BUFFING 101: polishing, prepping, shining, restoring, repairing...

[Redboy]

Cool thread, DRIVES. I've been meaning to up my polishing game a bit, so this thread's timely.

I have a Baldor 6" buffer with an assortment of buffing wheels and compounds - I don't know if anyone's mentioned it in this thread yet [EDIT: HAH! It's drivesitfar by a minute!! ], but it's important to have a dedicated wheel/buff for each compound. Use a marker to write the compound color on the side of the wheel as a reminder.

Most recently, I splurged on some nice brass wire wheels, and they're really excellent for removing paint and rust/patina without removing too much material.

 

[Know Wosad]

The polish job on that Wilton is only on the high spots.It looks great as an industrial tool. HOWEVER. You put that metal in a gun bluing tank and it'll come out looking like ****.
Metal is like wood. You start coarse and step from grit to grit removing ALL scratches from the previous grit.

 

[Roberts210]

Roberts: i bet you have made more than a few things shiny so if you have time post up some pictures of the items and the process. also what brand and type of compounds do you use with your buffer? great idea to wash the buffing wheels and i'm guessing they still work as well or does this shorten their lives?

DIF, I don't have pictures of the s.s. trim I polished. But while washing the buffs might possibly shorten their lives if I don't wash them they become unusable, so washing them lengthens their lives a lot. They work just fine after washing and drying.

 

[zmotorsports]

Here is my 1940 Chev coupe strip/show car that I built back in the early 90's. I started with GM's Torch Red and tweaked it a bit then shot it over a white sealer.

Blown small block engine.

My daily driver shop truck. Mildly built with a 75hp shot of nitrous that I occasionally took to the strip. Same kustom mixed color as my street rod above.

Daily driver 2006 Duramax that I repainted most of back in 2011 due to previous owners neglect. Similar process but not quite as in-depth as a full-on show job. Had to match the original paint on the areas that I didn't repaint, but still looks like it rolled off the assembly line after 10+ years of being on the road. Factory GM white.

Kustom built sand drag quad that I built in 2008 and my son raced up until three years ago. This was painted a kandy color from House of Kolor. Kandy Lime over Orion Silver.

My son's sand quad that we built and he raced. Black with scallops of Kandy Purple over Orion Silver.

Lots of work but well worth it to get the final result. Our 1940 Chev coupe was featured in Jan. 1997 issue of Street Rodder Magazine and both mine and my son's sand quads were featured in the Jan/Feb issue of Sand Sports Magazine.

Just a small sample of my past work but all using the same process I described earlier to cut & buff the clearcoat.

Mike.

 

[drivesitfar]

RED: GREAT MINDS!! thanks for the support and i agree we all can learn something from each other and from the smallest jobs to big ones we all want to learn how to make something better if we have the time to.

Z: i bet you've won several DAD OF THE YEAR AWARDS and i hope you son appreciates you. when you say BLOWN on your 1940 are you saying it has a blower or that you Blew it up?

nice job on the paint and polishing on all your rigs. WELL DONE!!

WO: good words and so true.

Roberts: thanks for clarifying

 

[don long]

Drives as you have requested
I will share what little I know about smoothing out cast Iron and brass and polishing it to a mirror finish.

When I find something old and cool I get it. I take it to my shop in the back yard and start playing with it.
I don't like the look of rough cast iron or the casting ribs from cast brass.
Being from the collision industry, I am accustomed to seeing my reflection in everything so that's what I do to almost anything I work on


With the tools and supplies I was able to turn this with all the rough casting marks

To this in about an hour

It's not quite ready to buff but it's close

So how did I get there??
First let me show you my tool set up.

Here is a shot of my sanding set up (I set it up to be my bondo table)

The front side.

The back side.

In the first pic. of my tool cart you see top row back side right to left
An air die grinder with a 3" roloc pad.
A 5" air grinder.
A 3" air grinder/polisher w/a velcro pad to hold various grits of sand paper
or a 3" buffing pad.
A 3" dual action palm sander (D/A).
An 8" bondo grinder.
A 6" D/A.
On the front row.
a 17" orbital air sander W/ a vacuum attachment.
A 17 " straight line air sander W/ a vaccum attachment.
A vixen file.
cheese graters.
2 hand sanding blocks.
A 4" and an 8" hand block with a velcro base and an air attachment.
Last is my 17" hand block with a velcro base and an air attachment.

