FE-FC Holden Discussion Forum

Finally installed my bench grinder, only been living here 4 odd years!
But that means I can now polish stuff, if anyone in SA wants any odd polishing jobs done send me a message.
I will only take small jobs though as I am still working on my car. For example the plain stainless filler cap on the FE took 10-15 mins to come up to a mirror finish, 10 or 15 mins more sanding out the deeper scratches would have got a concourse finish.

Stinky,

for those of us who don't live in SA, can you advise your secret method of bringing outstanding polished finish to otherwise ordinary looking pieces for our cars?...if its proprietary, I understand....

I too have a bench grinder, but what should I put on it and what goop do I buy to polish with?

cheers....Brad

Polishing is just making big scratches smaller. The smaller they are the shinier the metal. And much like painting the work is all in the preparation.
Please understand all the following advice is from my own experience and I am an IT Professional by trade not a polisher. You can however get great results quite easily.

Usually stainless is quite smooth so it needs little work, deeper scratches need to be taken out with sandpaper to a 800-1200 grit finish. With alloy/aluminium you don't have to be so fussy as the metal is soft and you can polish big scratches out easily. You just have to be careful not to take too much material out.

Once you have your smooth piece of metal, you can polish it on the bench grinder.

Set up your grinder away from anything of value if you are doing a lot of polishing as it gets hell messy.

I just saw the gear today at my local Mitre10 or you can look up abrasive supplies in your local yellow pages.

You need an auger/arbor (can't remember the name) which is usually a piece of hexagonal bar stock with a tapered external thread on one end (for the mop) and an internal thread at the other (for the grinder).

Then you need a mop or two, there are various sizes and stitched or unstitched. I currently use stitched as it is firmer and easier to control, unstitched is more for final buffing (I think) and they are messier too.

You also need compound, there are various compounds for various jobs, just pick the one to suit. They come in a solid bar not unlike a bar of gold.

Wear your safety gear!
including good shoes and welding gloves (the metal gets hot enough to give a nasty burn), I have learnt the hard way. It's not absolutely necessary but a face mask is good, otherwise you'll have black snot for a few days.

Once you have set-up the mop, apply some compund to the spinning mop, then get to work on the metal. Practice on scrap to start with.

Have a sharp piece of metal handy, an old bit of angle iron cut to a sharp point is good. You will need this to clean the mop every now and again as it becomes loaded with compound and polished off metal. If your wheel face is looking black and shiny, you need to clean it.

I think that covers it, give us a yell if you get stuck.

You know you've just unleashed a pandoara's box don't you!! I have shiney bits that definately aint shiney! Will a bench grinder remove pitting?

luke.

Not recommended, you need to work with sand-paper in stages until you get a finish like brushed aluminium (800-1200 grit is best) before you start work on the bench grinder.
Scratches etc in chrome will not come out, Chrome is extremely hard and needs to be recoated.
You can however clean-up dirty or dull chrome.

Hiya Glenn,
no q's on the polishing just saying hi as i havent been around 4 a while.
Finally moved, bought a house in Happy Valley.
How did the FC i sold you go driving it yet or was it a bit too much like hard work and she is someone elses project/parts car?
Anyway bye for now got about 18 months of posts on here to catch up on.
see ya
BRAD

OK Ive now got ammunition for the missus when she blows up at me ruining my good shirts too,  haha.
Just to add to Stinkys polishing expertise ,You can also pick up a kit at your hardware store to suit a drill but beware can become pretty risky, I wrote about the pad catching my lead and spinning the drill up into the cord with my wrist twisted and my finger locked on the trigger in the go position whilst laying on my back under the car - took forever to get to the power point .
Also maybe you could add to this stinky - I cut back my stailess trim with 1200 then buffed em up and I swear they came up much more brilliant than just an autosol job ,Almost like the surface slightly tarnished in time,.

G'day Brad,
the old girl is up and running (a few hundred dollars later), brakes and clutch renewed. I have lined up a reco VH44 booster this week, got a set of ROH splat style mags ready. Electrics and body work are the big issues though.
She'll be standing around for a little while longer while I get the FE on the road.

Harko
The drill attachments are good for bigger stuff like mags wheels, I'd rather hold a drill than a wheel. If the stainless is just dull and no major scratches, you can save yourself the time and skip the 1200 and go straight to the buffing wheel.

My first ever piece was cap for my Quicksilver shifter, shaped from piece of stainless bar then polished. Took a couple of days to get the shape right. File finished, polished and stuck with super glue, matches the chrome exactly. Found the original cap a few months later of course!

Good to hear Glenn,is it running with the same engine?
If so it sat for 21 years, started when i bought it.
Well it is a holden.
Cheers BRAD

Same motor, some plugs, oil change and a tune and she is sweet! Took it for a quick drive down the road and it ran OK, but the brakes are as hard a rock and the left rear door flies open around right-hand turns  ;D ;D

Amazing just goes to show ya.

Just a tip guys.
working with Stainless you need to avoid using sanding / polishing equipment on mild steel before polishing your stainless.
The mild steel particles that get 'polished' off can get embedded in the stainless resulting in rust marks apearing at a later date.

this is more a problem with cutting & grinding than polishing but the same principle applies...

Hey Stinky,

thanks for the clues on polishing stainless trims - I bought one of those cheap drill sets to polish a couple of small bits and they ended up looking great.  I was going to look for some trims in better condition but these " rough looking " bits now look like "new" so I won't have to keep looking!


regards
Earlee

Good to hear, it gets addictive too, seeing dull crappy stuff become shiny. I am working on some brass(?) fittings for my manifold. Was going to get them chromed but they look so good polished, now I'll just clear coat them.

Hey Stinky,

What's the best way of cleaning alloy.  I am putting a 202 in the EK and the standard manifold is fairly daggy looking.  How do I clean it up?

Earlee.

If you just want to clean it up, some good degreaser and stiff non-wire brush. A wire brush will scratch it up too much.
You could also take it down one of those car wash places and have a go with a pressure hose. Make sure you secure it somehow though, you may blow out on to the road!
There was also a thread posted a while ago that involved laundry powder and a battery charger.
Or a quick blast at a sandblasters will give a nice even finish.

Hi Stinky,

im about to set up a bench grinder with mops etc.

i have got 1 tapered spindle, 1 x sisal stitched mop, and 1 x loose leaf calico mop.

Do u change mops on the spindle or have u set up both sides of your grinder as a polisher?

fairly lazy trivial question I realise, but just wondering if continuously swapping the mops on the spindle  will ruin them.

thx

Ed

I used to have 2 spindles with a mop on each, but it was a hassle if I had to put on the wire brush or grinding wheel. So I was just swapping the mops over on the one spindle, haven't ruined one yet. They eventually "find their place" after being on and off the spindle a few times and the thread is cut.