stainless trim

[300]

Hello.  What is the best way to polish/ and take fine scratches out of stainless trim parts. Is there good products or is this something left to the pros. Thanks

[422STROKER]

I did all my trim on my bench grinder with a buffing wheel attached and some white rouge.  Practice on some spare stainless and you can get the hang of it.  Get a nice face shield and some heavy leather gloves and have at it.

Tom


Can be polished by hand as well but will take some time.

[300]

What did you use for a compond.

[422STROKER]

I just used some white rouge with the buffing wheel, the white is the least abrasive I think.

Tom

I used some Meguires stuff for the hand polishing, it's amazing how dirty the stainless is  when you start cleaning it.

[AMXguy]

It's an art to do it right, I used to have it done for me but for $500 a car I decided to try it myself, I'm decent but not a pro.

 For scratches hand sand them out with 600 grit paper, for dents tap them out with wood or a trim hammer then use a flat file to take the high spots off followed by 600 grit. then buff with a coarse wheel and then a soft wheel with proper abrasives. I do the best I can and if it isn't good enough I watch ebay for a better peice to replace mine with. like I said it's an art buy with some time and practice you can probably get it good enough to satisfy yourself. nothing ruins a nice car faster than crappy looking trim in my opinion.

[elitecustombody]

 just be careful if using a buffer watch how you're holding the trim, you can twist , damage or get some serious injury  when the wheel grabs a tip ot edge of the trim ,otherwise it's pretty simple and easy 

[300]

Anybody repop trim that you know of Thanks

[Street_Challenged73]

Not that I know about.  I'd go with a loose-weave buffing wheel on a bench-top grinder equipped with some white rouge compound.

[moparclown]

I am no pro thats for sure,but I have done quite a bit for myself and for friends.I always sand out scratches with 600 grit and work my way up to 1500 and then polish by hand or a wheel.Just be careful with a wheel,it can grab it and destroy trim in a split second and hurt you.Wear eye hand and body protection.

[300]

Thanks all. i got some 600 and 1500 paper, looking good, abit of a time with dents, a little 3m compond. what is this white rouge stuff.

[quapman]

White rouge is a solid stick, kind of like a compressed powder. You hold it against a running buffing wheel to transfer the material into the wheel fibers. Then you slide your trim piece along the wheel to buff it.

A video would help here!

Steve

[bb71challenger]

You can also use a platinum tripoli before the rouge which is more aggressive and will take the sanding scratches out faster. I use different rouges for different metals and white or green rouge imo is the best for white metals like silver, platinum or stainless steel. Red or yellow rouge for gold, brass, stuff with that tint.

[heminut]

Eastwood sells an arbor to fit an electric motor like the ones used in an evaporative cooler so you can put a buffer wheel on the motor. I bought one and just bolted the motor to a stand I bought at Harbor Freight. I also got 2 wheels and 2 grades of compound from Eastwood (white & green) and a trim hammer. I did the trim on my Cuda (worked out a serious kink on one piece) and it came out great. After working out the serious stuff with the hammer and a small anvil and a fine file I did like others said and worked up from fine to ultra fine wet-or-dry sandpaper then buffed it out. Worked great!

[Bullitt-]

I don't know what stage your car is in but you might want to try this 1st if your just needing to polish the stainless.. With the trim still on the car use a drill mounted buffer + buffing compound,  will put a shine on it...easier as you don't have to hold on to the part as a bench grinder tries to yank it away.  I tried Blue Magic headlight polish & it worked pretty good.

If you need the whole shebang look at, most available at any hardware type store

http://www.grizzly.com/products/category.aspx?key=100
http://www.grizzly.com/catalog/2008/Main/189

[300]

My arms just about ready to fall off. still sanding with 600, but it slowlyyyyyy  taking the marks out. I,m trying both wet and dry