advice on polishing small BA nuts and bolts

[ray h.Participant @rayh]

I have a fair number of small BA sizes nuts and bolts—–mostly around 6 BA–the sort of things used on the ST engines. These had become a bit corroded due to long storage. I have a pebble tumbler and I have tried that using fine carborundum and cerium oxide powders. this cleaned them up but they retain a sort of blue grey surface patina. I would like to get them back to the original bright shiny steel colour if possible.. Has any one any advice they can offer on this?

Ray

[ray h.Participant @rayh]

can the original surface colour be restored?

[Keith Wardill 1Participant @keithwardill1]

HI, Ray,

Didn't post earlier – your post must have dropped off the list before I got there, and today I was browsing, and saw no-one had replied.

I had a similar problem – I didn't find a 'bulk solution) but I put several nuts on a long 6BA bolt, which made it easier to hold, then polished them on a small polishing wheel to do the sides. To polish the ends, I locknutted two nuts near the end of a bolt leaving about 3mm of the bolt thread exposed, then put the nut I wanted to clean on the end. Then I could use the bolt as a sort of handle to hold it against the polishing wheel. I tried both polishing compo and metal polish on the wheel, but both gave about the same finished result.

I realise this is probably not the best way, and it can be a bit rough on the fingers. (gets hot if you polish for too long) – I only had about 30 nuts/bolts to do – I think I would make a couple of small holders if I had to do more. I did find that a polishing wheel gave me a good finish (provided the nuts were not badly corroded).

[Mark Foster 1Participant @markfoster1]

Have you a mate who reloads his own AMO . put it in a case tumbler with some wallnut shells .and there polish .you will see your face in them .

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Bit of fine Emery wrapped around a file and it does not take long and looks a lot better than a bright "polished" finish.

Do a few at a time between other things and it won't be a chore

I recently did a couple of dozen 10BA bolts that way which had been sitting around for a while for these pipe flanges

J

[alan knightParticipant @alanknight67321]

I normally put mine is a small precision chuck and then spin them at about 1000rpm and either use 1000g wet and dry and polish them that way, if thats not taking the staining off drop down to 600g

[thomas oliver 2Participant @thomasoliver2]

I have two very fine 3" wire wheels and use the brass one to polish up small brass nuts and screws, and the steel one for steel nuts and screws. The wheels are very effective and endow a nice shine. Also they can clean out threads as well. I have a 6" steel wire wheel and find it extemely useful for removing surface rust and for cleaning out threads on the larger steel bolts. It can also remove paint very well. Just be sure to wear strong leather gloves. As stated elsewhere, mount small nuts on a longish bolt and be sure to lock them against each other. Ensure that the direction of the action will tighten the nuts, not slacken them, or they will rapidly be gone gooses ( or geese ) around the workshop floor.

[ray h.Participant @rayh]

Hello,

Thanks to all the above members for their replies. I will work through them and see how I get on,

Ray

[Author]

Posts