84 FJ1100 barn find resurrection

[jdvorchak]

Waiting for a battery and to get the clutch cover welded I decided to do a little aluminum polishing. I should have done some more "before" pics.

They look so Good, how did you get them so shiny?

Cheers Alan

I start with 500 grit wet/dry wet sanding until all of the pitting (dark spots) are gone. The part then has a uniform grey color. Then move to 1000 grit to remove the 500 grit scratches and finally 2000 grit to remove the 1000 grit scratches. Doesn't take as long as it sounds. Just a few minutes of sanding, probably 20 minutes total. Then I use aluminum, or they call it soft metal buffing compound, on a 5 inch buffing wheel attached to my grinder. Final step is to change buffing wheels and use Mothers Aluminum polish. That is the quick part. Only takes a minute or two with each pad/compound.

I'm often asked "How long do you sand and polish aluminum?" My stock answer is "Until you get tired of sanding and polishing".  To get the parts looking like these, it really doesn't take long. To make them look like chrome? A lot, I mean a lot more sanding and polishing than I'm prepared to do. And quite frankly the soft aluminum alloy the Metric bikes used, back then, will never look like chrome. Except the fork lowers. I have polished parts on my Harley Davidon's to a chrome like finish. But that is such a PIA that I don't do it often.

[jdvorchak]

FYI since I really can't match the semi gloss finish of the engine and covers, I got some high gloss engine paint and primer. I intend to  paint the engine covers with the high gloss. Not OEM or stock looking, but a guy in the area has a Honda CB1100 with the side covers and valve covers painted high gloss and I really like the way that bike looks. It's an all black bike but they mixed semi gloss and high gloss.

[jdvorchak]

I got the cover back from the welder, my son Jimmy. He said it was pretty easy to weld and was careful not to use too much heat.





And after some JB Weld applied. Now all I have to do is wait 24 hours for the JB to fully cure.




I applied JB Weld to the outside to insure no leaks and to build up the surface dent for sanding and final paint. JB Weld is good up to 550 Deg F so I'm sure it will hold up.