| Guys, I need to let ya'll know that polishing SS is easy but everyone
is making it hard. I can take a piece of flat bar with the pitted mill
finish and take it down to a smooth finish in a couple of minutes. I need
to make one comment on those who insist on using sandpaper, beltsander
or the like. We all now that if we didn't have oil in our engines it would
generate heat because of the friction. The same is true with sanding SS.
If you will just take and put some WD-40 on the part and give it a little
lubrication it will slide smoother and your sandpaper last longer and
the finish will be nicer. Its no different than the difference between
dry sanding primer and wetsanding primer. Wet sanding paper will last
all day, dry sanding will last about 2-3 minutes.
Now, step by step to polishing SS
1.
It really dosen't matter what the surface condition of the part is.
First thing you have to do is get the scratches, mill finish and mill
pits off of the part. Even a 2B smooth mill finish on sheet stock needs
to be broken down. I do this with a 6" x 1" 3M EXL deburring wheel.
You can get them through WW Grainger or any tool supply house or as
BT said on Ebay. Yep there $45.00 they last a good long time and they
are superior when it comes to taking the mill finish and scratches out
of SS. And it does the job so dang quick you will probably save the
difference in the sand paper and time you waste. Really folks you need
to consider this method using the 3M EXL deburring wheel. Like when
I polish something that I made on my lathe it leaves turn marks on the
part. Dont polish in the same direction as the turning marks. deburring
in the same direction as the turning marks just takes all the turning
marks down at the same rate. On a deburring wheel make it cross cut
the turning marks and they just disappear. On say flatbar where you
have pitted mill finish I debur it in both directions so that my part
dosent get lopsided. Take some off in this direction, then some off
in the crosscut other direction.
2.
Now we go to the polishing wheels. I use a fairly stiff sewn wheel (not
a sissle wheel) with the white compound bar and really bury the part
in it. Damn it gets hot! But since you used the deburring wheel this
only take a few seconds. 3. Next switch to a real soft fluffy wheel
and use the red compond bar. This brings out the smooth surface really
nice. Once again very little effort required and you dont sit there
for hours and get all that black crap all over yourself. (like BT and
Bigdog) 4. Last, This is my trade secret here. Don't tell Unkie Fred.
On small parts I put down a terry cloth rag on the flat workbench put
a little dab of Wenol (blue tube) on the rag and bury the part in the
rag don't have any gripes about polishing SS and there is a bunch of
it on my car. To give you any example, when I was doing my radius rods,
draglink and tie rod I bet it took me some where around 50-60 hours
to do the polishing with wheels and compound bars. I can polish a 50"
tie rod in about 1 hour. I polished my SS radiator cover from start
to finish in about 7-8 hours. Lets a lot of surface area, weld grinding
marks and scratches to clean up too! Hope this helps, cause SS is cream
of the crop.
Later.
StrokerT
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