First shelf is all the grinding discs and long sand paper starting with
17" 40 grit and 80 grit paper.
Then the 5"36 grit and 80 grit grinding discs.
Followed by 36 grit and 50 grit 3" roloc grinding discs and 36 and 50 grit 2".

The boxes down below are the screen type sanding paper to fit the velcro hand sanders.

There is a vacuum on the left side and a welder/dent puller on the right.

On the back side in those small boxes are the different grit 3 " velcro sanding discs 80, 120, 180, 240, and 400 grit

 

[don long]

I start the process of smoothing out the brass oiler by grabbing my die grinder with the 2" roloc pad and 50 grit disc and gently grind all the edges that I can reach. Then with another die grinder with a straight shaft and small 40 grit sandpaper rolls I try to reach in to the tighter areas of the oiler and grind the ares smooth.
I then take the 3" D/A with 80 grit paper I repeat the process and again with 120 or 150 grit paper and one more time with 220 grit and the next one is 400 grit. At this point I go back and hand sand the real tight spots with the 150 grit paper wrapped onto the spindle of my die grinder then repeat it with the other grits until the piece is almost shiny

To finish up the process I move over to my 8" Baldor buffer and the oxblood color rouge.
I wear a pair of tig welding gloves, safety glasses and an apron while working on my buffer and when finished the pieces look like new

When working with brass it is best to spray clear paint on them after polishing them.

One note the brass should be cleaned with a good wax / grease remover before spraying on the clear.
I tried powder coating the brass with clear but it turned the bright brass to a dull greyish color

 

[mjoekingz28]

Cool thread, DRIVES. I've been meaning to up my polishing game a bit, so this thread's timely.

I have a Baldor 6" buffer with an assortment of buffing wheels and compounds - I don't know if anyone's mentioned it in this thread yet [EDIT: HAH! It's drivesitfar by a minute!! ], but it's important to have a dedicated wheel/buff for each compound. Use a marker to write the compound color on the side of the wheel as a reminder.

Most recently, I splurged on some nice brass wire wheels, and they're really excellent for removing paint and rust/patina without removing too much material.

Redboy, so are you saying you have several bench mounted spinning wheels and each have the SAME kind of polishing pad, but you use chemically different rubbing/polishing compounds OR do you just have different 'grit polishing pads'?

 

[drivesitfar]

Don: excellent post as per usual. i love your little carts you've set up to do certain tasks. i'm probably going to ask you a few questions as i re read your post a few times, but wanted to thank you for taking the time to post what you did.

also i don't know if you saw this, but i posted up a few pictures of your GAS CART cause it's one of my favorites. you did a fantastic job restoring it.

cheers

ALL: speaking of different wheels on several bench grinders and buffers do any of you have a line up you'd like to post pictures of? with my small space i'm hoping to get some hitch mounts so i can pull grinders with different wheels on them off the shelf and use them instead of changing wheels, but eventually if we move or remodel i'd like to have 8 or 10 or so wheels at the ready to just move from one to the next. anybody already do that please post up your pictures and tell us what wheels you have on your machines?

 

[Know Wosad]

I wish I hadn't lost my documentation from the seventies.
My kit consisted of 10" soft felt wheels from Paramount. 1" wide.My compounds were from Brownells. 220,320,400,500 and white grease blocks were the final step. They called that one polish-o ray 555,as I recall.Its just a standard white final step used by many and I still keep a wheel on my machine today to remove scratches from chrome and stainless.The other abrasives were a grayish, gritty "clay" in round tubes.One wheel for each grit. MARKED.
The final step is a loose muslin, one inch wide.Be careful because that type of wheel will ****** a part and punch it through the drywall behind the machine.
Buffing wheels should be run at 3450 or so.Slower is "grabbier"

 

[Know Wosad]

I spent 18 months prepping metal before, and after, the master engravers cut and often embedded gold wire at the Colt Custom Shop. I worked mainly with Howard Dove...... for you gun freaks. Perfection was the demand when someone ordered(s) a $10,000 pistol(back then). I also did some repair-resto for Purdy of England. I was a young man back then. Not possible for me today. Too battered.

 

[1/2 Cup]

drives, thank you for kicking this thread off, consider it subscribed..

 

[Redboy]

Redboy, so are you saying you have several bench mounted spinning wheels and each have the SAME kind of polishing pad, but you use chemically different rubbing/polishing compounds OR do you just have different 'grit polishing pads'?

I have several similar cotton buffer wheels of the same type (layers of cotton cloth, stitched together), but each is dedicated to a specific polishing compound. Hope this helps.

