Do-it-yourself drawing on a knife blade. Etching on a knife for the lazy. Artistic electrochemical etching

Agree, metal products (knives, blades, amulets ...) look much more beautiful if they are decorated with patterns and ornaments. But how to apply a pattern on a metal surface? Engraving? This method is also possible, but there are several more. One of them is called - artistic electrochemical metal etching.
In this article, you will learn how to decorate a knife blade. The whole process is described below from drawing a sketch to the metal etching process at home.

Development and drawing

Sketch

A plot drawing, a floral ornament, a logo or just a phrase - this is just a small list of drawing ideas that will be beautifully imprinted on the blade. Choose what pattern you want to see on the blade and start sketching. You can draw yourself or ask professionals.

Then you need to transfer the drawing to the blade. To do this, we place the blade in the scanner, transfer the image to the CorelDraw program, where we outline the outlines of the blade. Next, we impose a suitable ornament. The result should be duplicated in mirror image and sent to print.

Blade varnishing and pattern transfer

The blade must be varnished in advance. You can use a matte varnish for plastic models-copies. The varnish must be diluted with a nitro thinner to dry faster, and applied with an airbrush (you can also use a brush). The varnish is used because it retains plasticity during the day and does not crumble under the scrubber.

We cut out the sketch to make it easier to fit it to the blade, “blacken” the reverse side with a pencil, and attach it to the blade with masking tape. After we draw an ornament with a thin pen. The result is a drawing on varnish.

Scratching a pattern

We scratch the pattern on the surface of the varnish with the help of scrubbers with various sharpening. It is important that the metal of the scrubber is not harder than the metal of the blade, otherwise there will be scratches.

Drawing Features

In our example, the “field” is etched (this is the most difficult option, since it is more difficult to scratch the drawing), although a more accessible option is also possible when only the contours of the drawing are etched.

Metal pickling

You can use a variable transformer, for example, from a toy railway. It will be an adapter for a mini drill, which is indispensable for fine work. The maximum voltage is 12V, which is more than enough. Heat-shrinkable cambric serves as insulation.
Flannel: Copper/brass plate - approximately 100/7 mm.

We start electrochemical metal etching by putting the fabric on the plate and soaking it all in saline solution (do not spare salt). After we start to poison - with quick touches, you should not hold it for a long time, because. varnish may overheat.

Result

The described method of metal etching at home is good because it is easier to control the process here, in contrast to etching in a “whole” vessel. You just need to go through the drawing several times (earlier we advise you to practice on draft blanks so as not to spoil the blade). When the drawing has a finished look, turn off the unit and wipe the blade with a solvent. Actually, this is the method of artistic metal etching.

Based on materials from the site: namuradan-k.se-ua.net

Drawing a picture on a knife (etching). By order.

The young man brought a folding knife. He said: "I want ...".
Hohoha meant:
— remove scratches;
- harden (if necessary);
- polish;
- polish;
- sharpen;
- put an inscription or drawing on the blade.


It was originally a folding knife "Magnum". Quite a well-known and "untwisted" brand. This is what it looked like folded up.

Photo of the other side of the knife.

This is how the Magnum looked in the open position.

View of the other side of the knife.

Let's start fulfilling the customer's wishes. We disassemble the knife.

There are much fewer parts in a folding knife than in an automatic knife - a throwaway. This has a positive effect on its reliability. In addition, the knife has its own brand, made more accurately than the Chinese "nonames". Sanding is cleaner. Heat treatment of the blade, in my opinion, is not required. The blade of the knife has sufficient hardness. And adding a couple of Rockwell units on a folding knife, and thereby increasing the fragility of the blade, is unreasonable. Therefore, we do without hardening and immediately proceed to rough and fine grinding. This process is detailed in other articles on the site. For example: or How to improve a Chinese-made knife (part 2).
There are plenty of photographs with comments. I post only the result.

In the photo, the blade is already polished. This is necessary for further etching of the pattern. The better the polishing of steel, the less underetching will be. That is, the acid during the etching of the pattern will not seep through the irregularities of the blade or poorly polished risks under the protective coating. In addition, high-quality polished steel resists corrosion better.

Next stage. We come up with a drawing that will be on the blade.
I came up with an eagle, the customer came up with a commemorative inscription, then I came up with fire, and the customer came up with a panther ... Sketches, sketches, Email, telephone dialogues... Quite a long and fascinating process... As a result of joint inventions, a fiery eagle was invented.

We circle the blade with a pencil, aim with a drawing and ...

