Polsihing Fenders...what gives?

[knsmodels]

no disrespect to the others but you aint ever going to get out 160 grit scratches with 600......you are going to have to go back to at least 320 grit and slowly work back to the 3000.....dont rush it......you need to get all of the scratches out from each previous grit.....if you take your time you will get there.....basically treat the plastic as if it were paint on a car.....Good Luck.....

[RubberSalt]

Try some heat! take a propane or map torch to it for a splic second, that will get it nice and smooth. Gotta be fast with heat.

Heres my gastank i did quickly. I didn't go real real high in the sand paper as you can read.

http://www.3wheelerworld.com/showthr...lastic-Restore!

[Darius1502]

Thanks guys. I am learning and learning.

Basically most of you were right. I made the mistake of going too heavy a grit and I did use a dry sand at first.

However to get those big scratches out I had to use a heavy grit.

I also realized that I was not keeping my tools clean. 87200X suggest using a hose instead of a bucket because of plastic pieces.

Here is where I am at tonight.

I basically did this:

1) Started with 150 grit dry wall sand block and a clean bucket of water with a small bit of soap
2) Then 220 grit dry wall sand block new bucket of water
3) Then 600 grit (new bucket)
4) 800 grit (new bucket)
5) 1500 grit (new bucket)
6) 2000 grit (new bucket)
7) 3 M compound (wool rotary attachment)
8) Polish (wool rotary)
9) Novus 3 (wool)
10) Novus 2 (wool)
11) 3 M Machine Polish (foam)
12) Finally Maguire soft buff foam pad - used only for finishing. I kept going over it again and with this at a high speed. Almost to the point that you can feel the drag as you run it across the plastic with pressure. The plastic almost starts to bur but you keep it moving where there is resistance.

This seems to almost melt the plastic slightly and polish it to a mirror shine.

It literally shows fingerprints!

Here is a pic. More when I finish this all up. I have a pic of the front fender because I finally got it to match my work on the front fender:

[Darius1502]

Ok...now I am quite happy! I recently found a pair of NEW IN BAG NOS 350X air dams.

I put one of them up to the fenders I just polished. What do you think?

The air dam was just pulled out of the bag!! You can't get fresher that that!

[Darius1502]

Another shot....NOS just pulled out of bag versus polished fenders:

[shovelryder]

Looks great!!!!!

[atc007]

Looks like you definitely got it figured out !! Looking great. You gonna polish the scoops lol ?? NICE work!

[Darius1502]

Here is another comparison this morning. Still refining it:

[atc300r]

WOW ,Looks great Im going to follow these steps when I get aroung to doing my fenders .This is a great how to thread.

[Mr. Clean]

Great job Darius, I have nothing to add that has not already been shared.

Polishing fenders takes gobs of time and tons of patience.

[oldskool83]

good job. if it anything like polishing aluminum I will never try it lol

[ktmcrasher]

Groutaone YouTube channel is great. Last time I tried to polish plastic with one of those wheels I just had melted plastic everywhere. I will give it another bash after watching that

[Darius1502]

Great job Darius, I have nothing to add that has not already been shared.

Polishing fenders takes gobs of time and tons of patience.

Mike, did you find that the tanks are a harder plastic than the rear fenders? The 350X front fender was way easier. The compound of the plastic seems harder?

[atc007]

I just LOVE this stuff!! Great job !!

[Darius1502]

I just LOVE this stuff!! Great job !!

I am learning but something inside of me just always hated when my fenders got scratched up as a kid. The fact now that there is somewhat of a process to bring almost any fender back to looking really good....

well its like we have a weapon to bring these trikes back to new condition. I want to keep refining this.

I am wondering if there is some heavy wax I can put on these fenders to fill in the scratches that are still there.

Maybe Carnuba?

Any ideas....anyone?