bertmoog
Yes, I am.
does anybody know the in's and out's of metal polishing, i.e. materials, equipment, technique? wrightme43 ? bmccrary?
A very clean professional finish. I like it very much.
Nelly
does anybody know the in's and out's of metal polishing, i.e. materials, equipment, technique? wrightme43 ? bmccrary?
Yeah. I spent a year working at a bronze foundry. A lot of sculptures needed to be brought to a mirror finish. We had it down to a science. With the right tools and techniques, you can take rough metal to mirror polished in about five minutes.
So yeah, I know a bit about it. Ask away.
Fred
that's why i said in my initial post that i clearcoated it.
i recently read something about applying the solvent, that would have made it a lot easier! i didnt think it would work that well on the powder coating, plus, what would do to the tire if some got on it? oh well, next fz6 i get, i'll try it.:thumbup:
does anybody know the in's and out's of metal polishing, i.e. materials, equipment, technique? wrightme43 ? bmccrary?
Heres What I did with mine
See here for some choice abrasives.
3M Industrial Products Catalog: adhesives, tapes, abrasives and more
Generally, we'd use the roloc pads. For a pitted surface, start with a yellow pad. Then red, and finally blue.
For your wheels, you can start with a blue.
For odd shapes, try the Bristle line. You want the Radial Bristle Disks.
These will conform to strange shapes. But they don't last that long.
The Stars are also excellent for working into tight corners. At the foundry we had versions of these made of sandpaper. I never used the Scotchbrite Stars as shown here, but made similar tools by cutting up the Roloc disks when necessary.
This is all pre-polish stuff. For final polishing, just use buffing wheels with coarse and then fine polish. Use a different wheel for each grit of polish and don't mix them up. You don't want to put coarse polish on your fine polishing wheel.
As far as tools, get the most powerful tool you can. For your wheels, a die grinder is ideal, provided that you have a good source of compressed air. The air compressor you bought for $200 at Sears is not adequate unless you like working for 30 seconds and then waiting five minutes while the compressor refills. At the foundry our compressor had a two story tall air tank, and the compressor itself was a giant, electrically driven supercharger! And even that beast was running all day long, only shutting off when we went on break or to lunch.
If you can't use air, go with electric, and again, go big. If you were polishing a large item like a tank, I'd recommend an angle grinder with an adjustable speed control. For doing your wheels, you want some sort of electric die grinder like this. Electric Die Grinders | ToolBarn.com
A Dremel is not adequate. Well, it'll get the job done eventually, but it's going to take a really long time and about a hundred of those little wheels. And the polish won't be as good because with a small polishing wheel, you're working in small patches. That will show in your finished product.
Keep changing the angle you're working at. Coarse polish in one direction, and do your fine polishing at a 90 degree angle. This will help eliminate tool marks and make for a better looking result.
As far as working around the paint, I can't help you there. Everything we polished was bare metal. Finishes and patinas went on after we had finished our metalwork.
Hope this helps some.
Fred
This is what I used on mine.
Just stripped the paint off and cleaned then polished with this..........fits on a normal drill
Oz,
do you remember where you got that package?