All About Pocket Knives

Hey Guys ...i picked up a pretty decent Kutmaster Fighting Knife.....handle and blade all good with the exception.....the previous owner apparently used a rat tail file to sharpen it is all I can think.....pretty deep scratch marks on lower part of the blade.....I tried my Dremel tool with the small paper sanding discs...then used polish.....nothing works.....then tried my bench grander with a wire brush.....it slowly took some..of the deep grooves out a bit...but its still not what I want.......what do you guys suggest to take deep grind marks off a blade..??.......I went to Lowes to find a light grinding wheel for my bench grinder...all they had was medium or hard.......so Im at a loss right now........I appreciate any and all suggestions......Regards....Hans Fischer

All my work has been done by elbow grease. If you can't get it out with powered tools, I don't think it's coming out.

Maybe the factory could correct/repair it? Contact them.....

I have a Queen Half-Congress pocketknife that I inherited from a buddy - he obviously sharpened it with a file at some point. The grooves are so deep that to remove them would take off about 25% of the blade. I decided to sharpen it and leave it as is, a momento - that is about all you can do unless you want to take off a lot of blade steel. By the way, it is surprisingly sharp and has an effective edge with the striations. OH

I guess there is just so much a person can do, as has been said. Have you tried diamond particle sharpening tools?
I would like to see the OP knife. The only Utica fighting knife I am aware of would be the WWII M3. I don't know much about Utica. They imported some fixed blade hunting knives from Czechoslovakia, back in the day, that are very nice when in good condition.

TR, the only Kutmaster branded "fighting knives" I've seen are adaptations of the M3 (shortened blades, etc). OH

Old Hunter wrote:TR, the only Kutmaster branded "fighting knives" I've seen are adaptations of the M3 (shortened blades, etc). OH

I am attaching 2 pages from "The U.S. M-3 Trench Knife of World War Two, by Vincent J. Coniglio and Robert S. Laden. Sometime after the war, I believe a consumer version was sold, with a ring attached to the pommel. I am not sure of this because it has been awhile since I was looking at these items. Well, for what it is worth:

Hans - I would also like to see a photo of the knife. But I agree with the others: some marks are just too deep to remove without reshaping the blade.

Cal, Good info on the Utica M-3 (I'll add it to my notes to go with my only Utica M-3). OH

Without seeing the actual knife it is difficult to assess the damage. I have removed some rather deep scratches using elbow grease and emery cloth followed up with Wenol Metal polish and a Dremel felt polishing wheel. I began with 220 grit emery cloth followed by 320 grit and finish with 400 grit before using the Wenol. For the deepest scratches you can use Dremel abrasive flap wheels. I have used 80 grit wheels followed by 120 grit wheel. Following that it was back to the emery cloth and polishing compound again. Use flap wheels with caution to avoid removing excessive amount of metal. It all depends on how much metal you are willing to sacrifice. Wenol is best used by polishing with the white compound (blue tube and box) followed by the pink compound (red tube and box).

Cal,
That M-3 info was very useful! I just picked up an early converted M-3 ---> Kutmaster converted knife last weekend. Mine is the 5th and last variant. It is a sunburst staked, 6 groove, guard marked (partially ground off) Utica M-3, sold to civilians, just after the war ended... I posted it in the Military Knife sub-forum.

Old Hunter, nice photo!!

As for the OP question... it is hard to tell what to do, without good photos.