 

[CrotalusAtrox]

Here are a few Items I shined up. I used the same method as some of the experts start with a sand paper grit that cuts the amount of material you want removed that could be anywhere from 60 to 150 and up depending. If there are deep gouges I use a file to remove material. I do use a belt sander on some things but sparingly, they can cause more harm then good if your not paying close attention.

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[drivesitfar]

CA: thanks for taking the time to post up some of your shiny vises and drill press. you made an american flag one time on the side of your REED's jaws or was that just a reflection cause your steel was like a mirror?

Wo: since you don't have any (or do you) pictures of some of your past projects feel free to keep commenting and maybe post up a few of the ones shown on this forum that you think are worth mentioning. a lot of guys with the talent to spiff up their stuff don't always have time to post so i bet they would love for us to post for them. thanks in advance.

1/2: Welcome and hope you enjoy the thread. speaking of shiny if you have a minute can you post up how you spiffed up that used engine and what tools you used cause it looks better than new now? if i recall correctly you did it with a hand drill and maybe a router bit?

ALL: thanks for posting your comments and/or pictures of your ways you shine up your STUFF and feel free to post more than once if you have several. and for those of us that don't have those skills yet if you might post up other member's projects that works too cause we can never have too many pictures of cool tools can we?

 

[CrotalusAtrox]

CA: thanks for taking the time to post up some of your shiny vises and drill press. you made an american flag one time on the side of your REED's jaws or was that just a reflection cause your steel was like a mirror?

Wo: since you don't have any (or do you) pictures of some of your past projects feel free to keep commenting and maybe post up a few of the ones shown on this forum that you think are worth mentioning. a lot of guys with the talent to spiff up their stuff don't always have time to post so i bet they would love for us to post for them. thanks in advance.

1/2: Welcome and hope you enjoy the thread. speaking of shiny if you have a minute can you post up how you spiffed up that used engine and what tools you used cause it looks better than new now? if i recall correctly you did it with a hand drill and maybe a router bit?

ALL: thanks for posting your comments and/or pictures of your ways you shine up your STUFF and feel free to post more than once if you have several. and for those of us that don't have those skills yet if you might post up other member's projects that works too cause we can never have too many pictures of cool tools can we?

I did the same Flag reflection on the Morgan I posted above. I saw it done on a 1911 barrel chamber and thought it looked really good so I tried it on few of my vises.

 

[1/2 Cup]

All, there is nothing more satisfying that seeing a piece of metal being brought to back to life.

I do not have a decent buff, but I built this one some 30 years ago and its still going strong coupled with a heap of used buff wheels that my BIL gave from his chrome plating business. Crude but it works well.

View media item 38943
Many may know that I am restoring a 1930 Model A Ford


The A has a lot of stainless steel and its so rewarding to be able to bring it back to life. One piece, that being the radiator surround was a challenge.
Firstly they a real hard to find in good original condition and secondly the metal is super thin, it burns easily and if you get too much heat it warps even easier which is almost impossible to straighten.

I spent over a week on this and here is the result.

View media item 37629
Pretty happy with the outcome..

 

[drsung]

wrong thread

 

[zmotorsports]

Here are a few Items I shined up. I used the same method as some of the experts start with a sand paper grit that cuts the amount of material you want removed that could be anywhere from 60 to 150 and up depending. If there are deep gouges I use a file to remove material. I do use a belt sander on some things but sparingly, they can cause more harm then good if your not paying close attention.

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Very nice work.

Mike.

 

[zmotorsports]

All, there is nothing more satisfying that seeing a piece of metal being brought to back to life.

I do not have a decent buff, but I built this one some 30 years ago and its still going strong coupled with a heap of used buff wheels that my BIL gave from his chrome plating business. Crude but it works well.
]

The A has a lot of stainless steel and its so rewarding to be able to bring it back to life. One piece, that being the radiator surround was a challenge.
Firstly they a real hard to find in good original condition and secondly the metal is super thin, it burns easily and if you get too much heat it warps even easier which is almost impossible to straighten.

I spent over a week on this and here is the result.

View media item 37629
Pretty happy with the outcome..

My hat is off to you on polishing that shell. That is a LOT of work and it turned out great.

Mike.

 

[1/2 Cup]

My hat is off to you on polishing that shell. That is a LOT of work and it turned out great.

Mike.

Thank you Mike..

