Polishing tunnels. A bit of advise.

[gems4sale]

Just finished polishing my tunnel. A friend of mine caught me on my hands and knees a couple years ago wearing the ends of my fingers off. He politely told me about a much easier way...LoL He used Mothers billet polish. It works very well but I'm sure the others do too. The trick is not putting too much on at once and only doing a few feet area at a time so the coating does not dry out. Don't soak the buffer with the polishing agent. Just use a towel to put a thin film on like your laying on wax polishing a car. Your just applying the coat here, not trying to polish. After you get a thin coat on go to the drill with the buffer attached. See photo. I used a cordless drill but it is not as good as the plug in drill. It revs too slow. Just buff the Mothers off using medium pressure then go over everything when your done with a cotton towel by hand. Don't use paper towel its made out of wood and we don't polish aluminum with 2X4's. Paper towel is ok for applying the first coat as your going to buff it later. I just use windex through out the winter to keep it looking good. After a summer in the shed it could use another buffing.

It is not a big job. Should only take an hour or so to complete and for the time involved its well worth it for the look you get.

 

[08nytrofx]

heres mine
i did mine by hand tho

 

[gems4sale]

It looks pretty good to me! Yamaha will have the best looking sleds on the snow!

 

[Ironmanstl]

Looks great
How long start to finish?

 

[Topgun]

Looks good , I hit mine with a 2000 grit wet sanding then hit it with the mothers as above with a buffer on a drill. After all that I used a spray on stainless steel cleaner spray, wiped it off then hit it again with the buffer and it gives it a great shine. The ss cleaner is good to spray on and give it a quick polish by hand even before going out. LOL , and the pic below is still last years abused shine.

 

[nytrose]

personally I like to do it by hand.

 

[sheetwright]

The sides don't seem to difficult to do. What are you guys using for tools between the foot treads? Thats a pain area to me

 

[Ironmanstl]

This thread inspired two of us to do our tunnels.

We used the powerball as well and Mother's aluminum polish.
Took us 8 hours though, by time we did the running boards by hand.
Can't see how you could have possibly done all the nooks and cranies and completed it in an hour.

Very happy with the results

 

[woolyviper]

The new sleds dont buff up like the older ones. My 03 Viper looked like a mirror once I polished it. The Phazer is shiny, but nothing like the Viper.

 

[YamahaOutlaw]

Anybody use Maquires All Metal polish? I've used this on my tunnel, and I'm just wondering how it compares to the Mothers mentioned above. I got good shine out of it, just curious if anyone's done a comparison.

 

[jeffT]

Has anyone tried using rouge to buff the tunnels with?

 

[sledhead80]

yeah Ironmanstl and myself did them together. They took a long a$$ time, and alot of elbow grease. I really cant see how you can do it in an hour unless you have 4 or more ppl working on it all at once oh well Happy trails!

 

[drwhiskey]

Wet sanding is a must to get the mirror like finish.

 

[benny]

I used a Mothers Mini Buff Ball and Mothers Mag Polish. I removed the seat, plastic around the exhaust, taillight, and rear bumper to make things easier. I also used masking tape over the decals so I could go right over them and not end up with white residue all over everything. I did both sides of the tunnel first and then the running boards last. If you are carefull and hit the sharp edges on the running boards on the up stroke with the buffball, it doesn't tear it up too bad. I have done my tunnel twice with the same buffball, but it is pretty well worn out now. Time for a new one. The first time I polished the tunnel it took probably 3-4 hours start to finish. That includes seat removal ect. and putting everything back on. Second time around it goes much faster since you are not "cutting" so much aluminum and oxidation. Look pretty sweet when it's done. Use a drill with a cord instead of a rechargable, better speed and don't have to wait for batteries to recharge.

 

[NB-NYTRO]

Heres one I did all by hand a few years ago.. I used wet sanding paper too.. Yep a little at a time method works best. I tried the powerball and didn't like the results. I heard theres a product out now called Busch Aluminum polish thats supposed to cut the time down a lot and make a nice shine.