My take on polishing, as there is more than one way to skin a cat.
>From my vintage motorcycle experience (large alloy surfaces) the way to
a mirror like restoration finish was the "going through the wet&dry
grades" method as mentioned previously. Then use a polishing/buffing
wheels (several grades here as well) with special polishing. When you
get to this level, autosol and average cotton rag is too abrasive and
will actually dull the finish! The reason for the wet&dry is to remove
metal to get past surface imperfections ie scatches.
Then I was speaking about this with a friend who is into hot rods. He
just rubbed alloy rocker covers with steel wool and finished them with
autosol. I was fairly horrified at this treatment after all the effort
that went into my motorbike.
So there I was last week building my fixie, wanting to polish up an old
Weinmann centre pull brake. Too many curves & fiddly for the wet and
dry, so I tried the steel wool. It ripped the oxide off in a flash,
then I autosol'd and was amazed at the results. From matt grey to
mirror in minutes.
So in short my new technique is:
- previously polished, in good condition with oxiding - steel wool
(someone will say brasswool(?) as it doesnt rust if fibres get left
behind)
- scratched, machine marked or previously un-polished - wet&dry paper
until a smooth but dull finish is acheived.
- polish with Autosol, using soft cotton rags (tshirt material, not
business shirt type), and use heaps as it quickly gets full of the
oxide/metal you are trying to remove.
So now is my chance to show off my fixed, no close up of the brake
though
http://homepage.hispeed.ch/gwalton/bicycles/firstfixed.jpg
