Captain's term is "Pickled Randall's", and IMO is by far the coolest term I have heard for a blade getting the vinegar treatment to retard rust.

Here is mine. Some have seen it before but here it is again with a little companion....



Lets see them!

By "retard rust" do you mean remove rust or somehow prevent it from appearing on the blade?

I have taken some old Snap-on and Craftsman tools and soaked them in vinegar to remove 2 decades of rust so I'm familiar with removing rust with vinegar but I've never heard of using it as a rust preventer--is that what you meant?

BTW-nice Springfield!

Good question Hemingway -- does pickling actually prevent rust? No doubt that it looks GREAT, but are there real benefits to it?

Regardless, how best to pickle? Vinegar, lemon juice, The Captain's method?

John

I believe that pickling retards rust, just as I said earlier. Using my knives that have been "pickled" require little to no work to keep them almost exactly the same way they come out of the pickle jar.
Best, Capt. Chris

Beacause it is a acid,does this pickling affect the solder of the hilt to the blade? oldguy

Not that I've ever noticed, but when I pickle I only cover the blade itself.
Capt. Chris

The acid in the vinegar/pickling juice forms a patina or coating over the steel that further prevents corrosion. I have only done this with one Randall (above) and it has had no adverse effects on the solder joint. I have done it on numerous Bark River knives, a Dave Beck WSK and a few other customs and highly recomend it for a carbon steel user.

My experiences with vinegar or pickling juice are very good. It produces a very thin but quite durable layer that protects the blade.

Besides my #5-5 I've "pickled a couple of slippies with very good results as well.

Thanks for the info, guys. I've seen vinegar clean up something that was almost unrecognizably covered in rust, but I didn't know of its preventative properties.

Peter's photography + Randall + Leica = Eye candy!

I don't have a "Pickled Randall", but I do have a "Potatoed Treeman". Stick 'em in a potato overnight and get this:

Nice Doug, I've got one that has been treated kinda like it!

- Rob

Thanks Rob....hope all is well across the river!

BLOOD also works but it takes a couple of kills to make the same patina as pickle juice. I have done the pickle juice before, but the pickles just don't taste the same, but the blade sure looks nice.

Pap

Do you gentlemen have a recipe for this pickling procedure?

I have another question ...
Once pickled, can the patina be removed easily or does it have to be returned to the shop for the knife to be restored to original?
Thanks,
Tony

Tony,

Flitz will take it off.

Thanks Tom!

David,
I simply collect the juice from the (then empty) pickle glass and let the knife stand on it's tip up to the hilt for an hour or two.
The correct time depends very much on the amount of vinegar in the juice. Every make produces different results. You simply have to keep an eye on it

Capt. Chris has explained this in a thread a year ago HERE

I think it's a very good idea, at least for a user and it's fun to see your nice blade changing color, too

Thanks for all the pictures. It's very dangerous hanging out here. You guys make me want to spend my mortgage payment.

This has been a great thread -- thanks to all for contributing. There's nothing like seeing with one's own eyes and your pictures have accomplished this. Personally, I think a pickled blade looks great. Would I want every knife blade to like like this? Maybe not, but I might want a user to be pickled, especially if I know there's no harm done and there may even be a rust-protective effect of the pickled layer.

All of this raises an interesting question in mind. If pickled blades look great, and there is a protective effect, and carbon has other advantages in edge retention and sharpening, why isn't carbon our collective first choice in a blade material? Is it simply because a pickled blade looks like a used blade and we know it will be harder to sell?

I'll be honest about this and say that even though a pickled blade looks, in some respects, better to my eyes than a shiny new blade, I'd pay more for a blade that looks brand new than one that has sat in pickle juice for three hours!

The other question that is even more interesting to me than the relative value of pickled vs. non-pickled knives is whether pickling is as (technically) protective of the blade as stainless is. In other words, if you took a pickled carbon blade out in the woods for three months, how would it hold up relative to its stainless brethren? I suspect that the stainless knife would resist rust better but don't have the knowledge to answer this question.

So I'll throw the question out to all of you -- If you could only take one Randall with you in the woods for three months, and you needed this knife for your survival, would you take a pickled carbon blade or stainless?

