Polishing Stainless Steel/metal, chrome, etc....

[jonn127]

On my wifes MDX, I'm practicing pretty much every thing I can think of before starting to venture to friends cars, then paid for services. So I'm working on her mufflers and tips trying to polish those out. The 0000 steel wool is effective but sloooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwww. What would you guys recommend as a step up from the 0000 steel wool as far as abrasiveness but still be able to get done without leaving scratches. Are there any drill attachments out there I could use.
Also, whats the easiest way to distinguish between Stainless Steel, chrome, aluminum, coated, uncoated. Are there easy enough ways to tell or is it a matter of experience and knowing what manufacturers use on their cars.Feed back please

[LegacyGT]

I have not used it personally, but a mothers powerball for metal should be something you look at.

[CEE DOG]

If the SS is bad enough you can move up to 000 wool and then back to 0000.
When I bought mine at walmart it came in a pack with 3 different sizes of wool strand.
I even moved to the coursest of the 3 and back down when doing my SS tips

[Mike Phillips]

Stainless Steel is a very hard metal and doesn't polish anything like aluminum which is very soft.

If you have a rotary buffer and a wool pad, and you can safely get the pad on the rotary buffer onto the surface of the exhaust tip without endangering the body panel, then try hitting it with the wool pad and just about any metal polish. Some also have good luck with compounds like M105

:)

[oldmodman]

Are you talking about polishing the stainless exhaust pipes or the already polished tips?

When I got my Borla system it was unpolished except for the tips. I sanded them with 600, then 1500, then 2500, then polished with a rotary with two stages of heavy compound, then lighter compound, and finally Megs 83 (I had gallons of it left over) The pipes and mufflers ended up looking like mirrors. But even with power tools it took all day, eight hours. And I go over them about twice a year to keep them shiny.

[jonn127]

BOTH!!!! I've just been using some 0000 and metal polish, switched to Optimum Power clean to see what it did and it works better. Didn't even think to take sand to it. Thanks a ton.