Aluminum Oxidation
Thread Starter
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 9,830
Likes: 2
From: Wallingford CT
Aluminum Oxidation Ok, here is a good one.
Just got the car out of storage, did not drive much last year but really took notice yesterday. Notice the aluminum parts had a good amount of oxidation and white flakes.
Nothing is polished, just stock LS1 type finish.
What are you using to clean, and brighten?
Not looking to take parts off per say and bead blast everything, just want to clean up and keep nice.
Looking for Products and Techniques. Any weblinks on how to's also welcome.
PICS ADDED
Just got the car out of storage, did not drive much last year but really took notice yesterday. Notice the aluminum parts had a good amount of oxidation and white flakes.
Nothing is polished, just stock LS1 type finish.
What are you using to clean, and brighten?
Not looking to take parts off per say and bead blast everything, just want to clean up and keep nice.
Looking for Products and Techniques. Any weblinks on how to's also welcome.
PICS ADDED
Last edited by BlackScreaminMachine; Mar 26, 2012 at 02:03 PM.
I used mothers polish to do my calipers years ago and they've held up really well. They do need a touchup now, I'll probably hit them after I attempt to do my valve covers this year. Depending on the smoothness of the surface you're polishing just start with an appropriate grit sand paper and progressively work your way to a finer and finer grit. On my calipers I started out with the coursest stuff I could find (don't remember the grit it was too long ago) and I worked all the way up to 2000 grit then I hit it with mothers polish and they came out mirror like. Power tools are going to be your friend on this project. I used a vibrating sander to do the caliper and it still took me forever.
Staging Lane
Joined: Sep 2005
Posts: 51
Likes: 0
00 steel wool if it's really bad, followed by 000 and 0000 steel wool. You can find it at home depot/ lowes. Clean the parts with an acid free cleaner, or even soap and water, then use the wool as if it had wax on it. It will be the easiest way to maintain a clean and better than stock appearance on under hood aluminum parts. Never use an acid based cleaner on aluminum, it will etch easily and corrode quickly.
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You could do a real light acid wash. I used to do it all the time on my wheels on my truck that were uncoated and unpolished. Thats what most big trucks use to keep the aluminum fuel tanks, wheels, and trailers looking "clean". It wont make the stufff shiny, it will just make it clean, flat, factory looking, aluminum color.
You can get a gallon of acid for less than 10 dollars at any truckstop/store. You could even get some muriatic acid from lowes or home depot and just cut it with water.
You can get a gallon of acid for less than 10 dollars at any truckstop/store. You could even get some muriatic acid from lowes or home depot and just cut it with water.
Exactly, it might be called aluminum brightener or something along those lines. It is an acid wash and will remove all of the oxidation and leave a clean whitish surface.
You could do a real light acid wash. I used to do it all the time on my wheels on my truck that were uncoated and unpolished. Thats what most big trucks use to keep the aluminum fuel tanks, wheels, and trailers looking "clean". It wont make the stufff shiny, it will just make it clean, flat, factory looking, aluminum color.
You can get a gallon of acid for less than 10 dollars at any truckstop/store. You could even get some muriatic acid from lowes or home depot and just cut it with water.
You can get a gallon of acid for less than 10 dollars at any truckstop/store. You could even get some muriatic acid from lowes or home depot and just cut it with water.
Best store stuff is white diamond, stuff is so much better than mothers, i know polished stuff is cool but its such high maintenance, imo if you want it to look good for a long time paint and powder coat, polishing sucks, it gets dirty in a few days and will only look good if you repolish it
