Sunday, March 22, 2009

Icing on the cake

My very cool brother in law Chris gave Anna a gift. He thinks she is hot and when he saw this flashlight at a yard sale he snapped it up and gave it to her. Well he gave it to me, but he stated that he thought it belonged with Anna. It is called an Ash Flash.

Very nice 6 volt flashlight. It uses a big box type battery and looks so very cool.

The tail end has a red lens that flashes and can lift straight up so that if you break down you can put it behind the trailer to warn other motorists. The lens is cracked, but something will turn up to replace it. I love this thing, Thank you Chris.




Over the weekend a small pile of polishing supplies came out. I have changed tactics slightly this time around. I am using the Airstream Polishing kit from Jestco. I was turned on to this system by Uwe at Area 63. It is the big wide cotton wheel and grey then red rouge bars. I am not going to say it is easy. It is just a matter if plugging in the Ipod, putting on your game face, and going at it. An Adult beverage or four helps greatly too as long as you wait till after 12 noon.

I am just looking at it little by little. I started on the curb side which is the worst side of the trailer. I started on the door with in a door and worked out from there. This side had extremely thick oxide on it last year when I did the first cut.

The P.O's P.O. told me proudly that twenty five years ago he and his wife polished the trailer using mineral oil and steel wool. They used finer and finer grits and though it turned out spectacular. He also said he did not manage to do the street side or the ends. I now totally understand why the entire area they did looks like a tangerine skin. There is no amount of compounding or polishing that will fix that error. This is just something I will have to live with.

The grey bar works very quickly at the surface and moves a lot of aluminum around. This is one pass and about three minutes of time. Not bad, if you ask me. The red bar is like turning on a light bulb. The cotton wheel does create very fine vertical scratches. A little Nuvite "C" on the cyclo with an orange foam pad and the marks are gone. Very clear, very clean shine, with no scratch or swirl marks..

This was the result of about six hours total. I have done the door the outer door and the refrigerator door.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Frank, is that a polisher, or an angle grinder that's been converted. What rpm's do you use? So grey then red?

Love the flashlight! All you need ia an aluminum igloo and you're set!

Frank Yensan said...

Mark the cotton wheel is in a compounder. A Harbor Freight compounder to be honest with you. My Makita got wound up and the cord is bad. I have not been able to remember to get a new cord. Not sure about the RPM's, but the third setting, so that is fairly fast.

Anonymous said...

Frank,
Your new flashlight is too cool and your polishing looks good. Are you going to have Anna all polished up for CBR and the Crawfish Fest?
Carl

Anonymous said...

NooooOOOoooooOOoooo! Frank, can't wait for the firey end to this piece of equipement! :)

Aluminium Idler said...

Great vintage flashlight Frank... you can polish in the dark in style.
Chris