... pay attention in time to the fact that the side of the blade is not the same. The photo shows that next to the hole for the axial screw, there are two more holes of a smaller diameter. They are needed to attach the pocket clip to the knife body. She will close the drawing in this part of the handle. An eagle on a blade is flying somewhere. Here is an image of this “somewhere” clip and could close it. Well, at least I noticed in time ... The drawing must be done on the other side of the blade.

We cover the “correct” side of the blade with a protective coating. This is a tricky varnish with a tricky name. Inexpensive but decent quality.

After the varnish has dried, we scratch the drawing of an eagle over it.
But before that, we train again on paper. I draw without carbon paper and various devices. A little hand trembled - and the drawing is ruined. I would have to start all over again. So it's better to practice. In addition, he noticed his mistake again in time. The eagle's beak is longer and more angular. And on the back of the head is a small crest. In the previous drawing (on the wrong side of the blade), I lost sight of it ... Not a proud fiery eagle, but an angry scorched dove could have settled on the blade.

We completely cover the blade with construction tape and varnish, so that the acid etches only the pattern without damaging the wedge itself. Then we send the blade to a jar of acid.

I didn't take any pictures of the etching process. Firstly, it was necessary to take off rubber gloves (no one canceled safety precautions). And secondly, while you are jumping around the can with a camera, you can miss the right moment and the acid will “eat up” too much, the drawing will turn out to be too deep and loose inside the grooves. Here is the result of etching. The blade has already been washed and cleaned.

But the photo shows one of the petals of the flame (closer to the tip) with a yellow coating. Before etching this blade (from of stainless steel), I etched brass with the same acid. Dissolved copper from brass sat on the steel of the blade. The photo is not very good quality, but visually - the effect was quite beautiful. Why copper sat on only one petal - I don’t understand ... If anyone has come across such a curious effect and shares their thoughts, I would be very grateful. It would be very beautiful if the tips of all flame petals had the same golden hue. I will experiment...

Now we etch the very “somewhere” on the knife handle where the eagle flies. The fiery element to which he aspires... Or returns... I didn't ask him.
The process is similar. Degreasing, varnishing, drying, scratching with a cunning scratcher, etching, cleaning. Here is the result.

Now, with a very fine sandpaper, we remove the copper coating from the petal, grind the blade, grind the butt of the blade, grind the handle, grind the entire knife around the perimeter. It will look like this in the future.

We polish the wedge, the handle, the knife itself along the perimeter and, in general, everything that can shine.
Let's see what happened.

Partially assemble the knife. Straighten the cutting edge. Decrease its angle. We sharpen. We make the knife vicious and sharp. If you go back a few images, you can see the difference between the cutting edge before and after sharpening.

We collect the knife finally.

We bring it "to the razor".

We admire the polishing of one side of the knife.

We consider the reflection in the figure from the other side.

Putting down the knife.

Compare: what it is now and what it was before.

Everything.
The knife is ready.
Hair shaves.
The wish is done.
The customer is satisfied.



Greetings to those who like to craft and work with metal. In this manual, we will talk about the simplest homemade knife that you can easily do with your own hands. Making such a knife is not difficult, it is even very simple. Of the most complex and expensive machines that the author has used is a belt grinder. But it is needed mainly in order to make bevels. In general, this procedure can be dealt with with files, and grinding is done manually with sandpaper.


This knife is interesting for its unique pattern, it is made by etching. Such a pattern will be durable, it will make your knife unique. You can make an inscription or any pattern of your choice. And in order for the knife to turn out to be of high quality, you need to use good steel, it must contain as much carbon as possible, then it can be hardened. Similar steel can be found among various cutters, tools, and so on. The key feature of this steel is that when cut, very thick sparks are obtained. If you work with ordinary steel at low speeds, you may not see sparks at all, but carbon steel will form sparks. Abroad, craftsmen use steel O1, 1095 and others like it. So, let's take a closer look at how to make such a knife!

Materials and tools used by the author:

List of materials:
- carbon steel;
- wood for overlays;
- brass rods, tubes and so on (for pins);
- epoxy glue and dye;
- wood impregnation oil.

List of tools:
- Bulgarian;
- belt sander;
- Bulgarian;
- marker;
- drill;
- vice;
- clamps;
- drill;
- power supply, saline solution, etc. (for etching);
- sandpaper;
- files;
- tool for sharpening knives.

Knife making process:

Step one. Cut out the main profile
We simply cut out the main profile with the help of a grinder. We cut out the concave places in pieces, making transverse cuts. If you have a band cutter, this task can be done much faster.

