"polishing your keg" is more than a clever euphemism

Williams 728
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chriso said:
Sorry, could you explain that in a little more detail? I don't understand the process, but really want to do this. Sorry I'm daft.
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Sorry for the really long delay, but the greasless compound comes in tubes about 1ft long and different grits. You take your buffing wheel (sewn cotton) and spin it on whatever you have to spin it (drill, buffing machine) and then take tube and load the wheel up with compound. This only takes a sec to load the wheel literally.

After the wheel is loaded up you get a hairdryer, and dry the compound on your wheel. Only takes a minute to harden. You now have a nice easy way to sand stuff smoothly via cotton wheel.

The advantage is that it is not overly harsh(when right grit is used) and sands uniformly and gives a great polishing surface. You can achieve this by sanding like normal, but it takes 40x amount of time. If I am going to polish something, this is a staple before actually using a polishing rouge.

The key to polishing metal is assessing what grit to start at, and when your ready to go to the next finer grit.
 
Thanks very much, makes a lot more sense now. I couldn't figure out what was drying, the cotton or the keg!
 
God is telling me to build a Brutus 10 and to polish my kegs. Why? This thread, and I have stumbled upon (3) converted kegs (bulkheads and thermowells) for $175. I will begin rubbing my kegs when I get home!!
 
I am going the Gator Grit and polishing compound route... 3 hours ber keg isnt a huge deal to me really. It is going to take me 12 months to build and scavenge all of the parts I need for my Brutus 10 build anyhow. My wife and I are planning to build a wooden brewing rig, something that is stained and nice enough to place in a semi finished basement at some point. There is one posted here on HBT somewhere, dark stain and laquer finish, and highly polished kegs... that will be HOT.
 
ANYONE try the GATOR GRIT POLISHING discs? I saw them at Lowes, didnt see any plishing compound... anyone try these? ALSO, is the FINE Gator Grit pad enough to prep the keg for polishing? THANKS!
 
Yeah, if you read through the earlier part of this thread I show all the pads and compounds I used. The fine pad is a good place to start if your keg is in decent condition. Then you go to the polishing pad and use the #5 compound. Then switch to a fresh pad and use #2 compound. You should get one keg done on two fine pads and two polishing pads.
 
Where did you find the polishing compound? I looked all over Lowes and saw nothing yesterday, just the pads themselves. THX Also, I have one keg that is a little rougher than the others, should I use the coarse pad, then the fine, then the polishing pads? I will be getting started on my three keggles on Monday.
 
The compounds are in the tool section but not exactly next to the sanding/grinding wheels. It's weird of course because that's where you'd expect to find them.

Print this pic and show it to someone there. I think it might have been next to the power tools where you'll find a bench grinder.

kegpolishing2.jpg


On a rougher keg, I'd do a quick job with the burgandy "medium" pad, then go on to the blue "fine" surface finishing pad. You could go direct to the blue pad but it will take longer.
 
As for Gator Grit, my Lowes only had the coarse and the fine pads... which confused me a little. Id prefer a medium... maybe I will have to do some searching. Thanks for the pic and the heads up on the polishing compounds, I will be there today getting sprinklers (sod is coming this next week!) I will inquire about the meduim Gator Grit pads.
 
Does Star Wars pop in anyone else's mind when they see the shiney kegs? Always reminds me of C3PO at the end of any movie, all shiney and clean.
 
OKAY, so I got my tools in order and tried a small spot on one of my keggles... NICE. I have the FINE Gator Grit, I also have the #2 and #6 polishing compound and it seems to work very well! Thanks for the info guys, now I too will have GORGEOUS kegs...

EDIT: This is back breaking work though!
 
It does suck after a while. I broke the 3-4 procedure down to spaced out 30 minutes sessions to let my back recover.

I just got my Caswell order in the mail Saturday with a bunch of sisal and cotton 4" wheels and two grades of polishing compound.
 
I have been stradling my keg, sorta riding it while doing the top and bottom sections, which takes alot of stress off my back. BOBBY, how do you get the polished keg to look even? After using the #2 and follow up with the #6 compound, it is shiney, but looks uneven... what am I doing wrong? Still looks ALOT nicer than a stock keg.
 
I gave a couple cornies a quick shot with the #2 disc just to clean them up. It's nice to drag around a couple clean kegs for parties, etc. Thanks for the idea Bobby!



DSCN9692.jpg


DSCN9696.jpg
 
I promise it's not that hard to do... only on your back. I still haven't done the other two kegs because if I have a spare few hours I'm renovating my kitchen or actually brewing.
 
I just put the keg on a work cart to keep the base at waist height. If you are using the gator grit pads, make sure you get the backing pad for the angle grinder. It's well worth the 13 dollars and you'll get way more life from each pad. Also, make sure you are using the correct side of the finishing pad. If you are getting glue onto the keg, try flipping the pad over...
 
