has anyone chromed the ac condensor?

 

Do what he said. I followed the same technique on my car. Use mother's billet polish and a microfiber towel when you are finished wet sanding.

 

i will take some pics tomorrow and post them, i am almost as good as polishing as FIREHAWK#608, I've been polishing aluminum for about 5 yrs by hand....and for the past 2yrs i've been using the sanding technique....i've polished everything from superchargers, to intercoolers, calipers, intake manifolds, abs boxes, thermostat hosuings,catch cans,waterpumps, alternators, master cylinders, valve covers, oh and most most important thing that i started off on....wheels!

take my advice mothers will never let you down!
i've made alot of money polishing stuff for people...and i always used mothers, up until a few months ago i started making my own polish...the key ingredient to polishing aluminum is elbow grease its like when chicks was their hair, u know lather, rinse, repeat and all that good stuff...well its the same with aluminum the more u polish it the more it shines...if u need and pointer feel free to pm me anytime...i'll post pics of all my polished stuff whenever i get a chance

 

Aight so I'm interested now. About how long do you guys wet sand with each grit before moving to the polish? Do you guys wetsand with each for about 5 minutes, 10 minutes, half hour?

 

Take the grits up as high as you can before polishing, minimum of 2000 grit. I've used Mother's Billet Polish pretty successfully but there really is no substitute for the real polishing greases. Start with black which gets rid of the sanding marks then move to white which is the one that will bring out the shine.

 

There's really no set amount of time. You go with the rougher grit until you don't see surface imperfections anymore, then go a couple notches finer. Keep doing that until you're down to at least 1000 if doing it by hand or about 600 or so if you have power tools and it also depends on how soft the metal is.

If you don't have a LOT of time and PATIENCE, you might as well forget it.

 

i love polishing aluminum!!!

 

What's your address? There are some people that want to visit you and have you "try on" a straight jacket!

I love looking at the finished work, and working on a part in the final stages, but all the prep work... nope.

 

well I've been sanding my ac condensor for about a half hour, and all I've gotten is the brushed aluminum look (you can't see any sandpaper scratches tho). I tried applying normal paint polish and it made it somewhat shiny. You guys think I'm at the point where the metal polish will really make it shine? I just don't know what I'm doing so I wanna make sure I'm on the right track.

 

You're on the right track. The shine is only as good as the prep work. Use 1200+ on it before you go to the polish.

 

what grit would you start out with and end with..? and what is the best polish.. anyone know a site with steps for this. that would be handy.

 

DAMN! This thread is excellent! I have been 'learning' the polishing art for the past 5 months + on and off! I started with my valve covers....bad place to start.. Rough cast aluminum...had to get 80 grit to even begin to smooth it (at least thats what I did...!) Next was the water pump...another bumpy casting....I just wire brushed the hell out of it with my drill and many little dremel brushes. Then the TB and MAF. The TB is giving me problems with all the nooks and crannies..... Sometimes something seems to work but then not the next time!? The bolts to the TB...waterpump and intake manifold...and now the AC lines and all....

And I thought I was one of the few doing this

My only worry is the longevity of all my HARD labor?? I figured I would have a fair weather car after all this as I do not want to become a slave to the engine on my weekends! Any info here would be nice....

I even covered all my wiring harness with non-split carbon fiber tubing....Took most al the connectors apart so the tubing could slip over the exhisting plastic wireloom....looks pretty sharp, kinda like carbon braid.. but what a pain to install.

 

where did you get this tubing material at...sounds pretty cool. TIA-Freddie

 

At Pep boys.....In the sudo rice section (sorry guys...!!) I do not normally 'shop' rice, but this is wireloom...with a carbon fibre look. I wanted something different than the black split tube and I do not like the other color split tube out there.
I just worked slow, cut to length and, after removinh and documenting connector pinouts as I went, slipped the sleeve right over the black split tube to maintain shape. I used a cigarette lighter to melt the cut ends so the loom would not fray before I slipped it on. Then I used vulcanizing black tape to set the ends near the re-attached weather pak connectors. I found some black split loom that was the same braid like the carbon fibre on line but liked the carbon look better. It is sold under the G-sport name and is called G sleeve. I tried using the shrink tubing provided for the ends but it was too hard to manage.
I would not do this again as it is VERY hard and time consuming removing the connectors, documenting their positions, and re-installing all the pins!!

 

Sounds really interesting, do you have any pics of this, LS1pilot?

 

i tried polishing mine after i read this thread like a week ago and it looks sick. i used compound polish and a drill with a nice buffing wheel after wet sanding it up to 1500

 

Not yet....plan to be done in a week or 2 with the polishing and wireloom. Need to post some pix soon after that.

 

I used this method on all the stuff in my engine bay and it works great.

 

I've done mine but I still have a bit of the junk that's like embedded in the aluminum. I have a lot of sanding ahead of me, so I know I'm not finished or anything. I only did 800 and 1000, and then used some polish that I had on hand. It didn't turn out too bad I think for the first time doing it, and I know I got more work to do, but here's a quick before and after...




Winter's setting in, so it's dang cold out here in MI, but now I got something to keep me busy this winter.