I have a titanium handled balisong that I wish to anodize using cola and 9 volt batteries as described recently in Popular Science. Do I have to remove the stainless steel blade and allen screws for the process to work or can I just attach the wires and chuck the whole thing in a bowl of diet Pepsi?
I (given the cost of a Benchmade) would not take the chance that you might etch the stainless steel. Strip the whole thing down and only do the handles.
Since is easy to take apart, remove the screws and blades, anodize only the titanium handle parts.
Disclaimer - this is based solely on my own home experiments with DIY anodization.
As has been said, you don’t want any non-titanium metal connected to the anode to be in the electrolyte solution. Ideally you either want to hang the part to be anodized on a titanium hook. Barring that, attach a wire to one end of the piece, dip the other end in the bath till anodized, then move the wire to the anodized area and do the other side.
You also want the area of the cathode exposed to the electrolyte to be comparable to the area of the anode. Which means don’t just have a wire end dangling in the bath, attach the cathode to a piece of stainless foil or something.
In my experience soda makes a poor anodizing solution. I’ve had much better results with baking soda dissolved in water. For one thing, a clear electrolyte lets see how well the anodizing is coming along.