Polished Metal Drifter - First polish try

Never polished anything before but I took a stab at it today since I don’t have anything to throw till I get some friction pads and a second yoyo next week.

Still I think my metal drifter came out looking pretty good for a first ever polish.

1 Like

Let me be the first to say you did an excellent job.

And thank you :wink:

That’s a lot better than my first job! Looks great! And what happened to the bearing seat?

It’s hard to tell if the bearing seat is even removable or not. It’s really exact fit if it is and I didn’t pound them out. One bearing seat did have a tiny bit of scuff from the drill so I went ahead and polished it out too.

I’m debating if I should take the paint off and polish the rest. Tbh it was kind of fun and makes me want to polish my aluminum rims on my car.

What did you use?

Mothers aluminum and mag polish cream.

18volt lithium ion cordless drill

corded 1-5 speed. 30,000 rpm max Dremel

Dremel polishing wheel

Dremel 600 and 1000 grit sanding disks. They’re tiny so it took a few.

Pack of polishing cloth from automotive store. (about 3 paper towels in size)

The inner most part was the most difficult as it’s actual speed is so much slower than the rim speed.

For the most part I under-sanded it and could really tell because it took alot more effort to just polish through it. The outter rim area was the easiest as it had enough speed to really be effective but once you started getting near the friction pad track the relative speed was so poor. I had to spin the drill with one hand and manage the dremel with a polishing wheel in the other. It uses up the polishing cream sooo quickly you touch it for 3-5 seconds and dip the spinning bit in the tub of cream and repeat. Half a dozen or more and wipe it off and check progress.

I have been humoring the idea of how to reliably and safely attach a m4 axel to my router. I have both 1/4 and 1/2inch shank setup but however you set it up… you damn well better make sure you’re doing it well with a router motor. 22,000 rpm vs my cordless drill at 1,400. How fast does a lathe spin?

I’m sorry if some of you don’t have acess to power tools and my experience is useless to you.

Nice work. My personal preference would be to leave the blue in the hub.

That looks wonderful.

I have a metal drifter coming with my Messiah. Makes me actually want it now :wink:

Looks good man!

Haha wow I got my package today and the drifter was actually already polished it’s not bad either with worn down pads!