It seems as though its stainless steel with a thin chrome coating or something. I can't get it to polish unless I sand it all down past the coating then it looks like a different shine then the rest of the good trim. Talk about a time consuming mess. Anybody restored this stuff?
I have come to believe they might be coated with an arcylic or epoxy like the aluminum bumpers on my 78 are. After sanding through the finish (probably applied to avoid oxidation), it polishes up VERY nicely! Looks almost as good as the chrome bumpers on the Wagon! :D
i had a friend polish a spare peice for me and it turned out good but not a bright as the peices on the car. he said they had coated it with something and that was the differance..
phil
Quote from: dave1987 on January 18, 2010, 12:03:50 AM
I have come to believe they might be coated with an arcylic or epoxy like the aluminum bumpers on my 78 are. After sanding through the finish (probably applied to avoid oxidation), it polishes up VERY nicely! Looks almost as good as the chrome bumpers on the Wagon! :D
Dave, can you give some details on the process of doing this? I have a set of bumpers for my 78 off a junk car that look horrible. Mine are cracked and need replacement.
What grit sandpaper did you use? Wet or dry? What polish? Can the polishing be done by hand? Did you use another protectant on it afterwards?
I am at work right now but I have 77 aluminum bumpers that I am going to work and it is true there is a coating on them to protect it. I have some stuff special for this. I will lok tonight [if i can remember] and post the name of it and maybe a picture if i can get some batteries.
jim
I wet sanded my bumpers by hand. Still have the right half of the back bumper to do though.
I started with 320 grit wet/dry sand paper, and sanded down until I got to the actual metal (the aluminum). You will see and obvious change from the white coating to the bare aluminum once you get down to the metal. Believe me, you can't miss it when you get through the coating!
Once all the coating was sanded off, I wet sanded the bare metal with 400 grit, then 600, then 800, then 1000, then 1500 and finishing up with 2000 grit.
Once it was all sanded and the shine on it was uniform, across the whole bumper, I polished it with a microfiber towel and Mother's Mag/Aluminum polish, the kind in the small white tin with the red label.
The front bumper came out AMAZING. It's a night and day difference between what it was before and what it is now!
I did not coat it with anything afterwards, just waxed it real good to keep water spots away. I did this in august or september and it is still holding up nicely!
It takes a long time to do, but I had nothing better to do, so I got the front bumper and half the back bumper done in about a week and a half, taking a couple hours every other day to work on them.
Again, this part of my project will have to wait until some smaller honey-dos are done due to the time it will take to finish all pieces. There goes my Knotts weekend again, maybe next year. Black powder coating for that mean look is looking better and easier every day.
Wow Dave - I do not think my carpal tunnel issue is gonna like that!
Recon you can use a small detail sander?
I might give it a shot when (if) I run out of other projects.
I paid 60 bucks for both bumpers and they are just hazy white. At first I thought I wasted my $$, but now I am thinking they will come out nicely after sanding. They will reside in the attic until then.
Thanks for the advice!
I'm sure any type of electric sander would work, it's just getting around that curve at the top of the bumper that would be hard to do. The coating seemed to be the thickest in those parts, as it must have settled in the curves. Just take it slow so you don't get any swirling or sand to deep.