Glue coming off the polishing pad is probably more from applying too much angle where the edge of the pad is hitting the stainless. You also need to let the pad cool after every 10 minutes or so of hardcore polishing.
 
Agreed, fortunately my hands start to hurt after about 10 minutes so I take a break with my polishing pad. As for the pads them selves, one side looks "grittier" than the other. It's helpful to try each side of the pad to figure out what you need to do... I have found that if I use a light touch with the red pad, I can use less of the blue pads per keg.
 
Bobby got any pictures of the discoloring on the kegs after a few uses?

Is it easier to clean up now that they have been polished?

Thanks.
 
Bobby_M said:
Then you go to the polishing pad and use the #5 compound. Then switch to a fresh pad and use #2 compound.
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Do you use the #5 before the #2? For the stuff they sell at Lowe's I think it might be the other way. #2 is advertised as cleaning and #5 is advertised as polishing.
 
I used the Lowes Stuff (Task force brand). After cleanup with the gator pad, I hit it with the soft polishing one and the #4 polish. I may have been able to use 1 pad per keg, but I decided to change it half way through.

The keg looks really good. I did hit one of them again with the Lowes #5 and it's blinding!

Also, the polish is grease based so I found the best thing to clean it off with is Bar Keepers Friend, warm water, and a green scruby sponge.
 
Bobby_M said:
This crap hurts my back. Even though I'm not really spending all that much time, it's still a lot of work.
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True! I went to Lowes and picked up the Gator stuff and it is the cat's ass. You get quite a bit done in a relatively short time, but it will definately eat up a few hrs/keg.

Oh yeah, another thing: One of my keggles is a Boulevard keg....you know one of the kegs with two stripes painted around the middle? If you are planning on polishing one of these, it works best to first grind as much of the painted stripes as you can off with a wire brush on the angle grinder. Then run over it with a med grit Gator pad, then polish. I loaded one of the med grit gator pads up in a few seconds trying to grind off the paint intitally...pretty much wasted it. After taking the majortiy off with the wire brush, I was able to go over the whole keg with just one Gator pad without it loading up.
 
Just be careful with the wire brush- can cause gouges/scratches that unless you smooth them out good will likely promote rust.

I am working on cornies, slowly... I have an issue with getting dark gray metal in spots and don't know exactly what I'm doing.... Anyone have any ideas? I can post pics if needed. Thanks!
 
MoRoToRiUm said:
Just be careful with the wire brush- can cause gouges/scratches that unless you smooth them out good will likely promote rust.

I am working on cornies, slowly... I have an issue with getting dark gray metal in spots and don't know exactly what I'm doing.... Anyone have any ideas? I can post pics if needed. Thanks!
Click to expand...

Sounds like you are burning the metal by pushing too hard or staying on one spot too long. Just a guess though.
 
Stainless a gummy type of material to work with I found from restoring trim off the 57 Olds Holiday Coupe. After pick hammering, filing then the use of sand paper. Using polishing compounds vs special SS compounds on a industrial buffer it would leave streaks and fine tear marks. I went back to the sand paper route idea with different grits on a 1/4 sheet Porter Cable 330 palm sander. At the final stages with 1200 grit that resulted in a chrome like finish but it would dull the sand paper rather quickly, sand paper isn't cheap these days. I always look for the Norton brand but found that Ace Hardware and other cheap inport Hardware stores will have Norton brand Made in India. Fine and dandy as the paper is app 3/4" shorter than USA Norton paper, short enough to not reach the hold down clips on the 1/4 sheet sander. I found this out returning the other 9 sheets for Amercan Norton paper. Nex brewing keggles will be insulated who cares what they look like as heating efficiency is more important than beauty.
I going to use a Shop Smith with adapters to slowly rotate corny's to brighten up their finish. Let the machines do the work just hold the sander.
 
Paraops said:
The brush was SS as well...sorry.
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Does that mean that you will not promote rust b/c the wire brush is SS? I just scored a brand new keg (for free from a friend!), but the keg has paint along the middle. I want to remove it but dont want to scuff up the keg.
 
After scoring a near perfect keg from a friend (for FREE!), I started polishing right away with the gator method. I used the medium to take off the paint, no problem taking it off or wearing out. I then went to the Fine pad and now I am working with the polish pad with #2 compound and I still have the #5 to go. Process is easy but kills your back...like everyone says. Who cares though! Drink beer and look at your shiny keg and the pain goes away :)
 
Hey Bobby_M,

I have a friend that has a media blaster, do you think I could use that to shine mine up or will that pit the metal too much and promote rust? I don't know much about these, I did sand blast a motorcycle frame once but I sent it off to paint right away.
 

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