Polishing Old Knives

[careybirdwell]

I have a few older knives that I have bought a garage sales or flea markets. Is there anyway to polish the blade back to its original condition or should I just leave them alone. Thanks for any help

[jefandaward]

Leave the patina on the blades. Is the middle one stamped "Western" by chance?

[careybirdwell]

Leave the patina on the blades. Is the middle one stamped "Western" by chance?

It is a Schrade USA 498

[TimH]

I dig knives like this. Cool finds IMO.

[1shot]

I'd leave them alone but if you want to polish them out you can use a buffer and some green compound. If you wanting to get all the scratches out thats a whole nother deal.

[Kevin Smith]

You could use a fine scotch Brite pad in a drill.

[Shough]

You can polish just about anything if you want. If it has scratches I use sandpaper starting with 220 or so and work my way to at least 800-1000 grit. Then you can start with polishing compounds. Again that is a manual way with no tools, but I would listen to our awesome knife makers on here as they are the experts.

[White Falcon]

Here is one I did that was a rusty wreck, and leather was chewed up.