getting a polished look on alloys?

[w17led]

Hi guys,

as its a long weekend , was just wondering if anyone on the zone has used polishing kits for alloys.

I have a set of Azevs and the lips have gone a bit black and got a rough feel to them.

anyone used anything that will get the alloy lips back to original shine, was thinking of getting a dremel tool kit, any good?

your help would be appreciated

thanks

[dazleeds]

several grades of sandpaper and lots of elbow grease

[mrLEE30]

wet sand paper, start with 500 and progress to 1000 or 2000, then finish with a polishing wheel on the dremmel, but not too fast or it will ''burn'' the aluminium.
then finally finish with polishing compound and a wet rag. it will take you 5-6 hours per wheel.

i polished a sheet of stainless steel for my boat dashboard, took me 9 hours solid but result was mirror finish

mrlee

[w17led]

ok sort of get how to do it.

Is there not a bit on the dremel that u can use instead of sandpaper so it makes the process faster

thanks

[Turbo-Brown]

The problem with dremmely things is that you only have a tiny contact patch which makes it easy to overdo little bits i.e. remove too much material.

Polishing is pretty thankless to be honest, I took a set of wheels to a polishers and got them done for about £80. The guy did a much better job than I could've too.

Alas, those wheels turned out to be bent so that was a complete waste of £80

[mrLEE30]

there are millions of heads available for the Dremmel but it turns way too fast to polish metal and as said its too small. only one way for DIY and thats to spend 5-6 hours per wheel. If the wheels are really bad then get a drill and metal brush for the end and start like that, then you willl have to poilish out all the scrathches you have created. As said for 80 quid easier to get it done by a pro.

mrlee

by the way this is me with1. wheel cleaner, scrubbing brush then sand papaer and finally a dremmel and working for about three hours, then gave up and sent to pro, you can obviously see the difference.

The right wheel after three hours....



and about 80 quid later



moral of this story is as said above its a thankless task and easier to get it done by a pro

mrlee

[DaveD]

try a 3m flap finisher on the end of an electric screwdriver/drill...£1 from poundland

hey Lee, your's are stainless anyway...you are not going to get ordinary alloys like that!