Cast Aluminum polishing?

[Neons4life]

I have been so interested in polsihing my bike. I have been going through the site trying to figure out as much as I can. But I still need some help.

1) what are the ranges of the greasless compounds in grits?
2) what buff goes with each range??

3) what is the best process of compounds and polishes to get a mirror shine on cast aluminum?

I hear that the Greasless compound goes up to 320, and then from there I should wet sand by hand with 600, and move my way up to 2000. But is there any way I can use the greasless to 320, then go right into the finishing compounds.

thanks for any help
ciao
James

[tomg552001]

Welcome to the forum. Greaseless compounds i have found are best used with spiral sewn wheels. Do not get to heavy a hand with them because they cut fast. I'd also recommend after using the finest greaseless to go over it lightly with a 400 grit sand paper to help level out the sanding from the greaseless, but thats just me. Than i go to a black emory with a sisal, than right to a white rouge on a loose or canton flannel. Someone i bet can chime in with there favorite setup but from what i've seen, everyone has a different method. Your best best is to pickup maybe the finest greaseless, a few of each type of buffs, spiral sewn, sisal, loose, and canton flannel and a black, brown and white compound. This will give you a nice basic all purpose kit that you can use to experiement and see what you like the best. Good luck and feel free to ask any other questions.

[skiddz]

I've gone straight from the 320 greaseless to a sisal wheel and black compound. Takes a bit more time and effort to get all the sanding marks out (and sometimes ya can't!) but it beats the hand and finger cramps of hand sanding...

Question for you Tom.. Can you clean a tight spiral wheel enough to use different grits of greaseless on it? With the 5 different grits of greaseless and 3 different compounds, I'm runnin' out of wheels/buffs/bobs in quick fashion... heheh

[tomg552001]

You CAN clean wheels from greaseless but i dont suggest it and here is why. Eventually they will become cross contaminated and different grits will act differently. Also, it wares the wheel much faster. If you use one grit for one wheel, the wheels will last forever since you wint need to rake, simply reapply. Also, with the killer price on 4 inch wheels, its not worth your time to use one wheel for all the compounds. Same with felt bobs....if used right they should last a very long time so keeping things singular is to your advantage. Good luck!

[skiddz]

I was afraid you were gonna say that. Anticipating that answer, I ordered up a bazillion different wheels so each compound could have it's own wheel.. When the package arrived, I was kinda stunned that buffs and wheels would weigh 15 lbs.. Now if the blessed buffing machine would arrive...