Aluminum cleaner/polish

[Jaguarjoe]

The front facing surfaces of all the aluminum parts on my bike are pretty ratty looking. They're not corroded but they they look like the finish wore off of them. Is there a good aggressive aluminum cleaner polish that can bring these parts back to life again?

[Mike_H]

Not to sound like an A$$ here, but use the search feature. There are pages and pages of posts on polishing aluminum. Mother's works good, but you gotta strip the clearcoat.

Welcome to the forum BTW

[Jaguarjoe]

I tried searching for "aluminum cleaner" but nothing obvious jumped out at me- sorry.

So then that's a clearcoat finish that's peeled away from my parts.

[J_C]

Probably. Strip the clear with aircraft remover (OFF THE BIKE, WATCH ALL PAINT! stuffs vicious). Then polish. You can use mothers if its not that bad, else you can use a variety of methods including steel wool or polishing rouge. Do some searches and see if you can find some posts by reno bruce, that dude's polishing is epic.

[Nessism]

Different parts have different finishes from stock. It's the engine cases that are clear coated, some other parts are anodized and require a different treatment to bring them back.

I recently redid some engine cases by first using paint stripper and then progressively finer sand paper, used wet, followed by mothers. I don't like the mirror polished finish and prefer it to look like stock - which is pretty close to 600 grit wet paper. I used automotive clear on my cases but I'm not sure it's going to hold up to the heat. We'll see. The rattle can clear I've used before looked like crap compared to spraying with my own gun. Wish there was a high quality catalyzed clear I could buy that was made for the purpose.

[J_C]

True, some pictures would help in this situation in determining the best steps forward.

[Beaker]

Mate,

I had a similar problem on my GSX1400 - my side covers were lookin pretty shabby - corroded and butt ugly - and they were laquered. I got hold of one of these polishing kits for use on a drill and within about 30 minutes they were a near mirror finish. \\/ You can kinda see the finish acheived in the pic below....

[emjay]

WOW, nice looking bike! What year is it? Looks great, bet rides pretty well too. Any mods?

[renobruce]

For the engine cases, scrub, scrub, scrub with Simple green or Purple power. Use a toothbrush and baby bottle brush to get into the crevices. I also use a screwdriver witha rag wrapped around it to get in the crevices and in beween the fins. Rinse with water. I could be wrong, but I don't think the cases have clearcoat on them. I tried to strip mine to see if anything came off, and nothing did. The side covers do though.
As mentioned above, strip with aircraft stripper and then sand and polish. I used 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1500 and 2000 grit wet-sanding. Then polished with Mother's with a polishing pad on my drill.



I've been painting my new project engine and had to scrub it down before painting (obviously). Here's a pic of the head after cleaning:



and here it is painted (I know, nothing to do with this topic) :-D

[Beaker]

WOW, nice looking bike! What year is it? Looks great, bet rides pretty well too. Any mods?

She is a K4 GSX1400 - pretty much stock except for the Yoshi system and a PC3. And yes, she rides very, very well. (Apologies to Jaguarjoe for hijacking your thread )

[txironhead]

Wish there was a high quality catalyzed clear I could buy that was made for the purpose.

Eastwood's got some clears specifically designed for protecting aluminum. Haven't used them myself, but I've used other products of theirs with outstanding results.

[Regent]

Has anyone tried VHT Clearcoat?

http://www.caswellplating.com/vht/vhtclear.htm

That site also has a pretty comprehensive tutorial on polishing aluminum.

[Schweisshund]

DO NOT ... I will repeat that for the sake of repeating it ... DO NOT ever use aircraft stripper on plastic. Just in case you didn't know.

[txironhead]

I just saw a product at Wal-Mart that was specifically designed for stripping plastic. Two products, actually, one was designed for stripping plastic bumpers and one claimed to be able to take layers of paint off, so you could take the clear and topcoats off and leave the primer. They were made by the same company that sells the "aircraft stripper" at Wal-Mart, I just can't remember the name. Both were in aerosol cans.

[Nessism]

Has anyone tried VHT Clearcoat?

http://www.caswellplating.com/vht/vhtclear.htm

That site also has a pretty comprehensive tutorial on polishing aluminum.

I've use VHT clear, the one for headers so it's super high temp. Has a yellow cast to it and is not very chemical resistant.

I've never tried the Eastwood products but I'm pretty certain that any rattle can paint is going to have poor durability compared to the catalyzed stuff.