Well, then we proceed to polishing those places that we could not cut off. For these purposes, we again work with the help of a grinder. This time we need a thick grinding disc. With it, we bring the contour to an almost finished look.
For finer work, we use a belt sander. We also grind the plane of the blade.








Step two. Drilling holes for pins
We drill holes for the pins in the handle area. They should be of such a diameter that the pins enter with a minimum clearance, then the handle will hold as securely as possible. The author clamps the blade in a vise and drills holes with a conventional drill. Steel must not be hardened, otherwise it can only be drilled with a special drill with a carbide tip.


Step three. We form bevels
Now we have to form the bevels on the blade. Thus, we will set the main cutting characteristics of the knife. In order for the knife to cut perfectly, the bevels must be as smooth as possible. But to teach the rigidity of the blade, they can be done at a more right angle. For such work, the author uses a belt grinder, on which this is done simply and conveniently. First, we take a drill of the same thickness as the thickness of the workpiece and draw a centering line along the blade. And to make it clearly visible, the metal can be preliminarily painted over with a marker. We will use this line as a guideline so that the bevels are symmetrical.








Now we fasten the blade to a wooden block or use a special clamp, that's all, you can start grinding. When grinding, the metal heats up, just holding the blade in your hands will be problematic. We try not to overheat the metal when grinding. If the blade will be hardened, the blade is not sharpened, its very minimum thickness should be 2 mm. Otherwise, alloying additives can burn out from the metal, and the steel will turn into ordinary raw material.

Step four. Heat treatment of metal
Heat treatment includes two stages, quenching and tempering. The temperature conditions and the medium for hardening are selected depending on the steel grade. In most cases, knife steels are hardened in oil, and they need to be heated to a red or sometimes yellowish glow. If hardening is successful, the blade will no longer be taken with a file, while the metal will be brittle.



After hardening, a procedure called tempering follows. To understand to what temperature to heat the metal, it is advisable to grind the blade before tempering. When its color changes to straw, this will indicate that the vacation was a success. On average, the blades are heated for about an hour at a temperature of 200 degrees using an oven. Steel should cool down smoothly, along with the oven.

Step five. Grinding
After heat treatment, a dark coating forms on the metal, which is the result of oxidation. This whole thing needs to be cleaned up. To do this, use sandpaper dipped in water. You can also go over the blade on a belt sander. As a result, the blade can be polished, thereby preparing for etching.


Step six. Handle Assembly
The pen is dominated by dark tones, as the author intended. To make it look interesting, we take a drill and make cuts along the handle on the blade. When these parts are filled with epoxy with black dye, everything will look great.

You can also come up with interesting pins. You can take a copper or brass tube, come up with an interesting filler and then fill the tubes with epoxy resin with dye.


















We cut out the overlays, for this we use a dark-colored tree. If desired, you can use a stain or dark-colored oil. The overlays should turn out to be two pieces approximately the same in shape. That's all, you can collect the pen. We carefully clean the surfaces to be glued so that the glue adheres well. Metal can be processed with coarse sandpaper, so the glue will stick much better. As glue, the author used epoxy with the addition of a dark color dye.

We clamp the handle with clamps, this will evenly stick together with overlays along the entire length. Well, then we wait a day, after which it will be possible to confidently process the handle.

At the end, we proceed to grinding the handle, we form the desired shape. This can be done with a grinder, with a drill, or even by hand using files and sandpaper. We make the handle perfectly smooth. At the end, the handle must be soaked in oil, so the wood will be protected from moisture, and the handle will look great.

Step seven. Picture etching
The pattern on the blade makes the knife unique. For this procedure, we use a power supply, and we will also need water with ordinary table salt, the concentration should be maximum. We draw a drawing on the blade, paint over everything else with varnish or paint. Where the metal surface is exposed, etching will occur.

