Need ID help for Disston Handsaw

[steven c newman]

There is a paste I use...the same used to re-blue gun barrels....cold gun blue. Wipe a coating on over where the etch should be...allow to dry, that lightly sand until the higher spots are cleaned off. leaving the lower (etch, rust pits) still a blue/black colour. Etch should appear, if it is still there...

[Mark R Webster]

Thanks Steven, what is the condition of the saw blade afterwards.. is it altered in any negative visual ways. Do you have to treat the whole blade to balance color changes?
Thanks

[steven c newman]

You'll be applying it just to the area of the etch. When you sand away the "excess" the rest of the plate should match...depending on how well you have cleaned it...Should only be blue down in the "low spots" like an etch. Beyond that...maybe a few rusty pits.

Others have just rubbed the area with a black Sharpie pen, allowed that to dry, then sand back. Mainly to find out IF there is an etch still there..
The Farmer.jpg
After the gun blue paste was used....don't mind the fingerprints....

[Mark R Webster]

Thanks Steven, I will give it a try, be nice if the etch came as as well as yours but it is probably gone or almost gone on mine.

[Mark R Webster]

Tried the sharpie, nothing comes up ... I guess the etch is just gone

[lowell holmes]

Well,
I have a D12 that came to me minus a handle. So it now has a new curly maple handle, new saw nuts, has been re-toothed and is living happily
on my shop wall. I re-toothed to 10 tpi crosscut.
Enjoy your saw, I do mine. You can read the etch on it.

[Mark R Webster]

I am beginning to think that the saw is an Atkins No 56 with a Disston medallion. The carving looks more like the Atkins to me and the back being skewed pushes me further that way. I have found several pics that reinforce the thought. If this is in fact the Atkins with a Disston medalion, just wondering if any of you know which medallion should be on the saw... the AAA or the Phoenix? I can't make it out which in the pics I have found. Here is one from one of the catalogs.

[Rob Paul]

If its an Atkins 56 it would have been part of Atkin's "Sheffield Saw Works" line of saws, most likely with their "Sheffield" medallion

[Mark R Webster]

Thanks Rob!!

[Joe Tilson]

Mark,
I use Brass Darkening Solution to raise the etch in the same manner Steven mentions.
Just in the etch area.
Good fortune in getting an answer to your saw.

[Mark R Webster]

Thanks for suggestion!!

[Noah Magnuson]

If it is an Atkins plate, they are notoriously shallow etches compared to some others.

[Mark R Webster]

I would say that is the case here.

[steven c newman]

gun blue.jpg
What I have been using...
rehabbed saw.jpg
Has a VERY Faint etch...Atkins Perfection 64...
medallion.jpg
I'd have to dig the saw out of the til, and see what the medallion is...

[Mark R Webster]

Thanks for the visual Steven. I will keep an eye out for the blueing material. I think the etch is gone though . In general do the madallions fit over an indention of into an indention. With the medallion off there is an indention the size of the smaller indention. Do the medallions fit over any indentions or into them. I suppose some indentions could be from overthightening but this one is fairly deep.