"I suggest that if you want a flat surface you put the abrasive paper on something flat, surface plate, a piece of tabletop glass, a piece of marble, anything like that and then work what you are trying to get cleaned up across the abrasive. After that you might want to invest in a buffing wheel and some polishing compounds"
A-ha! I asked Sam if he had done the surface place route. He had tried that method at times. It takes forever and doesn't do as good a job on the rougher grits.
Also. Not looking to get a mirror finish on this. The standard 'surface' look on a stainless steel shiny section of your gun, from the factory, is what 400 grit sandpaper looks like if you keep it lubricated while you sand. I just want the slide to blend in with the other parts of the gun, not stand out like a mirror.
See the yellow circle? That's what is left of a blemish. You can see some swirly scratches in that vicinity too from lifting the sandpaper wrong. But much better than it was. The yellow arrow pointing at the pot edges is the next area I might look at. They don't impact function, but... extra ugly. I don't want a beauty queen, but... I can help a bit.
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If I wanted super polish then you betcha... polishing compound and buffing wheels.
You know where else you use a file for a sanding block to so your work on a gun? When you are doing the fitment for frame-slide that is titanium.
No matter what method you end up using, you get exposed to good ideas that might work for something else another time.
ReplyDeleteI used the surface plate and emory cloth technique to flatten and polish the internals on a Taurus 85 and it slicked it up a good bit.
I learned the technique from my machinist father.
The more things you learn, the more complicated (and/or expensive) the mistakes you make on the learning curve!