Has anyone stripped and polished an aluminium frame?

[Dave W]

I've always liked bare polished aluminium. I have an aluminium bike but don't like the colour much so have thought about polishing it up. Anyone done it? Any tips?

[the snail]

You can buy polishing kits with drill attachments etc
http://www.metalpolishingsupplies.co.uk ... hing-kits/
I don't think I'd want to start on that road, I probably wouldn't know when to stop. Chainrings/cranks look rather splendid with a mirror finish on them too...

[Brucey]

takes ages, and if left bare the finish is then marred by any road salt. Thus you kind of have a job for life that way, endlessly polishing.

If you use two-pack lacquer over the polished finish it can look great for a while, but then worse than ever once the finish is scratched or breached (you get 'wormholes' under the lacquer).

Another option is to have the frame anodised. Someone on here has had this done and it worked pretty well. The treatment did dissolve every steel nutsert in the frame though....

cheers

[NeilnrLincoln]

I did it to my Carrera mountain bike a couple of years ago, stripped with nitromors, scotchbrite pads & then polished. It looks great, you don't have to worry about scratching it & I only repolish it (by hand with autosol) a couple of times a year for it to keep looking good.

[robc02]

I had one chemically stripped. I then polished it with Solvol Autosol and a polishing bonnet on an electric drill and, finally, had it anodised. Mine was black anodised but you have it clear instead. It looks fine and has been very durable.

EDIT: Oh, yes - it did dissolve the steel nutserts, but I was prepared for that. The anodisers asked me to remove as many as possible, which I did, but a couple started to slip as I drilled them so I left them to be dissolved.

[johnmac]

Can the steel nutserts be replaced easily?

[Brucey]

Can the steel nutserts be replaced easily?

yes, very easily if you have (or can improvise) the kit to do it, so it isn't an insurmountable problem or anything, but you do need to know about it beforehand!

cheers

[Redvee]

I've done it on a pair of forks. Much easier to polish/strip with fine wet n dry due to the design. I did polish them and didn't worry too much with the finish not lasting as I sold them soon afterwards.