HALP!!Aluminum turns 'cloudy' when buffung?!!?

[BroncoCustoms]

Hi all,
Not a total newbie to buffing al as I have been restoring/modifying cycles and have done a lot of buffing polishing to bring the shine back to parts with really good success....until now.
I have two struts that I machined from raw aluminum block for a bike I am customizing. I got the al at a local steel supplier. Once the machining was done I sanded everything with 220 until all the tooling marks were gone. This is where it gets funny/strange. On the first piece I was impatient and buffed after the 220 sanding and it looked fantastic!! I noticed it one area I could see some of the sanding marks so I decided I would do it the right way and started over. Sanded with 220, then 600, then 1500. Then I started buffing and was very disappointed. I can't get the same chrome-look as I did before. The finish has a slight cloudiness to it. I even put a fresh wheel on to no avail. I took one part and re-sanded it with the 600 and re-buffed...it looks better but there is still a haze to it that I can't get to clear up. I'm using the white compound w/spiral sewn wheel. I even tried using a loose cotton wheel and that seemed to make matters worse! What am I doing wrong??

[mansonozz]

Hi all,
Not a total newbie to buffing al as I have been restoring/modifying cycles and have done a lot of buffing polishing to bring the shine back to parts with really good success....until now.
I have two struts that I machined from raw aluminum block for a bike I am customizing. I got the al at a local steel supplier. Once the machining was done I sanded everything with 220 until all the tooling marks were gone. This is where it gets funny/strange. On the first piece I was impatient and buffed after the 220 sanding and it looked fantastic!! I noticed it one area I could see some of the sanding marks so I decided I would do it the right way and started over. Sanded with 220, then 600, then 1500. Then I started buffing and was very disappointed. I can't get the same chrome-look as I did before. The finish has a slight cloudiness to it. I even put a fresh wheel on to no avail. I took one part and re-sanded it with the 600 and re-buffed...it looks better but there is still a haze to it that I can't get to clear up. I'm using the white compound w/spiral sewn wheel. I even tried using a loose cotton wheel and that seemed to make matters worse! What am I doing wrong??

I've had the same happen to me but from different circumstances. I had worse luck with loose wheels while using white rouge, too. Have you used tripoli or ebony compound? That's one step I never go without no matter the piece looks like or what my process is. Everything I do looks better after either of those than most people's work when they're all done. Hopefully they work for you. I like them on ventilated flap wheels, FWIW.

[BroncoCustoms]

I'll give that a try. I did some more reading here as well and think part of my problem may have been that I was being too agressive with wheel pressure. I took one and worked on it with a less pressure and it looks like it was cleaning up better.....