[Hector A.]

Hello,

How does one go about taking care of a sword with a blued finish or a antiqued finish? Do you simply oil the guard and pommel as you would normal fittings, do they wear off over time or rust?

If rusted do you just scot-brit pad normally or is there precautions to be taken...?

Basically I know very little of how to take care of swords who are blued, antiqued or even browned ( these are all Albion terms don't know if they are really called this way ).

Any and all information on this subject would be greatly appreciated, as i will soon own a blued and antiqued sword and i am afraid out of ignorance of making a maintenance mistake and ruining them .

Thank you in advance for all your help.

ps: I tried very hard to find answers to these questions prior to posting, but without any luck, so i'm guessing the answer might be as simple as: "treat them normally", but better safe then sorry, that's why i'm checking .

[Harry Marinakis]

Good question, I'm interested, too.

[Lloyd Winter]

here's my $0.02 worth.
Don't use abrasives on bluing or it will wear off really quick.

Cold bluing will wear off a lot faster than hot bluing under normal circumstances, I've seen hot blueing last for years and I've see it last for days, of course I could say the same about cold bluing.
Oil or better yet silicone with soft cloths are your best bets for protection.

If a cold blued piece is rusted then you are going to lose some of the bluing when you clean it up. You can clean it a little and hope for a nice patina or completely clean it and re-blue it with chemicals ending up with anything from a complete new bluing job or just a little bit of grey to anything in between.

I don't have a lot of experience with antiqued fitting so I don't have much to say on that count, but my Kingmaker has a heavy duty Albion antiquing job on the fitting and I don't think it really can rust after what they did to it. After 3 years now it shows no signs of additional corrosion or wear.

Most of my experience with hot blueing comes from modern fire-arms not blades or fittings so I'll leave that portion for others. Same for hot browning and fire bluing.

[Greg Ballantyne]

Like you Lloyd I'm thinking about blued firearms made in the last 50 years. I've used silicone, but mainly gun oil. Silicone fills the pores of the metal, and it won't hold the oil as well after that. I use gun oil on swords as well. The difference on blued metal is removal of rust should it appear. You should try something not very abrasive. I've used pencil erasers, sometimes ink erasers, or if they don't work hardware cloth. The more abrasive of course the more bluing you'll lose. Rust should not appear if the metal is not neglected. If it is kept oiled periodically and stored right you should never see it on properly blued steel.
At least that has been my experience..... with firearms. While I don't have any swords with blued fittings, to this point sword care performed similar to firearm care for me has yielded predictable results.

[Lafayette C Curtis]

Bluing and such are surface oxidation processes meant to retard or inhibit the development of rust, so if the weapon rusts anyway then maybe you should consider changing its conditions of storage or something like that.

[Ant Mercer]