Mirror finish

[adammichael]

I thought it might be interesting to see the steps you all use to get a mirror finish.

Heres what i do.

Here is the grits I hollow grind with to get a mirror finish
50/60
120
220
400 or 45 micron
heat treat
400/ 45 micron
30 micron
16 micron
6 micron
5 micron
3 micron

then 4 different grits on the buffer ending with pink no scratch.
It is very time consuming but it works for me.

Michael

 

[Rob!]

OK - time to admit to my demons - well at least the one about mirror polish. It has driven me NUTS!!! It seems nomatter how many grits I go through in the process, I always wind up with deeper scratches that show up in buffing. I go back to earlier grits to remove them and get the same thing all over again. Now flat grinds are solvable because after 400 grit, I hand sand every second grit along the length of the blade so i can be sure scratches are gone. From 1200 grit, they buff up pretty nice.

The ceramic platen liner has made flat grinds cleaner and I suspect my 8" wheel is too hard and maybe should be a softer solid design.
Adam, You mentioned 4 different grits on the buffer - but you only identified the last one. I was using emery to try to remove the deeper scratches - (it doesn't work) and then white rouge, based on advise from a guy at the tool store. I'm thinking pure green chrome and pink no scratch would be a better choice now.

Good thread Adam. An old topic but it never gets stale.

 

[A. Brett Schaller]

60 grit to near finished dimensions.

fresh j weight 400 grit belt -- easy to see whether 60 grit scratches are gone.

fresh 800 grit j weight belt.

Hand rub lengthwise with 1200 grit wet or dry paper and WD-40 -- makes it easy to be sure all the 800 grit scratches are being removed, and minimizes the problem of steel grain showing up during buffing.

30 seconds on the buffer with pink no scratch.

30 seconds on the buffer with pure green chrome to remove any cloudiness.

 

[george tichbourne]

Four steps grind with 50 grit, compound with greaseless compound 240 grit, after heat treat belt with used 400 cork coated with green compound then buff with green compound.

I'm not saying that you couldn't do it the other way but it is not the way that I do it.

 

[J.Wade]

Four steps grind with 50 grit, compound with greaseless compound 240 grit, after heat treat belt with used 400 cork coated with green compound then buff with green compound.

I'm not saying that you couldn't do it the other way but it is not the way that I do it.

Just tried that this week. Thanks for the tip George it works great.Now it is how I will do any shinny blades


jimi