Aluminum cleaning and shining.

[Polymer-2]

I have an old engine I'd like to restore to look like new. Does anyone know of a good way to make the aluminum look like it did when it was new?

[Something Odiferous]

I have used Mothers on my bikes, but I really like Never Dull wadding polish better.  It is some work, but gives good results that seem to last.  I love to shine aluminum.

[Something Odiferous]

As a little follow up to my reply, I too am going to tackle the motor on my 750 C.  But I am going to paint it black.  Otherwise I think I would have to remove the engine, get it blasted, etc.  Seems like a lot of work when these Hondas look good with a black motor, and shiny carbs.

[Polymer-2]

Something Odiferous wrote

As a little follow up to my reply, I too am going to tackle the motor on my 750 C.  But I am going to paint it black.  Otherwise I think I would have to remove the engine, get it blasted, etc.  Seems like a lot of work when these Hondas look good with a black motor, and shiny carbs.

What type of black paint do you use and does it affect cooling?

[Something Odiferous]

I have used a high heat paint from Auto Zone and that worked just fine.  The finish was a bit glossy and I'm not sure I liked that, but to each his own.  As far as the cooling, I'm not an expert there but I did run the last bkle I painted all summer and did not sense any heating problems.  My first paint job was on a 82 Custom that was already black and I just went over the whole thing to clean it up.  Ran it all summer too after my winter project was done.  Looked pretty good I thought and it was a bit glossy too.

[gonebiking-2]

Get the motor sand blasted and then use a high heat silver or light grey paint to give you that new from the factory finish. Make sure the surface is 100% clean so that the paint doesnt peel .

[macca k5]

im in the process of the same job and have had great success with wet and dry emrey paper and then finishing off with mothers i started with 180 grade and went right thru untill 1500 heaps of elbow grease reqiured and a couple of cold beers but it looks great!

[Something Odiferous]

A little follow up again.  I have been doing this to my 750 and what I came up with is the 180 grit sandpaper, then a 400 grit (a pretty fair amount of elbow grease).  I painted the motor with some good high heat paint from a local paint store, but kept the stator cover and ignition cover, and the chain gear cover unpainted.  The sandpaper does a good job, but I finished it with Never Dull and it looks very good.  The motor itself looks new, except that it is painted.

As a side note, the pipes on this bike were very rusty.  I sanded them down and used what's called a Very High Heat paint on them I got from Auto Zone.  The color was too light so I bought some Woodstove paint from Tractor Supply that gives them the flat black I wanted.  A local cage racer here told me he used the stove paint on his headers all the time.  Worth a try.  We'll see how it looks after I have a few miles on the bike.  Right now I likey.

[Sgt Womderful]

I took mine all apart and sand blasted it and painted it high temp aluminum. Looks like new. Now I;'m wondering if I should clear coat it. Any comments?

[Sgt Womderful]

Above picture of newly painted motor.