 

[drivesitfar]

Sung: might not be the best place to advertise your extra tools, but i bet that is a solid grinder. can you go in your profile and put your area in so maybe a local member can meet you with cash or maybe a trade for another tool he doesn't use?

1/2: AMAZING and WELL DONE SIR!!

thanks for sharing. did you just use that buffer or do tell all the hand tools that you might have use to make that radiator shine? also if you might have the pictures of you using your special tools to clean up your son's new engine that would be great if you have some time to.


ALL: we all love the pictures and if you can post up pictures of your tools in action and maybe how you used them or got them ready to use that would be great.

 

[drsung]

Sung: might not be the best place to advertise your extra tools, but i bet that is a solid grinder. can you go in your profile and put your area in so maybe a local member can meet you with cash or maybe a trade for another tool he doesn't use?

Sorry, it was more of a "is this polisher any good"? vs "who wants to buy this polisher"? Post has been deleted...

 

[drivesitfar]

Sung: without your area in your profile either city/state or region nobody would know about shipping costs unless they PM you. that's all i was saying and if you prefer to not put it in your profile just edit your post with the picture of the buffer and put the area in that post if you want to find a good home for it. if you were local to me i'd consider it and not sure if you want to sell it for $10, $20 or more, but Milwaukee tools are some of my better tools especially the older ones.

more information helps, but generally we don't put tools up for sale or trade in threads. you now have 100 posts so you can put up your tool in the classifieds and if you need help doing that just ask.

 

[drivesitfar]

ALL: anybody else want to share how they use their buffers or other tools to spiff up their STUFF please post up pictures and methods if you have the time.

thanks in advance!!

 

[drivesitfar]

ALL: i've accumulated a few small dents on my Honda Pilot this last year and since i'm not a car guy and have never done much body work any ideas on how to fix something like this by yourself if i choose to?

I'll get a few pictures if needed, but one is a dent I actually caused while trying to pull out a tree that looked dead and decided it didn't want to come out. my grip slipped on the tree and my **** made a nice dent in my rear driver's side panel next to the tail light. the other one is a bit more difficult location where some *** Hat hit me probably with something hanging off the end of his truck at a steel company on the passenger's window in the frame's narrow part.

I've used a hair dryer and a hammer to repair a few of my kid's dents and on one on my wife's bumper, but they are more of a plastic rubbery material.

if any of you have pictures and want to post details of how you fix a dent and then make it match the rest of the paint or car please post them.

Hoping everyone had a great Christmas!!

 

[motofool33]

Here is my 1940 Chev coupe strip/show car that I built back in the early 90's. I started with GM's Torch Red and tweaked it a bit then shot it over a white sealer.

Blown small block engine.

My daily driver shop truck. Mildly built with a 75hp shot of nitrous that I occasionally took to the strip. Same kustom mixed color as my street rod above.

Daily driver 2006 Duramax that I repainted most of back in 2011 due to previous owners neglect. Similar process but not quite as in-depth as a full-on show job. Had to match the original paint on the areas that I didn't repaint, but still looks like it rolled off the assembly line after 10+ years of being on the road. Factory GM white.

Kustom built sand drag quad that I built in 2008 and my son raced up until three years ago. This was painted a kandy color from House of Kolor. Kandy Lime over Orion Silver.

My son's sand quad that we built and he raced. Black with scallops of Kandy Purple over Orion Silver.

Lots of work but well worth it to get the final result. Our 1940 Chev coupe was featured in Jan. 1997 issue of Street Rodder Magazine and both mine and my son's sand quads were featured in the Jan/Feb issue of Sand Sports Magazine.

Just a small sample of my past work but all using the same process I described earlier to cut & buff the clearcoat.

Mike.

Small World Ive met you Riding that Green Quad or maybe your Boy. When Riding my 250r

 

[zmotorsports]

Small World Ive met you Riding that Green Quad or maybe your Boy. When Riding my 250r

Awesome. Where did we meet at?

Mike.

 

[hobie1dog]

When I use to do the finishing work as a Pipe Organ builder

 

[2oolhound]

I thought I'd post these again here as I'm sure I've posted some of these in the past on this site but they demonstrate what you can do with few tools and lots of ambition.

It's been about 8 years since I started turning my small garage into a shop. One of my 1st purchases was this 3/4 hp grinder. There was no power to test it and when I got it home I discovered it needed new bearings. While it was apart I sanded, polished and buffed the alu caps.

