Taking Care of Your Archangel Steel Works

Please, don’t store your sword in the sheath over any kind of long term period. The sheath is meant for transport, handling, and wearing, rather than storage, as sheaths can hold moisture near the steel and cause rusting. A great strategy is to hang your sword collection on your walls as art. That’s what we do.

Your sword is made of high-carbon steel, heat treat hardened in the salt bath method. Thus, it is fabulous at holding an edge and has great durability but needs to be cared for properly. You should oil your blade monthly and/or after each use and handling, especially if your fingers (skin oils/acids) have touched the steel.

We use a liquid, food grade, penetrative oil in the workshop, but we also use PB Blaster in our armory and shipping area. Try to avoid getting a lot of PB Blaster on the leather of the handle.

Whenever you use or wear your sword or finger marks have been left on it, the steel should be gently rubbed down with oil. Finger oils and acidity on high carbon steel makes it more vulnerable to oxidation in those places that were touched.

There are special oils, such as Hanwei Sword Oil, which is a great choice for oiling your blades, but if you have 3-in-1 Oil, machine/sewing machine oil, or gun oil, those will work. You can even use mineral oil, if you’re in a pinch. If you have nothing else at hand, you can use WD40, but I would get a better product for long-term care of your high-carbon blades. Basically, you want to use a product that will leave a thin, penetrative, protective barrier to prevent rusting. WD40 evaporates pretty rapidly, so it is not an ideal solution for long-term protection.

The British Museum developed a product, specifically for protecting their artifacts, called Renaissance Wax. It is affordable and easily ordered on Amazon or many other online stores. The wonderful thing about this product is that it was developed to care for and to preserve wood, leather, marble, paintings, and metals. :) Thus, you can safely use it on both the steel and the leather wrapped handle. If I were to choose my favorite product for maintaining our art for long-term storage, I would opt for Renaissance Wax. Use it sparingly all over your sword, including the handle, and hang it on your wall. Depending upon the humidity in your air, a very thin coating will create a barrier between your high carbon steel and the air that should last a few months. Get in the habit of reapplying a bit more often during very humid seasons.

UPDATE: Since I wrote this "Maintenance" page we have discovered a product called Fluid Film. We were getting a bit desperate when even PB Blaster was letting us down at Michigan Renaissance Festival last summer. We had the wettest, most humid season ever and we were having issues with the high carbon steel weaponry we had out there. It was so moist and humid everywhere, everyday. Christian discovered Fluid Film and it was a huge game changer. We don't use PB Blaster as much anymore.
We have Fluid Film in a 5-gal. bucket, but we began with a small spray can of it and once we knew it was the solution, we bought bulk.
However, our customers will only use a very thin coating of it on their steel, so a regular spray can of it should last a very long time.
You can easily purchase it at Amazon, Meijer, Wally World, AutoZone, or pretty much anywhere that would carry automotive goods.

Do be careful to not make your grip slippery with a coating though. Use any leather oil, such as the Renaissance Wax or neatsfoot oil, sparingly on the sword handle. I would note though, that most people wear leather gloves when using swords, because they help protect the hands and give better grip.

Also, please be aware that conditioning leather tends to darken it, however, by the time you've received a weapon from us, the handle has typically already been oiled at least once.

All of that said, I also want to caution you to be very careful when cleaning your sharp blades. I wear gloves when cleaning and handling the swords. This also helps me avoid getting my hand oils on the blades. Thick leather or some other cut-resistant glove material works well.

Oh, and one last thing...when I am taking photos of the swords, I clean and oil them first and I use a lint-free cloth to wipe the excess oil off. Inexpensive lint-free rags can be very commonly found in the automotive section at Meijer, AutoZone, or any other chain or local hardware/automotive store.

I’m going to add yet another “last thing”…While Archangel steel weapons are very strong, except for our flat munitions blades, Christian doesn’t create them for the purpose of chopping logs and other hard impacts with dense wooden objects. As weaponry, his art was designed to cut through steel plate armor and flesh. They weren’t meant to be backyard tools. Let us know if you intend to do yard chores with them and we can add extra welds to help them take the abuse.

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us if you have any questions. We can be reached via our website, our Etsy store, or any of the major social media networks where we have accounts, and we are very quick to respond. The links for all of them are at the bottom of each of our pages here.