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Apprentice
 
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Hi
I've got a collection of steel plate and a few steel weapons, and in places they are looking distinctly scratched. I've no good ideas for polishing them out, they're too much for brasso. I'm sure somebody can tell me how to sort it properly...
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Duncan Thomas
duncan dot thomas at gmail dot com
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Apprentice
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I'm part of a roman re-enactment group, I'll ask out techy to give some ideas.
Kekle, Voice of Luns Khan of the Mongols. (curious Pastimes)
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Champion
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Well, you can use pumice, as described in the Home made clank? thread.  It is important to get scratches out, to prevent rust. So use sandpaper and cloth wheel if you can`t find anything else.
________________________________________________________ - IRL: Edwin Hofstra
- - mostly crewing at the moment
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Apprentice
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Well, pumice seems to leave a dull, scratchy finish rather than a polished finish I was hoping for. Better than it was in terms of being smoother, but still not shiny...
Anybody else got a suggestion? I'm not necessarily after any kind of historical accuracy, otherwise I'd paint it black, I'm just trying to make a couple of display pieces look better...
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Duncan Thomas
duncan dot thomas at gmail dot com
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Champion
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If you really want it shiny, you`ll have to go from coarse to fine, and not skip a step. Work crosswise, to prevent making new scratches yourself. Sandpaper, polishing paper, cloth wheel with polishing fat (in a well closed space using breathing protection, because the fat will get everywhere). If you don`t have the means to use a cloth wheel you could try a polishing iron/stone, but that will take a lot of patience. These days they`re only used to 'rub' a few small scratches in an otherwise immaculate surface, not the entire surface.
________________________________________________________- IRL: Edwin Hofstra
- - mostly crewing at the moment
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Champion
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For deeper scratches, rather than grinding down the entire surface to the level of the bottom of the scratch, you could try using a hammer or "English wheel" to smooth it out, moving metal from high points to low points.
The side effects could be making the metal harder, more brittle and thinner.
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Heroic Knight
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When you've got rid of the scratches and have a dull finish left, get yourself a tube of 'Autosol'* metal polish, a load of rags, a piece of soft leather (if you have it) and a pair or three of latex gloves.
Use the leather as a 'polish-on' cloth and and re-apply autosol at intervals, use plenty of elbow-grease, use the rags to buff off, check the finish, and if you have to, polish again
the gloves are because a, that stuff will colour your hands for days
and b, to keep your sweat off the steel
* we sometimes use this at work to polish marks out of the moulds
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Buy from me and stop one
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The term you're looking for is Seige Engineer !!!
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All problems can be solved with engineering......and large amounts of kinetic energy
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Knight
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| Have you considered wet and dry paper? If you start with a 320 grade or higher depending on how deep your scratches are, and then work up the grades to 1200 (common grades are 240, 320, 400, 600, 800 and 1200) you should be able to achieve a mirror finish. The wet and dry will naturally break down and become finer as you use it, each time you change grade you should change the direction of stroke through 90 degrees and thus polish out the scratches from the previous grade, as recommended above you could finish off with autosol on a cloth or even autosol used in conjunction with crocus paper (engineering equivalent of Jewellers rouge) If the finish is fine enough then you should have no problem with corrosion but buffing the finished surface over with a rag wetted with WD40 will keep plain polished steel rust free for weeks, obviusly you'll have to keep the armour out of puddles and wet grass but common sense applies here.
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Apprentice
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I'm going to give wet'n'dry followed by autosol a try. I'll let people know what I think of the result, but it sounds like the way forward.
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Duncan Thomas
duncan dot thomas at gmail dot com
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