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Old 07-18-2020, 02:12 PM
jimmontg jimmontg is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: Now live in Las Cruces NM.
Posts: 1,345
Backside

It just kind of comes off the smooth side of the leather and doesn't leave much. Use veg tan leather as it seems to work the best. I use oil based over water based as it lasts longer. I also use diamond paste up to 1 micron or 16,000 grit for buffing the edges of my leather cutting knives. Diamond paste is much more aggressive than buffing compounds especially on hardened steels.

I use a three inch or 8 centimeter soft cotton buffing wheels attached to 6mm shafts on my drill press for buffing exotic hardwoods or G-10/Micarta handles with 5,000 grit diamond compound on it. It doesn't take a lot of compound to really make my handles shine. With Desert Ironwood when buffed to a mirror polish you can actually see silicate crystals in the wood with a 5x magnifying glass, it's why the wood is so dense and hard and why it ruins saw blades.

Note; Do not use any kind of polishing compound on an open grain wood like Wenge wood as the compound will get stuck in the crevices. Sand to a high grit, 2000 grit is usually good enough to give the polished look. I then buff with a clean cotton buff and it looks polished.
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