Orange Peel?

[squaredealer]

I too have learned alot from reading this forum. Having some trouble with the little marks. My plater called them air bubbles. She, (yes she) said that I may be taking too much metal off with my sanding. Been starting with coarse moving to fine dry. Then, wet steps. I'm not seeing the orange peel look until I start polishing. I initially started with brown. I t was like I was just putting in this look. So, tried black. With alot of work, it seems to come out some. When I think I've worked them out and move to white, the orange peel starts shinin too. I am working on stock Harley Davidson aluminum parts. The plater says she'll build up the copper to cover these. However, I would like to not submit my work with these in. Obviously, for polished only pieces this won't do. Any further discussion on this would help.

Thanks

i never heard of orange peel in polishing can you post a pic ...

[polishinginc]

"gas" is what its called. Basically its just air bubbles in the casting. Theres absolutely positivily nothing that can really be done to fix this. Its a casting flaw, sometimes you can sand through the gas pocket but it can get worse the deeper you sand. The foundry either had inferior materials in the casting or they had the alloy way to hot when they poured it into the molds.

I do alot of GM parts 85-04 parts, who ever casts them still do a poor job cause I still get as much gas in the new parts as I do in the old ones. The GM intakes are the worse, on every single LT1/LT4 intake top where the accent lines are theres gobs of gas pockets.

Your plater should be able to get around the gas. Does she crome coat everything or actually go with the nickel,copper,chrome

[squaredealer]

My plater does the triple chrome. She says the copper will fill the gas bubbles. However, it will be more cost effective for me to deliver withot these. She dosen't have to "build up" the copper to cover. I just did a test piece using the abrasive wheel compound 120 then 240. Then went to 400 and 600 dry. Then 800-1000 wet. Went to the black compound and then to white. NO GAS BUBBLES! I'm encouraged! Think my problem has been not doing a good enough job sanding.