How do you polish aluminum to a mirror finish?

[BrianG]

Originally Posted by TexasSP

It also depends on the anodizing and type of process they use if you can get it off. Typically even light anodizing permeates a little bit of the metal so you would have to remove all of it to be able to polish it. If an item is hard anodized which is typically clear but creates a rather grayish tint to the aluminum you will not get it off with EZ off. It actually permeates and strengthens the aluminum around .003 of an inch.

This is true. The EZ Off trick worked on some Traxxas parts, notably the nitro Revo chassis. A better/deeper anodizing job may be more difficult to work with.

Just curious here: will this be a shelf-queen? I can't imagine you'll even want to get fingerprints on it after all the work/effort/cost of polishing this thing.

[TexasSP]

Originally Posted by BrianG

This is true. The EZ Off trick worked on some Traxxas parts, notably the nitro Revo chassis. A better/deeper anodizing job may be more difficult to work with.

Just curious here: will this be a shelf-queen? I can't imagine you'll even want to get fingerprints on it after all the work/effort/cost of polishing this thing.

The traxxas stuff to me has always seemed to have more pigment and a smoother surface but less penetration. However you also have to take into consideration whether you are talking about machined parts 6061 or 7075 versus raw aluminum sheets which have been punched/press formed. The cast. The raw aluminum sheets will tend to be more coarse thus allowing anodizing to penetrate deeper than a machined smooth piece of 6061 or 7075. In fact 7075 has to be anodized differently than 6061 due to its higher density.

Some of the nicest parts I ever saw machined and anodized though were traxxas' aluminum bulkheads for the maxx trucks. Those were some absolutely beautiful parts.

[mistercrash]

Polished parts look great and you got some good advice from the guys up there. The only thing I would like to ad is that polished parts look awesome on a shelf queen. If you're going to run the truck then you might not even want to polish anything because that mirror finish will get destroyed by rocks, sand, dust or even an ant walking on it.

[Krawlin]

It's not going to be a shelf queen, I only am wanting to polish the top side of my MGT chassis, I just thought it would look good on there. I bought another new chassis off ebay for $13.50 shipped, so I figured I might as well try to make my old one look a little better and if I like how it looks then ill use it. Brushlessboy16 offered to polish it for me for $20, can't beat that for the work involved, and since it's an old chassis I don't really care if it's not perfect.