (f) bowie should be a pretty good knife -- that was before the sale of the company to Coleman. If the scratches are just along the edge, you could clean them up with sandpaper. But a lot depends on how deep the scratches are. If they're too deep, you'll lose a lot of metal and it will take a lot of time by hand.

Pics would definitely help.

You might try to contact one of the blade grinders here and have the scratches removed professionally. Those bowies originally had a polished, not mirrored finish, I think. So I'd have a pro take it back to 600 grit, especially if it's a carbon steel. I don't know when stainless steels started to be used.
 
Twindog said:
Your 1982 (f) bowie should be a pretty good knife -- that was before the sale of the company to Coleman. If the scratches are just along the edge, you could clean them up with sandpaper. But a lot depends on how deep the scratches are. If they're too deep, you'll lose a lot of metal and it will take a lot of time by hand.

Pics would definitely help.

You might try to contact one of the blade grinders here and have the scratches removed professionally. Those bowies originally had a polished, not mirrored finish, I think. So I'd have a pro take it back to 600 grit, especially if it's a carbon steel. I don't know when stainless steels started to be used.
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I'm sorry about the lack of pics, but I am technologically maladroit. Getting on to this site used up darn near all my eptitude. These scratches are way out in the field of the blade, and pretty deep. Ugly as home-made sin. If I could slow down my 4" belt sander I'd take them out on it, but as it is, I can see myself making a heck of a mess.
 
I have a PAL Bowie knife from WWII. It was in REAL bad shape from somebody only sharpening the belly or sweet spot. I commishened one of the bladesmiths hete years ago to give it a regrind and a good sharpening. He even reglued the stacked leather handle. I'll post pics when I can. I then had a new leather sheath made by a sheath maker here. The original was dry rotted.
I'll post pics when I can.
ps. Don't be too hard on this place...some of us diehards love it here.
 
freefalltheyounger said:
Not knocking the content, just my experience signing up.
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You haven't lived until you tried some of the old Woodworking sites for really high end woodworking.
HAD to use your real name. They checked. Others crashing and kicking you out and having to sign in over and over and over even though one ticked the "keep me signed in" box. One when ever I typed "? ? ? ?" would give me an automatic demerit and lock my thread.

Nah dude, nah . . .
THIS IS HEAVEN HERE !
And yes, from experience of polishing the sides of knives, even very small ones, it is going to take you for freekin' ever to hand sand it with wet or dry.
If you got the right very coarse, very cool running belt and changed the pulleys (do you have that option) on your belt sander to run much slower and dipped the blade when ever it felt hot to the touch.
Probably best to let the Pros do it. Also you are going to sand a divot in the side if you just work in the general area and if you work the whole side and not the other that is going be a little funky.
A nice even grind to both sides would tend to be optimum.
IMO.
 
It takes me about a day or more of hand sanding with 400 grit wet or dry sandpaper at a 90 degree angle to the 40 grit marks left by my belt grinder to remove them, if you are doing this by hand you will potentially be in for a weekend or two worth of sanding regardless of what grit progression you use. With my carbon steel knives I often just do a half ass job then force a patina to make the few remaining scratches less noticeable.
 
Kootaga13 said:
I have a PAL Bowie knife from WWII. It was in REAL bad shape from somebody only sharpening the belly or sweet spot. I commishened one of the bladesmiths hete years ago to give it a regrind and a good sharpening. He even reglued the stacked leather handle. I'll post pics when I can. I then had a new leather sheath made by a sheath maker here. The original was dry rotted.
I'll post pics when I can.
ps. Don't be too hard on this place...some of us diehards love it here.
Click to expand...

who did you get to do this work? I have an old buck and an old case pair of fixed blade hunting knives that need to be restored. Thanks for any help.
 
The knifemaker who did this is so far along in his art or career now that I really don't think he'd be interested in such a project.
This was done many, many moons ago.
 
GABaus said:
It takes me about a day or more of hand sanding with 400 grit wet or dry sandpaper at a 90 degree angle to the 40 grit marks left by my belt grinder to remove them, if you are doing this by hand you will potentially be in for a weekend or two worth of sanding regardless of what grit progression you use. With my carbon steel knives I often just do a half ass job then force a patina to make the few remaining scratches less noticeable.
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Yah, I guess that's what I'm looking at. I will be selling this some day, just titled it NFS so people wouldn't think I'm trying to backdoor sell it here. But I want it to come out nice, and I know if I put it on my belt sander I'll make it worse.
Also, in best Alaskan fashion a previous owner (probably the same yahoo who scratched it up) duct taped it to something and removed about 1/2 the finish from about 1/2 the front of the sheath. So that needs attention too. I'm tempted to hit the buggered up area with brown Kiwi Scuff Cover, then the whole thing with paste shoe polish. But I'm skeered. I don't know if it would be worth more with the damaged original sheath make it a new one.
 
So, had a rainy afternoon so I got after it with some 320 grit paper, then went to 400 and it's looking pretty good after about an hour. I'm tempted to call it good.
 
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