This guide will tell you how to clean and protect your blades and handles on your valuable or antique knives. If your knife is especially valuable or old, consider using gloves to handle it.
Protective Maintenance & Cleaning
Wipe your blade down with a dry soft cotton cloth (t-shirt material). If it is still dirty, use a lightly damp cloth, and if you still need more, use any mild cleaner (mild soap, spray, isopropyl alcohol, etc). If the blade has glue or other sticky substances, we recommend using Goo Gone. If that still doesn’t do the trick, try a little polishing paste like Happich Simichrome or Flitz.
Dry your blade thoroughly, then use a protectant like A.G. Russell’s Rustfree.
With clean hands and a clean blade, apply a coat of protectant (Rustfree). You only need one or two drops of protectant on each side of a four inch blade.
“Rustfree is a silicon-based product and is the best I’ve seen for protecting blades.”
– A.G. Russell III, Founder
If you live somewhere humid, and especially if you live near saltwater, check your knives often.
If you live somewhere dry, or the blade is stainless steel, your blade will be much safer, and a protective coating will last a long time. There are so many diverse types of steels and environs it is difficult to give blanket statements, but it doesn’t hurt to visually inspect your blade every so often.
If you want to be really careful, place a new coat of protectant (such as Rustfree) on your non-stainless steel blades every 3 months, and on stainless steel every 6 months.
Lubricating the Pivot
Use a quality lubricant such as Quick Release for folding knives
Do not use WD-40 on pivots, it will gunk up over time.
Cleaning Imprinted Fingerprints, Tarnished Hardware, Guard, or Bolsters
Use Simichrome or Flitz with a soft cotton cloth to clean any tarnished metal surface including stainless steel, non-stainless steel, nickel silver, brass, silver, gold, and even discolored copper.
Polishing pastes are mild abrasives that clean off imperfections. This means that if you scrub too hard or with something too abrasive you can scratch your knife. Be especially careful with nickel silver and other mirror finished surfaces. Do not leave visible fingerprints on old or valuable knives.
“I have used Happich Simichrome for over 30 years and have never found a better polish. It works on all the metals I have ever used it on.” – A.G. Russell III, Founder
Spread the polishing paste on the tarnished metal with your finger, a light coating will do. Then wipe it with a soft cotton cloth. Repeat as necessary – not all tarnishes are removable without damaging the blade/materials.
Cleaning Tarnished Blade / Pitting / Rust
Wipe the blade clean with a clean cloth, use a lightly damp cloth if it is dirty. For valuable knives, don’t use anything more aggressive than a soft cloth (like old T-shirt material).
Use Simichrome or Flitz with another clean, soft cotton cloth to remove or at least reduce any pitting on the blade. Polishing paste is a light abrasive, and it can remove light tarnishes.
More aggressive scrubbing will help remove more aggressive tarnishes, but it runs the risk of scratching the surface and ruining the finish. Irregularities from polishing are especially noticeable. Stick with a soft cotton cloth to clean valuable or old knives, don’t use more abrasive things like Scotch Brite pads. When possible, polish along the “grain” of the steel. Simichrome IS safe to use on Damascus steel, just don’t use tons of force to scrub it with polishing paste. Take care especially with mirror polished blades.
Regular users of Simichrome agree that for more stubborn tarnishes, letting the paste sit on the tarnish for up to ten minutes will improve its effectiveness.
There are further tricks to remove rust, but we recommend leaving anything more stubborn alone to preserve value.
Protecting Knife Handles
What you do will generally depend on the handle itself, usually the most important factor will be the humidity and temperature where it is stored.
For leather handles, keep them conditioned with a good leather conditioner (one without petroleum in the ingredients).
Keep an eye on your exotic, natural material handles.
While less likely to degrade over time than leather, exotic materials can still use a little maintenance.
To clean materials like Pearl or Jet, use a mild furniture polish spray. Then wipe it down and put a protective coating of Renaissance Wax on it. This will bring back the luster and protect your handle.
Use Renaissance wax to protect leather, wood, bone, and ivory handles. Do not use it on Stag handles. This only needs to be done occasionally – especially if they are not regularly handled.
Do not leave spilled liquids on your handles. Clean them up right away. The longer you wait to clean something, the harder it will be to clean.
It sounds obvious, but you’d be surprised how many valuable knives we receive with tea, coffee, juice, and wine stains.
Thanks for reading!
Look at our other articles about valuable and antique knives:
- General Care Principles For Valuable & Antique Knives
- Cleaning & Protecting Blades & Handles For Valuable & Antique Knives
- How to Care for Leather Sheaths & Pouches For Valuable & Antique Knives
- How to Store & Keep Records of Valuable & Antique Knives
- How to Properly Ship Knives
