How to polish up Stainless Exhaust

[VRSenator065]

Hi all, am making up my own stainless exhaust. Fully welded the first section yesterday and used pickling paste to clean it up afterwards. It has cleaned it but left it all a pretty dull grey. I am not after a mirror polish at all, but would like just to make it all look a little more uniform.

Any ideas on how to make it look a bit neater. I thought maybe sanding it with wet and dry along running along the length of the pipes, but that's a lot of elbow grease (will do it that way if I have too), but maybe some sort of flapper wheel in my angle grinder used lightly?

All ideas welcome..

 

[Not_An_Abba_Fan]

It will depend on the grade as to how good a finish you will get. But any steel will polish to a certain extent.

Elbow grease, and lots of it. A few different ways to do it, either go to town with steel wool, then a metal polish. Or for a better finish, start with 800 wet and dry, then 1200, then polish.

316 or 304 will get you a really good mirror finish, but if it's exhaust grade 409, then it won't polish up like chrome, but will still have a dull shine.

The best thing would have been to polish all your bits first off the car before you welded it all together, then it would have just been the welds to clean up.

 

[padrickz88]

To do my mufflers I just use steel wool (grade 00 then 0000) then polish it with metal polish... I think I might buy a buffing ball next time and give that a shot

 

[ari666]

calico polishing wheel in a variable speed buff or rotary sander and some polishing compound:

sand paper will give it a brushed finish.

 

[VRSenator065]

Thanks all, might head across to Bunnings next door and see what if anything they have. Cheers

 

[VRSenator065]

Ok, bit of an update, went to Bunnings, bought the finest flapper type wheel for my grinder, also like a scotch bright style sanding disc that fitted in my drill, and a regular barrel style flapper wheel. Both flappers were way too aggressive for what i wanted, the scotch bright style was good though and took out pretty much all the blemishes and got it to a nice even look. I could almost just leave it as it is. But I think I will try Ari's advice and try and get hold of a calico wheel for the drill to finish it off. Will post some pics once its done and the gear I used. Again thanks for everyone's help so far.

 

[ari666]

id advise against the one for the drill, i bought one of those and its a fker. its cos' theyre so small, and when you slip. the drills chuck carves nice chunks out of your steel. although i havnt bought one yet, im gonna go grab one of the wheels (like the pic i posted) and bolt it onto my rotary sander so i have more room for error.

im currently polishing my front bumper which was chrome, but i chopped and welded it to tighten up to the guards, then realised its 700 bucks per bar to get rechromed. so im using 'glisten PC' once its high gloss.

so i chopped this bit out:

and and inch off the lower valence:

after 120 on the sander:

the shiny bit on the corner is after the calico wheel, the brushed bit is 1000 scratches:

was just taking too long, so i stopped and waiting till i can get to bunnings and grab one of their big wheels.

although this is just mild steel, the process is pretty much the same.

 

[SavVYute]

There's different grades of polishing compounds available too.
Tripoli (brown) is fairly aggressive used on a sewn buff (like in your pic) and will remove the emery paper marks.
Then a softer buff charged with a finer polishing (white / green) compound will give the mirror finish.
Kerosene will get the stuff off for clean up or creating a slurry while polishing.

 

[VRSenator065]

Bloody awesome info right there guys, very much appreciated. Btw ARI, the one I am taking about is actually quite big in diameter, guessing maybe 120mm, so its easy to use the side of it and avoid the chuck of the drill etc hitting. Its bloody hot over here today, but if i am able to get out into the shed tonight I will take some pics. I really cant be stuffed spending the time for an all out mirror finish, I just would like it all uniform.

 

[ari666]

guessing maybe 120mm,

yeah sweet as. the one i bought is prolly 60mm at best. cant find it cos i tossed it somewhere in anger. so 120 would be heaps better.

just to be on the safe side, while i was using it i wrapped the chuck with a few nice thick layers of electrical tape "just to be sure" and it saved a few scratches.

ill be watching your thread for pics