Polishing stone?

[shoot summ]

Couldn't find any previous threads on this.

I've been dabbling in stone work for several years now, have acquired a number of tools, and am actually pretty decent at it. I can cut and edge most stones, marble, limestone, granite, quartzite, and have done a number of projects around the house and helped friends.

What I am struggling with is getting a good polish on flat granite like counter tops. I have the diamond buffs but am looking at what the next step is, found a few videos but really wanted perspectives from those that might have done this with success.

The buffs seem to work well in certain instances, I bull nosed some quartzite and it came out great. I've tried them on some flat granite though and it seems "cloudy" and doesn't have any "depth".

 

[shoot summ]

Alright, maybe I will spark some interest in this thread with some pics of my latest project.

I found a piece of "marble"(actually travertine) on CL several months ago, $30 I couldn't pass it up even though I didn't have a use for it. Ends up the wife finds a new, old stock hand scraped bathroom vanity she wants to chalk paint. The CL find was just big enough to fit it.

Here I've marked the cabinet profile on the bottom of the stone, then marked my cut lines.

Here the cuts are finished, I've done my cuts dry mostly with a diamond blade in an angle grinder. I wanted more precision on this piece so I purchased a small tile cutting circular saw with a water feed($90).

Several years ago I bought a hand profiler for a bathroom project, you can run them wet or dry, in this case I ran it dry although I have since purchased an air grinder with a water feed.

Here the edge and top have been finished with 800 grit diamond pads on a DA. After the fact I should have stopped at 600 as there is a little too much sheen on it.

So anyone have any feedback on polishing granite?

 

[akdiesel]

That turned out great. How hard was it to use the the edger?
I polished granite with a dry soft pack before I got my wet polisher. I polished my concrete topper and stopped at 800 grit. It turned out well but was not have a shiny finish but I liked the results.

 

[shoot summ]

That turned out great. How hard was it to use the the edger?
I polished granite with a dry soft pack before I got my wet polisher. I polished my concrete topper and stopped at 800 grit. It turned out well but was not have a shiny finish but I liked the results.

The edger is simple to use, much like a router bit but you use a grinder instead. It goes slow, but that is the nature of working with stone.

Polishing the edges of a granite countertop can be pretty labor intensive and requires a delicate touch. If you decide to give it a try, you’ll need to use a grinder or stone polisher equipped with various grit diamond pads (these may be rented at tool rental centers). The pads start at 50 grit and go up to 3000 and more. If your granite has already been partially polished, you can skip the lower grits. You have done great work, i want to say thanks for sharing this whole procedures images.

Thanks, I have a couple of sets of pads already, 50-3000 + one called a buff. I've found that anything stone related goes slow, and is fairly labor intensive. As stated I've gotten great results on polishing the edges of quartzite, and even granite, I just seem to be lacking something to get the depth on the flat surface. If you look at the front porch in the picture in the background I installed the quartzite and bull nosed the stones on the leading edge, they have a nice shine, with a lot of depth. Here is a pic before I grouted and finished the polish on the edge.

This is on our 12 year old counters that looked OK until I installed new lighting in the kitchen, now they look like ****. I tried just using the buff on them and it helped, just doesn't have the depth that I seem to remember they had initially. Thanks for all of the replies.

Several of the videos I've seen recommend using a felt buff or hogs hair pad with some special compounds, I am going to give that a shot.

 

[rlitman]

Cerium oxide, that's the special compound.

 

[shoot summ]

Cerium oxide, that's the special compound.

Thank you!!