Buffing Out An Alaska Medal Case

[klinej54]

Picked up this Alaska Medal case for an early Elgin B. W. Raymond. The case was in fair condition, but I though it would be fun to clean it up a bit. 

I used to do stringed instrument finishes in a former life, so I setup my old polishing wheels and gave it a go.

 

You can see some pitting on the edge of the back closest to you

 

Here's my buffing setup. I used my 10 inch (25.5 cm) , double wheels on each end of the arbor. One side is dressed with Menzerna Compound (brown), Item # 3169. The other side has Extra fine (ivory), Item # 3174, although to be honest, I can’t remember the last time I put any of the ivory on the clean wheel.

 

The double wheels that make up the course side. 
I know the guy on YouTube makes a big noise about a hard wheel for buffing, but I’m really not trying to push a lot of medal around, so I have good success with this setup. I find you have less heat and cutting with a softer wheel. I have bigger wheels (16 inch) too, but don’t really use them much for this application. Not that they wouldn’t work, they're just really expensive, so I save them for finishes, when someone talks me into doing an instrument repair.

 

My motor base RPM is 1725, and I have 2 to 1 reduction ratio on my pulleys, so my finial RPM at the buffing wheel is 850 or so. Any faster than that and the whole system shakes so much it dances across the floor.

 

Here’s a link to Steward –McDonald. When I did finishing on a regular bases, I’d by my stuff from them. http://www.stewmac.com/SiteSearch/buffing%20menzerna%20compound.html

 

Here's the case after buffing but before polishing. You can see the pitting is gone. I'll post another case clean up sometime and use a junkier case so you can really see the difference.

Edited March 12, 2016 by klinej54

[bobm12]

Excellent job, K! I've used Steward –McDonald in the past for different guitar related stuff. I didn't know about their finishing stuff! I'll visit them one more time.

 

Cheers,

 

Bob

[klinej54]

Excellent job, K! I've used Steward –McDonald in the past for different guitar related stuff. I didn't know about their finishing stuff! I'll visit them one more time.

 

Cheers,

 

Bob

Thanks Bob.  I mostly worked with guitars and mandolins.  I used to do the finishes for a luthier named Gary Zimnicki. Great builder of custom you name it.  Here's a link.  http://www.zimnicki.com/   Now Gary does his own finishing. You can see he uses the same system I do.

[bobm12]

Thanks for the link! The side port concert classical is interesting and yes, he has your same set up.

 

It strikes me that materials for concert classical have change a lot since my time...IMHO, they used to be more of choice woods than now...mahogany was for cheap stuff, etc, never concert (rosewood, yes and spruce or certain cedar variety for the top yes, i.e. Ramirez).

 

A question remains, since he is doing the finishes and is using your same set up, I wonder if his quality would be comparable to yours...it seems to me he copied your technique. All in all, do you have a "recipe" for different watch case materials, (pastes, buffs) i.e. gold plated, gold, silver, silver plated, chrome, stainless steel...well you get my drift! :)

 

Thanks for this interesting topic. I'm already learning quite a bit!

 

Cheers,

 

Bob

[klinej54]

Nickel cases (from which Alaska cases are made) are pretty indestructible, sense you don't need to worry about break-through. That 's way I used a cutting compound and a moderate wheel speed.  Coin silver is also pretty tough.  I use a medium to fine grit compound for gold.  On plated cases I will slow my buffing wheel down to reduce the heat production as well as decrease the risk of breaking through the plating to the base metal.  Using a soft wheel also reduces creating hard spots and break-through.  If I've done some heavy buffing, I'll use a finer compound for a second buffing to clean up any wheel marks before I polish.  

 

Gary uses the same basic instrument finishing process I used, except he has a LPHV (low pressure, high volume) spray gun.  I used a traditional high pressure gun. The color work, wet sanding, and buffing are all the same.We both can do french polish as well.

Edited March 12, 2016 by klinej54

[bobm12]

Thanks K! Your advise and experience is deeply appreciated and comes in the right time as great help for a project I have.

 

Since I normally work on watches, -- not pocket watches but wrist watches -- I normally use a dremel tool but was finding it a little aggressive for the job (in many cases). I'll probably upgrade my old one for a new variable speed dremel...I also have something that resembles what you have but I suspect it is one of those Chinese low quality ones that if you press a little it stops! No power whatsoever! Therefore the dremel alternative. Also, there is the problem of holding the case properly...I believe I might have to make a fixture for that too.

 

Cheers,

 

Bob

[jdm]

I know the guy on YouTube makes a big noise about a hard wheel for buffing, but I’m really not trying to push a lot of medal around, so I have good success with this setup. I find you have less heat and cutting with a softer wheel. I have bigger wheels (16 inch) too, but don’t really use them much for this application. Not that they wouldn’t work, they're just really expensive, so I save them for finishes, when someone talks me into doing an instrument repair.

Very nice setup and results. I have limited success results moving around stainless steel, even buffing regular scratches on a clasp is a challenge.

I use a 2" hard wheel, with grey compounds on a rotary tool with of 5K min speed. Surely that's too fast and the wheel too small?

[klinej54]

I don't work with stainless much in my watch world, as most of my work is on pocket watches.  Nickle and sliver are much softer than SS.  That being said, when I do the math, our wheel surface speeds are about the same.  (The radius of my wheels are about 5 times yours, and your RPM is about 5.5 times faster).  I wonder is torque, or lack thereof, is a factor for you?  Other than the wheel hardness, the big difference here is the motors driving our systems.  I'm have a 1 horse motor, which mean my wheel speed is pretty constant, even under load.  I think a bigger wheel and motor would give you better results, as well as reduce the risk of point loading contact between the wheel and the piece.  If you want the blemish to "flow", you need to heat the area around it as well.  A larger, and subsequently wider, wheel will do that for you.

 

I have a 6 x 1 inch fine deburring wheel I use when I working with knives, (another hobby) which does a good job of cleaning up scratches before I move to my soft wheels. 

Edited March 17, 2016 by klinej54

[jdm]

I don't work with stainless much in my watch world, as most of my work is on pocket watches.  Nickle and sliver are much softer than SS.  That being said, when I do the math, our wheel surface speeds are about the same.  (The radius of my wheels are about 5 times yours, and your RPM is about 5.5 times faster).  I wonder is torque, or lack thereof, is a factor for you?  Other than the wheel hardness, the big difference here is the motors driving our systems.  I'm have a 1 horse motor, which mean my wheel speed is pretty constant, even under load.  I think a bigger wheel and motor would give you better results, as well as reduce the risk of point loading contact between the wheel and the piece.  If you want the blemish to "flow", you need to heat the area around it as well.  A larger, and subsequently wider, wheel will do that for you.

 

I have a 6 x 1 inch fine deburring wheel I use when I working with knives, (another hobby) which does a good job of cleaning up scratches before I move to my soft wheels. 

 

Thanks. The piece gets much heated, but evidently as you say it may be a matter of torque and contact area after all.