I have a nice stainless steel plaque with a very deep inscription - actually water cut all the way through - and I want to remove a couple of scratches and blemishes the finished item has aquired - nothing deep, I'd just like to get a uniform finish on the metal. I dont want a mirror polish - and dont want to screw this up. Was thinking very fine wet and dry? Any thoughts?
TIA
Emma
Your local Halfords should have a good range of fine wet and drys up to very fine. Mixed packs are also available. Many use a graded series to get a mirror sharp edge on chisels etc, so sharp it is called Scary Sharp. I do too and the edges of my chisels are mirror fine. The idea is that each finer grade takes out the scratches made by the previous one until you can see no scratches at all. Then finish off with a fine liquid metal polish.
For something like this don't go in with too harsh a grade to start with, see how fine you can go and still take out the scratches, less work, and do the whole surface or the patch will show.
Peter
yeah..thats not bad. You can finish up with some kind of metal polish worked in straight lines to get a brushed effect.
I should have added that if you are worried about rounding over an edge then you can glue the sheets to somethng flat, like 12mm mdf with spraymount and rub the metal on the paper instead of vice versa.
Peter
Buy a set (3 or 4) Garryflex blocks. They're a big rubber block filled with abrasive grit, colour-coded according to the grit size. Absolutely standard kit for any sort of metal finishing work. Roebuck sell something similar, under that name. Axminster and Machine Mart sell them, as do most other good toolshops.
As always with finishing, especially metal finishing, start with the coarsest grit first. _Don't_ switch to a smaller grit until you have all the bigger scratches out -- you'll only have to go back and do it again.
As a final finish, Autosol or Simichrome polish (car shops) on a rag will do. Brasso won't, as it's too soft for most stainless steels.
Buy a set (3 or 4) Garryflex blocks. They're a big rubber block filled with abrasive grit, colour-coded according to the grit size. Absolutely standard kit for any sort of metal finishing work. Roebuck sell something similar, under that name. Axminster and Machine Mart sell them, as do most other good toolshops.
As always with finishing, especially metal finishing, start with the coarsest grit first. _Don't_ switch to a smaller grit until you have all the bigger scratches out -- you'll only have to go back and do it again.
As a final finish, Autosol or Simichrome polish (car shops) on a rag will do. Brasso won't, as it's too soft for most stainless steels.
I smoothed down the edge of the pressure plate of a camera which was scratching film using toothpaste on my finger. If your scratches are shallow it might work.
Phil
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