These are my stainless steel, illuminated, door sills that I've had in my Zeds (first NA and now in the TT) over the last 8 years. But over that time, they've acquired some scratches and scuffs that I want to polish out. I have both rotary air and electronic tools but i'm not sure what polishing compounds and brushes I need to get. I essentially want to polish out the scuffs and maintain the mirror shine. Can someone tell me what I need to get and where from. Cheers
Unfortunately because stainless is so hard its a tricky job to remove scratches for the home enthusiast. You could give the Jasco polishing kit for alloy wheels a try. You get it from Bunnings and is less than $40 and you only need an electric drill. The worst it can do is make you course scratches into finer scratches which is what polishing does anyway.
You need polishing wheels and rouges Hi I don't know what 90TTZ is going on about as it its actually fairly easy to fix. Brush???? You dont need a brush as a brush will not help you - lol, you need a polishing wheel/s (ideally a hard and soft set) and jewellers rouge (an abrasive buffing compound) As stated you can get these polishing wheels to fit a drill whereas the more professional set is fitted to bench type of polisher similiar looking to a bench grinder Those scratchers are not that deep, so I would not start with black rouge but rather a red or brown rouge and work your way up to blue - by that stage it should have no scratches left Here is a link that tell you everything you need to know in detail for them to come up looking great again The great thing is that you can than start polishing your plenum and radiator pipes and anything else thats metallic with the products you purchased to do your insteps and the experience you gain from doing your first polishing task :rofl: http://www.pjtool.com/jewelers-rouge-chart.aspx Happy polishing! Jamie
Get the JOSCO brand that 90TTZ mentioned its what most polishing shops use. Because your refinishing an already polished piece i would use a their green SSXCARD polishing compound on a loose leaf calico buffing wheel. its used for final finishing stainless . A word of warning if your going to do it with a bench grinder fitted with polishing wheels. They can rip what ever your holding out of your hands very quickly and turn it into junk.
Super z is in the know. I recently purchased a lot of compounds and wheels from a very good business with great discounts. I spent $135 if I recall and that bought two of every 6 inch wheel and all compounds for all the metals. If you only have the illuminaed panels in mind, id call into your local polisher
You could try working it with some wet and dry, aiming to finish with 3000 and then polish.... I've seen some polishing metal polishing my brother has done like this (works as a painter/detailer for a wheel repair shop) and it comes up really nice. Haven't tried it myself though, and would probably do a "test" run on something expendable if I was to give it a go. I have the same sills (except the laser etched rather than illuminated version) and have just sucked it up with regard to scratching, I'm sure being scuff plates that if I was to bring them back to mirror finish they would soon be scratched again.
Whatever method you use, make sure you remove the illuminated sections from the panels. Don't try & work around them. The problem with these panels is the metal is quite thin & can be dented or bent easily if excessive pressure is applied. Whilst proper polishing tools & compounds are the way to go, depending on how deep the scratches are, paint cutting compound may be used, however a lot of elbow grease may be required.
Thanks for the link, some very good info there. I was more referring to someone without the gear to do it would be tricky but your explanation has certainly made it a lot easy to tackle