share personal experience in this seemingly simple matter.
Because I am a radio amateur, I often do printed circuit boards technique LUT (Laser-ironing technology). Recently, a fellow biker asked me a question: is it possible to pickle steel to make different fuss and how exactly to do it. Gust of the Internet, I made sure that the solution ferric chloride in the water eats not only copper on the textolite but almost any iron. What I was able to verify when it spilled onto my galvanized balcony sheet and the very next day I saw decent holes there ... In short, I thought, purkua would not have been pa ...
So we need:
Ferric chloride 200g (70 rubles)
Water 0.5 liters (from the tap)
Printer LASER black and white.
A sheet of paper with text and the least number of pictures from Popular Mechanics or Iron magazine. For some reason, the printer chews paper from Lisa magazines and others ...
Iron.
Comp with Word or any graphic editor who cares. I did it in Word, where the drawing is easiest to stretch as you like.
Sample drawing - took on tattoo sites.
Technology.
Choose a drawing and stretch it as you like.
We take a knife or a piece of iron, we clean it with a zero sandpaper.
We print the drawing on the area with the text of the prepared sheet.
We put it on a knife and iron it with a hot iron until it sticks and the toner slightly comes through the paper.
If necessary, we do the same on the second side of the knife.
We put the knife under water (in a bowl or ladle) for 5-10 minutes.
Fingers begin to rub on paper. The paper rolls and the toner remains on the metal.
If the toner tears, then re-skin and make drawings on the new one and iron it harder and longer.
After that, we protect the rest of the surface of the knife where there will be no etching or by painting it with paint, NC varnish, bituminous varnish. I, in my immeasurable laziness, completely wrapped it with tape ...
So so. IMPORTANT. If you want the etching to be of high quality, you will have to go over the drawing from above or with a marker with paint. Those. something to “strengthen” it, because the toner sticks with small holes and there will be undercuts. The same applies to minor flaws in the translation of the picture.
We put an object with a pattern into a solution of 200 g of ferric chloride in 500 ml of water. (Dissolve not all at once, but in parts - it heats up).
Periodically we take it out and pass it under running water with a paint brush. After a couple of hours, we get a noticeable etching of 0.3-0.5 mm.
Then we overwrite everything with sandpaper and polish or not polish ... Depending on laziness

A sample of the resulting bottom. As I said, it turned out to be undergrass, but this gave the ornament so to speak ... old or something ...








Of course it turned out so-so, but not bad for the first time
P.S / Any etching and inscriptions make the knife less durable and it usually breaks just along the etching line.
All success. 73!

Melee weapons have always attracted the attention of men. Especially knives from damascus steel. Tula blacksmiths not only revived the ancient secret of making a Damascus blade, but also improved and diversified the pattern on steel. The blade began to play with unusual wavy lines, various bizarre shapes. A blacksmith, like a woodcarver, thinks in advance what kind of drawing he wants to make, so that his product would be unique and bring beauty to connoisseurs of edged weapons.

I, a woodcarver from Tula, was lucky not only to decorate the handle of a knife, but also to acquaint you with my work. On the pages of this site I will show a master class on finishing the handle of a hunting knife made of Damascus steel. The handle of the knife is made of Caucasian walnut wood, which is distinguished by its strength and specific texture, which gives a beautiful color after processing. The size of the pen has a small tolerance for the realization of my plan. But more on that later. To begin with, I came up with a sketch, which I carefully drew on paper. I moved it to the top of the knife handle.

I would like to clarify my point. On the upper part there will be not only a thread, 3 directions will be connected here:

1) Thread

2) All silver

3) Inlay with voluminous boxwood inserts.

All this I concluded in one drawing, but in a different technical execution. This is quite difficult in execution, and therefore the invented bunch of a new connection is rarely used by me.
Well, perhaps, let's start piercing the threads of the back of the handle. With a semicircular chisel of a small radius, we pierce the carved layout along the back stop. The layout has the same pattern elements along the entire diameter of the handle.

Since I made the markup in advance, the fragments of the drawing turned out to be the same, which made it easier to puncture the contour.

In the lower part, a fragment of a leafy ornament is drawn, it seems to embody the beginning, the basis from which a carving and a notch emerge on the upper part of the handle. In my case, the pattern is symmetrical, so I make two identical punctures, changing only the radii of the chisels.

First of all, everything. The groove is punctured with radius chisels to a depth of 1 mm. Since the pattern is symmetrical, the puncture of one part of the pattern repeats the radius of the other part.

As the curl twists, the radius of the chisel decreases.

I will not rush with everything, but I will move on to the inlay of elements from boxwood. This will complement the drawing and visually arrange all the inserts in their places. I first sawed the leaves out of 3mm thick boxwood plates with a jigsaw. I chose this size so that in the flat-relief carving the inlaid boxwood leaves would later look voluminous with the carving.

I turn to the inlay of elements from boxwood.

The place for the leaf is chosen and I carefully try on the element in place. If the inlaid part does not enter immediately, then I cut the edge that interferes. I do not make efforts so as not to break the insert, but gradually adjust it in place. With a cranberry made from a thin needle file, I clean the bottom of the landing cavity so that the part sinks as deep as possible into the handle array and is flush with the surface.

