I am having very little luck removing the soot from my pipes. I have hear mention of Autosol. Anyone know anything about this product or better means of cleaning the exhaust?

Thanks again,
KW

 

I use autosol on my chrome kitchen appliances. It kicks *** for shine. Not sure about heavy grit though.

 

easy off?

 

I use Blue Magic metal polish. Stuff works great and is non-abrasive. Check the detailing forums - they'll likely have more info and suggestions.

 

Any chrome polish should do the trick...always works for me.

 

A product bikers have been using for decades on highly chromed out motorcycles is NEVR-DULL. It is a chemically enhanced wad that is great for cleaning chrome and leaves a slightly oil residue when finished. Simply wipe that off when done. As with any cleaning job, it works a lot better if you stay on top of this from when the car is new. If allowed to build up, it will take that much more effort to get it back to the original condition.

 

There is a thread over on 6Speed with quite a bit of detail:
http://www.6speedonline.com/forums/d...aust-tips.html

A lot of positive comments there and in other detailing threads about "P21S Total Auto Wash" for cleaning tips. I don't know where to get it though - except online.

 

Thanks to everyone for their input.

 

Thanks for the link. Those tips are sparkling! I'll have to do mine like that.

 

For chromed tips I wouldn't recommend using steel wool, as the plating can eventually wear off. It's okay to use on the stainless tips as it's just pure metal throughout.

Here's what my recall replacement tips looked like after the service shop let me take them home to polish the lips up before doing the replacement:

 

Those would be easy to polish to a mirror finish with the right polish and a dremel tool or work beck mounted polishing wheel. However they are a brushed finish because they are easier to keep clean that way.

 

Flitz metal polish with a wool ball works perfectly.

If the pipe has heavy soot, remove and use an APC type cleaner with a brush, rinse, then polish with Flitz and a wool ball. Or use Wenol Red first, then Flitz.

Wenol Red is very heavy cut/clean polish. Be careful with Red as it can remove chrome if used too aggresive. They make a Wenol Blue with less cut/clean as well. Wenol Red can be purchased at most Williams-Sonoma stores. Blue is a bit harder to find.

Flitz is sold in several auto stores or bike shops. I find Flitz to be one of the best polishes for metals.

Final polishing can be done with a foam ball and finer polishes to really bring out the best look. I've used a Menzerna jewelers polish for fine polishing chrome tips to a very high gloss. Or use Menzerna PO106FF or PO85RD for paint finishes if you cannot find Menzerna Jewelry polishes.

Wool ball: http://properautocare.com/wopoba.html

Foam ball: http://properautocare.com/mopo1.html

Flitz polish: http://properautocare.com/flmepofipare.html

Regards,
Deanski

 

That was done purely by hand, using a few barrels of elbow grease.

Had to start with a file to round out some of the flat spots along the brims, as the surface curvature was far from perfect. After shaping a full radius curvature with the file I proceeded with coarse sandpaper to remove the file marks and then worked my way up the grit ladder until I reached 1500. From there I switched to steel wool 00 and then finished off with 0000 and generic metal polish.

 

Dang...nice work! too bad they get all sooted up so fast.

 

Thanks.

Yeah, but I just keep the brims clean so it's pretty easy to do with just a rag and a smear of metal polish and a couple circles around each and they're good to go. I never let the soot build up that way. So maybe once a week I'm doing this two minute process to keep them clean, and sometimes all it takes is just wiping down with a plain rag.

I gave my original tips the same polished brims look, but, thanks to experience, this time around I did a much better job:

https://rennlist.com/forums/2312033-post1.html