Polished Gauge Housings?

Flugtechnik

Flugtechnik

My bike is not transportation, it is a respite
As I'm working my way through my bike, I've gotten to my gauges. The black paint is faded and the top edges are chipped with lots of ugly touch up paint. I started sanding them down to smooth them out and prep them for paint. I noticed the metal underneath was bright shiny steel. I had the idea to just clean the paint off and polish them up.

Has anyone else done this? Any pics? Everything on my bike is either Silver, chrome or polished aluminum except the gauges, grips, seat, tires and fork gators. I've already polished the lever and control housings on the bars.

Since they are steel, I guess I would still need to clear coat them so they won't rust?

This is the best pic of my gauges that I have.

(click to enlarge)
 
i woudl not worry abotu clear... as long as you keep your bike clean they will not rust... yes you can polish that to shine like no other!
 
My housings were black when I first got my bike, but I found a set of gauges with chrome housings and am replacing them. If you didn't want to polish them you could paint them chrome or silver. The black would offset things, but since 95% of your bike is silver that's probably the way to go.
 
This bike should never see another drop of rain in it's life, but the humidity down here in the south can rust stuff even in your garage.
 
I went ahead an polished the speedo last night. I don't know what Honda painted their gauges with but I could only get it off with sandpaper. The wire wheel barely made a dent. After about 2 hours, lots of sand paper, steel wool and metal polish, this is the result. I think it looks pretty good. I'm not going for "show chrome" shine. I put a nice coat of wax on it. I figure if I don't like it, I can just rough it up again and paint it.

The tachometer is next.

(click to enlarge)
 
Not sure what the housing is made of but that may rust on you if it's steel. I don't think these were alloy. The wax should help with that though - keep us posted.
 
looks great bud!!! i remember doing all this by hand with paper girts and wool... man that was when polishing tooooook forever... look into trackind down a old grinder and put a buffing wheel on it... i got mine from a shop i like to call DADS HOUSE... shhhhh dont tell.
 
Yeah, I've got a grinder. It has a grinding wheel and a wire wheel on it right now. I guess I should go spring for a buffing wheel and some compound since I still have a lot of stuff to polish. I will probably get a small one for my die grinder too. After the gauges I have to do the front wheel and the forks.
 
what i would do... well what i DO do is... got a fine brissel wire wheel... then also a polishing wheel... get all the diff metal polish bars and GO TO TOWN... her is my set up... the towels on each side catch all the extra crap that gets thrown up... keep an old stiff wire brush and spray bottle handy to clean off the wheel as it begins to cake on there as well as to keep it moist so you do not burn the part... on my smaller buffer it has a clutch so that is pretty nice on small items like screws and bolts... you will LOVE how much faster this will go... i did my whole swing arm in 1 hour, and both lower legs in about 2... i still keep some metal polish on hand an 00000 steel wool when it does but to the part i can just get it right off... I do have a light and like to have the shop lights low, this will allow me to really see all the imprefections in the metal as i go... it is one of those things i just picked up while doing it for a while.

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Flugtechnik said:
Do you clean the wheel when you go to a finer compound? If so, how?
Click to expand...

I just started this whole expedition into polishing and since they were relatively cheap picked up a different wheel for each type of compound and labeled them.
 
This is the grinder I have. It has a wheel on each side with guards. This is the wire wheel side.

 
Forgot to say that the tach housing looks really good! Even with a buffer/grinder I have found polishing still takes a long time.
 
yes i clean the wheel... well kind of i should say... i run the wire brush against the wheel as it spins... all the old polish gets caught on the brush... either that or i will take a flat head screw driver on a slight angle to the wheel to get off the extra polish... flug... my small grider is the same as that! i cut the metal schroud deal a bit on my poishing side so that i can work with it a bit easier... really helps...
 
I took the paint off of the tachometer last night. It came off with just the wire wheel. Much easier. I plan on getting some buffing wheels today so I should have the entire gauge cluster all polished up by Monday.
 
another tip... get some gasket stripper or aircraft stripper... spray the item down with that, and as you are working wtih another part let it do its magic... will strip it to the bare metal and make polishing way easier...
 
here is a website i have found helpful, Its kinda hard to navigate but it has a lot of really good information.
http://www.finishing.com/index.html
Specifically, i think this particular artical will be a big help:
http://www.finishing.com/0800-0999/800.shtml
 
I got everything all polished up this weekend. I think I've found that the key is to get everything smooth with the sandpaper and work my way up in the grits before actually polishing. I have to paint the bracket that attaches the gauges to the triple tree, but It has been raining so I'm waiting for the humidity to go back down. I also need to get some new rubber "cushions" for the gauges. Besides a couple small pitted rust spots, they look really good. When I get it back together, I'll post some pics.

Much cheaper than springing for some chrome gauges!
 
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