Anton's 68 Charger - 2012 Update

Rich · Post by **Rich** » Fri Jan 27, 12 7:45 pm

well impressed,keep on keeping on
this is a good thread and an inspiration to those who have not yet done this kind of thing...

mopar_mark · Post by **mopar_mark** » Fri Jan 27, 12 8:52 pm

Anton,
Nice work & good initiative as usual.

Make sure you don't use the wire wheel on any critical bolt threads, such as rod bolts, as the wire wheel can impact their ability to work as specified

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Mon Jan 30, 12 8:45 am

I spent a bit of time tiding up my rear bumper this morning as there was a lot of rust around the number plate area and the quote I got to re-chrome it was between £250 and £300 and I just can't justify that at the moment so I polished it up and i am amazed at the results.

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Mon Jan 30, 12 8:48 am

One more

Charger · Post by **Charger** » Mon Jan 30, 12 9:03 am

great stuff, looks good enough to me

what polish did you use??

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Mon Jan 30, 12 9:10 am

Charger wrote:great stuff, looks good enough to me

what polish did you use??

The big electric one on the previous page with proper polishing soap (different grades) and different grade mops. i have re-polished all the chrome and stainless trim this way and it has made a big difference.

Ivor · Post by **Ivor** » Mon Jan 30, 12 10:08 am

I did exactly the same on my RR bumpers, they were so enormous, I knew the chroming bill was going to be close on a grand by my reckoning, so did exactly the same as you Anton, using an air powered mop and a range of compounds..the results were nearly as good as yours!

Dave81 · Post by **Dave81** » Mon Jan 30, 12 1:38 pm

Would you use Autosol......?

My bumpers dont look to disimilar to yours regarding their current state!

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Mon Jan 30, 12 2:34 pm

Dave81 wrote:Would you use Autosol......?

My bumpers dont look to disimilar to yours regarding their current state!

Buy hand you just can't rub fast enough to get the same finish as a proper grinder style polishing mop set up. Autosol is good if you want to polish ali as that is a soft material but if you try and use it on chrome (very hard) by hand you will be there all day and as it is quite coarse you could end up with fine scratches. If you want to do your you can use a car polishing mop on a big grinder and use car polish like G3.

VGVIP · Post by **VGVIP** » Mon Jan 30, 12 3:05 pm

Hi Anton.

Don't mean to barge in on your thread, so apologies in advance.

Top job! Great idea about polishing the bumpers and chasing the rust away... wonder how long it takes to become visible again.
My bumpers on the VG are quite bad with a bit of pitting in places but after seeing your work I am inspired to see how well they would polish up as I can not afford to spend much on them.

Two years ago I undid a mistake I made about two decades before on the Monaro. I had painted the stainless steel trim to hide some ugly little scratches and dints. Anyway I did a bit of research on repairing dints and use of files and wet 'n dry then machine polishing.
It all came out very well but was a lot of work!
For my polishing, I used mops on my 6" bench grinder, 3000rpm if memory serves. Probably not quite enough peripheral speed though.

I like the look of your bench polisher! What speed does it run at?
What diameter mops do you use?

Here is a couple of handy tables for anyone interested in polishing.

http://www.schaffnermfg.com/speed-chart.html

As can be seen in the link high speed is important on stainless. Otherwise it can be a slow process.
But I am not sure about chrome plated bumpers.... think my bench grinder is fast enough!?

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Mon Jan 30, 12 3:47 pm

VGVIP

My compressor motor that I used to make my polisher spins at 3000 rpm but is a 2.2kwt (normal bench grinders are between 300 and 500 watt so mine is 4 or 5 times more powerful) motor so i can put alot of force on the motor to generate the heat need to polished quickly and the motor won't stop. I have 8inch mops and 6inch mops to get into awkward areas. I try to sand as little as i can because it can be hard to remove the scratches. I generally use the coarse mop to get any scratches out and any dirty/paint off the piece and the slowly go to finner mops till I am at the finest mop with the finest soap. If you want and even better finish I use G3 polishing compound on the finest mop but that can be very messy.
Whet I start my own business I will offer the service of polishing chrome and stainless trim and I will also removed dents and straighten bent trim as I have just done with one of mine.

sinny · Post by **sinny** » Tue Jan 31, 12 9:16 pm

Those bumpers look awesome! I was looking at getting mine re-chromed but based on yours I'll get a polisher. Thanks for the tip Anton.

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Wed Feb 01, 12 7:32 am

I went to the garage this morning and stripped the rest of the interior out so I could get the rest of the stainless steel trims off so i can polish them.
I also plan to put my new carpet in so i need to get the old one out and clean and paint the floor. I will also be replacing the firewall and under dash insulation after I have cleaned and painted. I have also move my charger from the large garage I had a work to a much smaller one very close to home. I have a lot less space but and can get there more to do more work. It used to take 45 minutes to get to work to work on my can now I can walk there.

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Wed Feb 01, 12 8:46 am

I also got my new exhaust tip hangers in the post yesterday and because the are bare steel I decided to paint them before I install them.

This is how limited I am for space in my new garage. I can just get in the car. This make it a bit challenging to work to say the least.

ANTON · Post by **ANTON** » Wed Feb 01, 12 3:43 pm

The reason I took off the rear trims I had a dent in one that has annoyed me ever since I brought the car so now that it is off I can fix it.