Exhaust polished, before/after pics

[speedmachine]

Hi guys,

Here are some before/after pics of my attempt to polish the exhaust myself. I requested some quotes for letting someone do it for me, but they all were around 300 euro's, so I thought "let's give it a try myself". So instead of buying a nice polishing machine with some buffing pads, I decided it was a little job which could be done by hand.

i started out with sanding paper 180 on the bad spots and 280 or 400 on the "ok" spots, followed by 600, 800, 1200, 1500 and 2000. After those it is like flat shiny...but no more scratches from the sanding. Than I used a high gloss polishingpad for your average drilling machine and some Belgom Alu (like Autosol, but more known here)

The result is an exhaust which looks like new again and my back looks like quasimodo, so if anybody is thinking of doing this by hand, I can happily say you shouldn't, at least invest in a polishing machine...if your exhaust is as bad as mine was that is off course! The rusty bends were a real pita!

Before:


after:

[turbo911]

Tidy wana do mine for free????

[speedmachine]

[quote="turbo911"]
Tidy wana do mine for free????
[/quote]
Sure bring it over and i'll do yours too!






I live in the Netherlands, is that a problem for you?

[turbo911]

errr yes !!! been to valkensvard in the past to watch some world champs motox which was good i will have to have anther go at mine as yours puts mine to shame !!!!

[Lane]

Nice.  That's how they ALL should look.  The car's too beautiful to have one of its most visible parts left to rust and tarnish. 

[benyeats]

[quote="Lane"]
Nice.  That's how they ALL should look.  The car's too beautiful to have one of its most visible parts left to rust and tarnish. 
[/quote]

I am going to look into ceramic coating of mine.  I don't think it is that expensive and will improve the look many fold.

[speedmachine]

[quote="benyeats"]
[quote="Lane"]
Nice.  That's how they ALL should look.  The car's too beautiful to have one of its most visible parts left to rust and tarnish. 
[/quote]

I am going to look into ceramic coating of mine.  I don't think it is that expensive and will improve the look many fold.
[/quote]

Be aware, ceramic coating is great and has great optics...when new and under the bonnet, ceramic is porous and when it gets wet and dirty you will not be able to clean it very easily (or just not)
When you give it a black ceramic you will have a nice finish for quite some time, but when you opt for the nice white or other lighter colours, you will be scr*wed!

[benyeats]

[quote="speedmachine"]
[quote="benyeats"]
[quote="Lane"]
Nice.  That's how they ALL should look.  The car's too beautiful to have one of its most visible parts left to rust and tarnish. 
[/quote]

I am going to look into ceramic coating of mine.  I don't think it is that expensive and will improve the look many fold.
[/quote]

Be aware, ceramic coating is great and has great optics...when new and under the bonnet, ceramic is porous and when it gets wet and dirty you will not be able to clean it very easily (or just not)
When you give it a black ceramic you will have a nice finish for quite some time, but when you opt for the nice white or other lighter colours, you will be scr*wed!
[/quote]

Yep Black looks like the best colour to go for.

[MonsieurX]

How long did that take?

[speedmachine]

The way i did it, it took me 2 days...or 2 evenings and one afternoon to be exact, but mine was really, really bad as you can see, the sides of the exhaust were all brown...as were the flanges

[Mota Leira]

[quote="speedmachine"]
The way i did it, it took me 2 days...or 2 evenings and one afternoon to be exact, but mine was really, really bad as you can see, the sides of the exhaust were all brown...as were the flanges
[/quote]

Nicely done! I did mine a couple weeks ago, but only spent 30 minutes (all by hand and no sandpaper) or so on it. It got a lot nicer and I thought it wouldn't get any better, but looking at yours I see I have some more work to do.

[GTED]

Mota, can you tell me what kind of polish did you use?  I have a polish machine from Griot's Garage but not sure what polish and pad o use.  Thx

GTED

[speedmachine]

[quote="Mota Leira"]
[quote="speedmachine"]
The way i did it, it took me 2 days...or 2 evenings and one afternoon to be exact, but mine was really, really bad as you can see, the sides of the exhaust were all brown...as were the flanges
[/quote]

Nicely done! I did mine a couple weeks ago, but only spent 30 minutes (all by hand and no sandpaper) or so on it. It got a lot nicer and I thought it wouldn't get any better, but looking at yours I see I have some more work to do.
[/quote]

If yours is semishiny, you should be fine without sandingpaper, but it does make a big difference to use a drillingmachine with a 10 bucks polishing head and some autosol or such.
Parts where you can really see oxidation you need sanding...when it's just a little you could try and only use 1500 and 2000!
But watch out, if you are planning to use nothing but your hands, so no drilling machine or such, you won't be able to clean up the tiny scratches from the sanding very easily!

[MonsieurX]

Apart from the main muffler, what's the best way to clean the pipes?
Trick question, what of the headers? Any advice?

[speedmachine]

Cleaning is just using autosol and a cloth, polishing is just how i wrote in the first post, when there is more rust you start with a stronger paper or maybe even with steel brush for the headers, just depends on how bad they are