Polishing Spring

[Murdock]

I got a buncha spring steel now

I'd like to get it all real shiny


I've been polising it by hand and with a buffer mounted on a drill.

I now have a bufing wheel mounted on my bench grinder.

With the drill the steel gets only mildly warmish to the touch. With the bench grinder buffer it gets to hot to hold at the point of contact. I've only used the bench grinder on mild and stainles bits so far.


I've got conflicting reports on wheather or not getting the spring armour hot from a buffer will ruin the temper and make it as dentable as mild.

Anyone know for sure, i don't wanna ruin my temper just to get it brighter faster.

Jehan James you both have Jeff's stuff too what has been your experience?

[schreiber]

No kind of expert here, but maybe it will.

I'm pretty sure it has to get hotter than you're willing to handle ( at least bare-handed ) in order to ruin a temper.

You could also try heat-sinking it - put something heat absorbing on the non-polished side in order to draw some heat out of the piece.

Or, it could be that you're trying to rouge a 120 grit sanded surface... if that's the case, then yes, it's going to get really hot and not do a whole lot to the finish.

What finish are you starting with, and what are you using on the wheel?

[Murdock]

I've got a fabric wheel with a grey "ferrous materials" polishing compound stick (from Sears????)

It get's pretty hot i can hang on to it but it's quite painful. Fingers don't turn red or anything.

My ole stainless barbute looks like a mirror now where i've worked on it.

I'm pretty worried about using it on Jeffs stuff since it's pretty thin.

The stuff from Cet has faded a bit, i sweated on it and had to de rust it with 600 grip sandpaper, it's down to a bright satin finish Jeff's is still a high bright finish, with a coupld dull spots.

I'd like to get it all up to the same finish again. But i'd hate to take the temper out of my nice nice dent resistant armour.

[Tarquin Bjornsson]

you have to reach an excess of about 400-700 degrees before temper will be affected


just my 2 cents

[The Midnight Rust]

Just like different grits on sand paper, there are different grips of polishing compound, and each of those compounds works best on a different sort of cloth wheel. I think there's a black sort of compound that you use before the gray, and then finish with a red compound.

Wherever you buy your polishing stuffs, I'm sure there's a chart laying around that describes exactly what you need. Try looking on the back of the packaging, that's where it is on the stuff I've bought.

[Murdock]

Yeah thats what i'm discovering

I went over stuff with gray/ black

now i'm using this red

I thought my old helm was bright before!!!! Parts of it look like glass or polished crome!!!

I really doubt i'm getting 400 degrees on the wheel so sounds like i'm good.

Now i just gotta get the lil turds of polish off of it all and it'll look perfect.

Still only polished the mild bits of my rig and my olf stinless helm.

Hell i might go crazy and polish my shield boss and basket hilts and buckles and everything!

[Jehan de Pelham]

I don't let it get to the point I need to put it on a wheel. I get a beer or three, sit down with some Owain Phyfe, and rub on it with 2000 grit automotive sandpaper, 1500 if I need to get aggressive, 1000 would be as low as I would ever go--read: I messed up.

Jehan de Pelham, esquire and servant of Sir Vitus

[Murdock]

I didn't want it to get that bad but i was at Pennsic and there's only so much i could do there.

Jeffs stuff is still shiny i'm hoping to get it al to that shine if not a bit better.

[Jehan de Pelham]

Ah, Murdock, it's all in the bag.

The bag I mean is this: an individual bag for each article of armor, which you soak in oil, or in my case Liquid Gold. Before you put it in the bag, you dry it off either by hanging it in the air (inside your tent probably) until it's dry or mopping it off with a couple of clean dry towels, and then put it inside the bag and then rub the article within.

It's a little bit of work but well worth it, especially in the long run.

Jehan de Pelham, esquire and servant of Sir Vitus

[Murdock]

I did that.

It kept everything but the breast plate pretty nice after Pennsic.

I got a couple spots here and there, they've been cleaned. But i want it even shinyer than it was when it was new.

I think i'm gonna try it tomarrow on a piece that not that important.

[Gruber]

A good piece of 20-22gg spring steel will be tempered around 400-450 degrees. The color of the steel at that temp is just a little before the blu-ish to purple range. Best thing to do is to hold the piece with light cotton gloves. This way you can feel when it is just starting to get hot enough to notice.
If you do bring the heat past the tempering heat, you might remove some hardness (dent resistance) but increase the spring. The difference is usually negligable ubless it is on a larger piece with greater surface area; ie,
cuisse, breast and back, and vambrace to a smaller degree. Knee and elbow cops are pretty safe from this provided they are actually 18gg thick AFTER polishing. They are pretty solid in spring steel and even with some of the hardness removed, the shape of the cops makes them very durable.
Then again, if your pieces are fluted- good luck denting anything in spring steel; even if you have removed some of the hardness
Gruber

[James B.]

Murdock

The armours will have better advice at this point than I but here is my secret to keeping the finish.

1) Wool bags. Wool will keep the dew off of your armor because water has a real hard time penetrating wool. OTOH if you put you armor in the bag wet you will have issues because the water can't escape.

2) Wipe down the armor of any moister and let air dry before storing. I have an extra plank table with saw horse legs like in how a man shalt be armed shows. I let my armor rest there before storing. I also store the armor in the bags in a chest at night. At pennsic I was in tight quarters so I used a plastic tube at night hidden under the table with a table cloth on it.

3) Any surface rust I get I use neverdull on. You rub the area until it’s a black spot. Let the polish set a few minutes until it fogs up like a car wax, then remove with a tarry cloth towel.

4) This black spots come off easy with the super fine grit and a polishing wheel.


Hope this helps

[Thomas Powers]

Note: Wd40 will remove buffing compound residue---then you can apply the oil of your choice...

Thomas

[James B.]

But then you have WD40 on your armor. Man I hate that stuff.