Again we return to all things silver. But as I said earlier, the surface of the vase will be uneven and limited by space. This creates certain difficulties. The difficulty lies in the small size of the surface itself. The constant mobility of the product in work makes it necessary to focus on safety. As the Russian proverb says: "The eyes are afraid, but the hands are doing." Here's how to protect your hands! After all, with these hands, holding a flat chisel, I smoothly lower the surface of the notch. And in some places, along with boxwood inserts, because. inlaid leaves are an integral part of the alley and one connecting element.

Increase

The pattern of a silver thread, which has a thickness of 0.2 mm, is already clearly visible. and a width of 0.76 mm. Now my idea is becoming clearer to you, where the lines of the notch are smoothly connected, we correct the groove with a straight chisel. I flatten the tip of the silver ribbon and insert it into the groove close to the silver thread.

Increase

I press the thread into the groove, gently twisting it into a spiral curl. Having twisted the spiral, I cut off the silver at the end of the curl.

Increase

To give a finished look to the curl, you need to put a point. Silver dot. To do this, I make a small puncture with an awl at the end of the curl.

Increase

We hammer the protruding piece of wire, but not completely. I do this so that when stripping, the silver point has smooth edges, and is not deformed by wire cutters.

Increase

Choosing the background, I expose the contour of the notch and carving.

Increase

Only the contour of the vase and thread was drawn.

The surface must be perfectly flat, without mechanical traces of processing. To do it neatly in a limited space, you have to try. Having cleaned the surface of the handle with a needle file and emery (except for carving fragments), I moisten it with water.
Increase

The water raises the pile when it dries. This is clearly visible on the surface. After drying, I protect the surface with sandpaper. Again, I urinate and clean up, but with fine emery. I do this so that in the future, when impregnated with drying oil, the pile no longer rises, and the final polishing takes less time. After the third impregnation, I do not use emery. The entire surface becomes smooth and matte.

Sampling is carried out from the middle to the edges. This is in order not to crush the edges of the recess border with a chisel. Having adjusted the insert, I put it on the glue, but so that it rises above the surface. Having visually compared the second insert on the other side and making sure of their symmetry, I outline the outline. I also inlay the second insert.

I give the elements the shape of the surface of the handle. Both elements rise above the surface by approximately 2mm. I left this height for the next cut, so that they are voluminous. In this part of the master class, you can see how the handle is transformed. From above and below, floral ornaments float on it, intertwined with a silver inlay and inlaid with volumetric inserts of boxwood. The back of the handle is encircled by a layout of identical plant elements. It remains to give shape to all this splendor. This is what I will do in the third part of my master class.

Part 3

This preparation is essential. It is a definite and important link for the next stage of cutting the plant element. Going further, I use a chisel whose radius matches the small sizes of the various elements of the layout.

I cut each leaf of the layout with a chisel. Starting from the tips of the sheet and smoothly moving to the central part. The beginning of the leaf is cut with the entire radius of the chisel. Moving to the middle of the sheet, I smoothly turn the chisel. With this movement, I adjust the width of the cut and cut through the bottlenecks with the tip of the radius chisel. Prepared technology is present for each element, no matter where it is located. At the bottom of the handle, lowering the element, I also cut the central part of the sheet with a corner.

Many people think: “Why such training? She takes time. Immediately passed the radius, and that's it! But no, when the fragment is not prepared, the radius of the chisel cuts off the excess on a flat surface, sometimes chipping off the fragment without having time to give it a shape. According to the prepared fragment, the chisel moves along the geometry of the sheet and cuts only what is needed. At this moment I control the cut itself.

And on the other hand. So the thread elements will be the same in cutting and in shape. Inlaid boxwood leaflets are prepared and cut in the same way as carving, although they are inlaid parts of the notch. They have the same volume as the thread.

Having finished with a flat-relief carving, I begin to chamfer the notch, which, in the process of interlacing with the carving, has fuzzy edges.

I immerse the product in drying oil for a day, if the volume allows or lubricate it abundantly. After the drying oil is absorbed and dries a little, I protect the surface with fine emery to remove the film.

I repeat this process until the drying oil is no longer absorbed. At the last cleaning, already worked out with fine sandpaper, the surface is polished and acquires a smooth surface, pleasant to the touch. Well, that's it, my "work report" has come to an end. In it, I told in detail and showed all my secrets, many asked me about this. Maybe other masters do it differently, and this is their right. Everyone has their own approach, their own technology. I tried for you and for those people who will hold this edged weapon in their hands, let them feel the tenderness and warmth of not only the wood from which this handle is made, but also a particle of the master's soul.

Sincerely!
Valery Prostyankin.

 

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