Removing unwanted etching on blades?

[TrickyRick]

One of dad's knives caught my eye this morning, probably a Pakistan knife and dad doesn't remember much about it other than he said he didn't use it much. I still think it's kind of interesting but I would like to remove the blade etching on it. Wondering what might be my best option.

[Reverand]

I would start with a Scotch-brite pad and a light oil. Scrub by hand in the same direction aa the grind marks, which is "short ways" back and forth from spine to edge. If that is not enough, a 400-grit sandpaper will be a bit more aggressive.

[eveled]

Try a solvent first it might be ink.

[eveled]

On my user knives. I like to smooth and flatten them out. I prefer the new lines to run the length of the blade. The machines at the factory go across the blade. Eventually the blade etches go away. You can see this one was in a low spot. This is because I use a flat plate. If you use a soft backing or your fingers you won’t reveal these low spots that are on every blade, (even high polished ones).

I posted this to illustrate why you want to match the grit and direction of the grind lines. Otherwise you will have to do the entire blade in whatever grit you do use.

[edgy46]

It looks like ink to me. Try semichrome first, that may do the trick. Hope this helps.

[TrickyRick]

Thanks for all the ideas on what to use and how to approach the etching removal. Tried acetone and 0000 s/w first, faded it a bit. Tried 1000 grit wet/dry sandpaper and 3M oil that removed it in about 10 minutes. Found a tube of Case paste in a shoe box of my dad's so used it to polish all the blades. Looks like what I would call 4 sheep foot style blades, no wonder my dad never used this one much.