Final Scratches from buffing wheel

[regulator]

All,

Hopefully someone can answer my questions. First, what I am doing.

I have a thin sheet of aluminum that I am practicing my polishing with. I have been trying for months to figure this all out and reading these forums have helped a lot.

What I am having trouble with is the buff marks that are left after the final polishing wheel. I have sanded from 120 to 400 wet, emery w/ sisal (seems to scratch it more), emery w/ sewn (nice mirror like finish), tripoli w/ sewn (even better), white w/ loose (nice mirror luster), but am left with tiny little scratches that can be seen in the right light at the right angle. These occur with every compound and wheel. Cleaning before every stage was done with acetone. I made sure I was not overloading, played with heating the part, and anything else I could thing of. I have also tried sanding to 1500 wet with the same results. I have started with the emery w/ sewn first as well and it gave the same results.

I tried the talcum power/baking power manuver with no help. I have tried different wheels, compounds, angles, etc. I keep everything seperated as far as wheel, rake, compound goes.

Could it be that I have contaminated my wheels somehow? Maybe I wasnt so carefull at first? I really try to keep everything clean, acetone in between changing compounds and all. The scratches are pretty uniform in direction and will change with the final buff if another angle is used.

The sisal wheel I have looks like the "All Sisal Buffing Wheel" That Caswell sells, not like the "Sisal" wheel that they sell. Are they the same? They definetly look different from their pictures online to me. The wheel I have looks like SYCO's from his tutorial and he called it a "Lamintated Sisal Wheel". Will this make a difference?

Please help me! I am getting discouraged and really want to learn this. I have a set of wheels for my 54 Ford Truck that I want to polish and some boat parts. My budds all want me to get this down as well as they have old cars that need some parts polished.

[regulator]

Oops...Sorry,

Forgot to mention my buffing machine. It's a 2.1 amp 3600 rpm converted bench grinder spinning 6 inch wheels. Does not seem to have a problem doing so. Thought this info might be useful.

well you are polishing thin metal .... try this :

prep up to 600 wet and dry
load a sprial with emery this will give you a great shine
load a sprial with white and look at the shine get briter

don't use sisal on thin metal all you are doing is making more work for you ......

and caswell got great product's and you can't beat there prices ..