As a newbie to this forum, I apologize if I'm asking a question that's too controversial or provocative, but I'm sincerely interested in picking blade material based its performance and durability rather than its looks. Again, thanks for the input!

John

In a scenario you describe, I would have zero issues taking my cabon model 18 exclusively for that 3 month stint.

For just three months and for strictly a survival situation, I honestly don't think it would really matter since a rusty blade will work as well as a shiny one. What MIGHT matter is how easily the blade can be sharpened in the event you lose or don't have with you a decent sharpener. If I had to use a river stone or my boot for a strop or some such thing, I'd rather have carbon.

I've heard that carbon is tougher and/or less brittle, but I don't have any personal experience with that. If it's true about carbon, then in a survival situation I'd rather have a tough rusty blade than a shiny broken one.

You didn't ask about handles, but I think that handle material is a greater variable than steel. I would have complete confidence in carbon or stainless steel, but I'm not so sure about stag or wood versus micarta for toughness.

I guess for me it would be carbon primarily because my favorite Randalls are carbon, 8, 23 and 12-11. I would not have any qualms taking them into the field for 3 months.

Carbon for me. Think of all the soldiers who have carried carbon Randalls into war for longer than 3 months.

And all of them had rust and stains. But that is part of it. In conditions like Vietnam I could see loosing the edge fairly easy to rust.

If carbon steel never rusted we would all use it!

Here is my pickled #1. I like the grayish black color and it lowers the maintenance quite a bit.

Pretty cool!

For night ops a blackened blade is an advantage-- you sure don't want anything shiny!

Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ

Sir (HALORANGER),

That is an OUTSTANDING Model 1! Very, very nice.

Thanks a lot Matt. It is one of my favorites.

I pickled my Model 5 last night. Not bad.

I just got this #7-5" in from AZCK and it went straight into the pickled okra jar! It had a lot of spots and stains on the blade already and since I bought it to use for hunting, I figured I aughta pickle it. Thanks for looking!

Pickled Perfection!

Here's a couple more pics with different lighting. I love the look of the dark blade with stag. Thanks Captain for the idea!

One thing to definitely remember is the 01 comes with Ren wax and needs to come off before pickling otherwise it won't be consistent.

Pap

Mike--

The Ren wax must have come from another owner?

I think the shop uses oil on them.

Either one would block the effect of the pickling, so cleaning with a good degreaser followed by hot-soap-and-water at the kitchen sink, then pickling, is what I think somebody recommended before.

I never pickled one, but admire the results shown here.

By the way, I don't remember if Capt. Chris mentioned the effects of the pickling on the hilt, and how to protect it????

Larry

Since I run stainless the hilt is what pickles on my knives! Probably wouldn't show up well in a photo though

Good-looking pickle job on that one! What a classic look it gives when done right!
Larry: I try to avoid getting the hilt soaked in the juice so I can't speak to how that would look.
Best, Capt. Chris
PS: Larry is correct and Pappy's RMK must have had the Ren Wax added by a source, other than the Randall shop...CCS

Made just a few days ago.. A couple of hours in vinegar, et voilá!!

Well I suppose we have more than one thread recently on pickled blades. Here's an AG I got not long ago from a recent Forum member. Got it cleaned up, honed razor sharp, and picked for work this fall. Came out nice IMO.

Yes it did come out nice and a really good hunting knife blade shape.

Pap

A coat of mustard wrapped in foil leaves a nice patina also.

good idea!!

:-)Rocky

My 18 after a dip

By the way, Coca-Cola also gives a good result. I will show the photos later. There is 1 point - it is necessary to degrease the surface before the procedure - alcohol / gasoline / something like that

Potato Pickled....

Looks like digital camo. Interesting, wonder what an apple would do?

Almost has a Damascus look to it!

I was pleasantly surprised.

It matches the cat.

Dennis

Was thinking the same thing Lol.

wasn't sure that was a cat in the first photo....looked more like a 3 day killed possum...

:-)Rocky

Lol!

Great minds Warren

Dennis

Dennis,

"It's a case of mind over matter. I don't mind, it don't matter "