Next I tackled an old motorcycle I'd had stored for 35 years in a barn. It had been moved out of the barn and under an eave. Where it was laying over and touching the ground you can see the terrible corrosion that took place. After some experimenting on the timing cover I thought these old parts might still have a chance (good thing they made them from solid cast alu instead of todays pressed metal and plating). The bottom of the TC looked just as bad as the rocker cover, covered in white and green mould. Wish I'd photographed it too.

This is what I was dealing with, shown with the active mould removed with a wire brush:

After removing the mould and giving it an overall sanding the deep poke marks revealed themselves:

These poke marks had to come right out if these parts were ever going to look nice so I used a coarse file to grind the metal down to the bottom of them creating the flat spots you see.You can see I've finally reached the bottoms of all the poke marks:

.
Next I used some 36 grit emery and hand sanded them to get the flat spots off (remember this is in the early days of my shop without hardly any tools so I did a lot of hand work).

This is what it got to looking like after putting buffing wheels on my 3/4 hp grinder and machine buffing. These parts aren't at a mirror finish stage yet but you can see the transgression that took place using hand files - 36 grit emery and up to 400 grit then onto the grinder/buffer.

 

[dirt_dobber]

2oolhound - that is impressive and great work.

 

[zmotorsports]

Those Norton parts turned out great. Nice work.

Mike.

 

[PFSard]

2oolhound

Hard to believe those are the same pieces. Very nice.

 

[2oolhound]

Thanks for the comps guys. I spelled pock marks p-o-k-e marks but I think everyone saw what I meant.

I could have just bought some other parts off ebay but it was also an experiment to see what could be done. It also demonstrates what lengths a guy will go to when he's been garage starved for 20 years. Today, 8 years later I'd be using a lot more power tools but I still stop using abrasives at 400 grit and go to the buffer at that point using a hard wheel with lots of abrasive compound.

 

[drivesitfar]

2ool: great job on those Norton bike parts and it's inspiring to those of us that pick up those rusty things that were treated so badly knowing that they can shine again with a little work.

HOBIE: sorry for not commenting on your cool ORGAN earlier. did you build that one or any of them or were you just restoring and shining old ones up? please do tell and post up more pictures with details on finishes cause i think there are a lot of woodworkers here at GJ too. thanks

ALL: how many of you paint cars for a living or maybe do one a year or two at your shop? i'd love to see some before during and after pictures if you care to share. or bikes or old vintage machines if you have one you made a gem out of a turd to show us it can be done.

thanks

 

[wjamyers]

Love this thread. Inspiring. I'm thinking about buying some Rebar and turning one of these:

into an an electrolysis tank which will greatly simplify the prepping step, especially considering my wife has a bunch of rusty pieces of metal sitting around for art projects.

I have nearly nothing but simple autoomotive hand tools but now I have a nice Reed 104 1/2 and I'm thinkin about doing it up... do I need a bench grinder next? Should I get a 4.5 inch rotary tool? A Dremel 3000 for 59.00 at HD considering it's the most versatile? I'm not sure I should invest too much in this because I might get bored and move on but my tiny garage is getting better all the time and I might just stick with it.

 

[Shop Dad]

Drives thanks for mentioning this thread in the Vice 101 thread. I'm starting to get more serious about making shiny things.

Caswell Plating has a "how to" tutorial on buffing and polishing: http://www.caswellplating.com/buffman.htm

I just picked up their buffing wheel and polish kit and it's very nice. I will add that besides a wire wheel one can add a "convolute" wheel or two to their kit. These are non-woven fiber with abrasive at various grit/polish levels. I have one made by Norton.

 

[scooternut]

Drives

I just picked up their buffing wheel and polish kit and it's very nice. I will add that besides a wire wheel one can add a "convolute" wheel or two to their kit. These are non-woven fiber with abrasive at various grit/polish levels. I have one made by Norton.

Recently bought a convolute (or deburring) wheel and I love that thing, incredible what it does. That got be to thinking, is there something similar for my 4 1/2 angle grinder? I have trouble getting to all the parts of a vise main screw end with the handle still attached.

Deburring wheel for a 4 1/2 grinder??

I grabbed that orange one from norton, but it is ceramic and cuts way more than the convolute.

 

[Shop Dad]

I have one at 4-1/2" I think it is the Norton RapidStrip, but they also had a RapidFinish that's less aggressive.

 

[scooternut]

Thanks, the orange one that I mentioned is a Norton "blaze rapid strip." It's awesome, but far more aggressive than the deburring wheel.


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