Finished polishing the pipe :)

C

canusa

New member
Hey guys,



Just figured i'd let everyone who'd interested know that i got rid of most of the squiglies, and this is what i ended up with.



Before





Afters







I'm actually not very impressed with the results from the amount of work i had to do, but oh well.. my fingers are sore now and its staying like that.



Thanks to everyone who gave ideas about getting rid of those marks :)



-canusa
 
someone on here said something about being able to "seal" in that shine. or to improve it even more with better polish. any recommendations?
 
Looks like a nice job. Did you do anything other than polish by hand? I think you can get it to look a lot nicer using a buffing wheel. Just do a search on polishing aluminum.
 
I agree with Grimm. A buffing wheel attached to a variable speed drill will work wonders. Get a good aluminum polish (I'd recommend Blue Magic or Mothers) and work on those parts for a couple of minutes. You will be amazed. Just don't let the wheel go too fast and generate too much heat.
 
i used the mothers powerball with the polishes on my cordless drill. It didn't turn as black as i thought it would. and it was a PITA to get the residue off. i was using very low speeds on the dill. any recommendations??
 
should i use more or less force on the powerball, and how much polish should i be putting on the ball/on the piece
 
What kind of polish did you use, some sort of liquid? I ask because for this sort of polishing to get it top notch, I think the stuff that comes in a hard bar may be required. I've never used it myself, but I know that is what my dad has used before on his bench grinder to buff trim parts on old cars. But maybe it's not any better than the liquid stuff, I don't really know.
 
i used "Auto-sol" pretty thick paste in a tube, then mothers "power metal" more liquid like and finally mothers billet which is in a tin and is a paste. but i don't think i'm using the powerball correctly. it didn't turn black as i said before.. anyone who has used it have any advice?
 
The rouge bars you are talking about are much better than any liquid you can buy. They are basically sandpaper grit in a bar form. You rub them against a high speed buffing whhel and they melt onto the buffing wheel. Then you make passes on the piece you are polishing, frequently reloading the buff. It takes some time and patience to learn. Have to have the right pressure, wheel speed, etc. Using the rouge bars, you use a polisher with a speed between 1800-3000 rpm, which will give you the correct surface feet per minute in the buffing wheel. Most pro polishers use the Dewalt 849. I self taught myself and now do it as a side job polishing semis and such. It is a dirty job...just be warned. But just like in detailing, prep and good product bring in killer results.



Just as an example, to get aluminum to a mirror shine, you would statr with sandpaper. Depending on how bad the pitting is, probably start with a 320 grit, then 400, wetsand 600, and 800. Then start with the correct wheel and rouge bar, buff the whole piece, move to the next next wheel and rouge bar to remove the polishing scratches from the previous step, and then most likely repeat that step one more time with your softest wheel and rouge. It takes some time to get it perfect!!
 
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