I took my front bumper off today in order to straighten some of the fins on my intercooler. Since I had a little time to kill, I decided to clean up the surface of the end tanks. Several hours and a few beers later, here are the results. I went way farther with it than I intended, but it looks much, much better than it did from the factory. I know that I will need to polish it every so often to keep up the finish, but it looks fine for the time being.

 

that looks sweet. good job bro. btw, was it a pain on the a ss? i might do the same thing too.

 

bling bling...I had no idea it would shine like that.

 

It would not have taken nearly as long as it did if I had not polished the entire thing.

 

What kind of polish did you use , it lookes good

 

Yea that looks great

 

Can you give us some info on exactly what you did ?

 

good lord, that must have taken ALOT of polishing!! Looks good

 

damn that looks hot
Would you be interested in polishing another intercooler for $$
Im local

 

I will try to post some larger, more detailed photos shortly, but I can at least tell you how to do it. You basically just need to go to the store and pick up an assorted pack of wet sanding paper. Ideally you need to start with 220 and end with the finest stuff you can find.

Obviously the first step is to pull off the bumper and remove the intercooler. I highly recommend not doing this with it still installed, because you will get aluminum dust everywhere (so it is also recommended that you wear a face mask too). I choose to do this outside with the garden hose serving as a constant water source. I next attempted to strip the black paint off with paint stripper, but that failed. I found it much easier to just sand it off starting with the 220 grit. I personally prefer to use a power sander when polishing, but you have to be very careful. WARNING! Aluminum burns extremely easy. If you are sanding with power tools, then you will need to constantly watch the temperature of the metal. If the metal heats up too much it will discolor. You will then need to start over with your rough sand paper in order to break through the discolored metal. So go slow!!!

As I said, start with the 220, and keep the paper and surface wet at all times. This will cut down on the heat, will keep your paper form wearing out too quickly, and will wash away the aluminum you sand off. I started on the face side of both end tanks and worked my way around. There are rough spots from the casting, and that is what the 220 is best for removing. The sides of the tanks are even less flat, so you may wish to not spend too much effort trying to shine them up like I did. Make certain to sand the pipes very well, because they are very visible. Once the 220 has broken down the rough sections, you can move up to a smoother paper.

If you use a power sander, pull off the 220 paper and hand sand the areas that you have just cleaned up. This will help remove some of the patterns that are obviously left in the metal. It will help make the finish smoother and easier to clean up in the end. Now you can move on to the 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1500, and even 2000 if you like. Go over every section with each of those grit levels.

The more time you put into the details, the better it will look. If you rush through the early rougher grit paper, then it will make the job harder to get it smooth when using the 1000 or 2000 grit. Try to spend the same amount of time sanding with each kind of paper. I promise the results will be worth it.

If you want, you can sand and polish the entire thing. The only place that I didn't polish is the back. I even cleaned up the cooling fins. I only recommend using a flat palm sander on the fins, because you will certainly bend the fins with your fingers if you sand by hand. This will brighten the look of the surface on the fins, but do not expect them to look spectacular. They are sooooo fragile you should really avoid doing much with them.

Once all of the sanding is complete, you are ready to really polish. The surface should look fairly good at this point, but it will not be a mirror. The key to the mirror shine is in the polishing compound. The best stuff I like to use is the 3m rubbing compound creams. They are ideal for removing up to 1500 grit scratches and it really smoothes things out. I am sure that there are other, better choices, but Mothers Mag polish works pretty good too. At this point you will be tired of sanding, so it is best to use power tools to help with the final steps.

A bench buffer is ideal, but you can also buy buffing wheels that can be used with a drill. Like this:

http://content.sears.com/data/produc...650000-dlv.jpg

Just like before, you will need to be very careful about the heat buildup on the surface of the metal. With the help of a buffer or the drill attachment, you can liberally apply the buffing compounds or emery cake and go crazy. Just go over the whole thing over and over again. The more you do it, the better. In the end, you will want to probably finish with the Mothers polish. It seems to leave a small amount of residue that helps resist water spotting. At this point the finish should look like a mirror or close to it. As I stated before, the more time you put into this then the better your results will be. Good luck!

 

hey man that looks really cool!! i like that alot it would look awsome on a tarmac or bby evo.

 

Just thought I would follow up on how the intercooler looks after a few months. As I suspected, the initial shine only lasted a few weeks. After a few rain storms and car cleanings, the water spots started to take over on the finish. Most of the polishes will repel the water for a while, but it is all over once the stains set in on the metal. Overall it still looks better than it did stock, but it just does not have that chrome reflection it once did.

The best way to maintain this mod would be to remove the lower grill from the bumper to gain easy access, but I value the potection it adds too highly to do something like that. You will basically need to remove the bumper cover once a month during the summer to polish everything back up, which I would assume most people would rather not deal with.

 

LOOKIN GOOOOOD man!

 

Lets say I polish my intercooler, and then leave it for a few months. Then like you said after it gets weathered and whatnot its not as shiny as it was at first. If i use the polishing compound only, will it bring the mirror shine back? Or will i have to fine sand some of the metal again, and then re-polish it?

Thanks!

 

you did a nice write-up on that Audio! Do you think you will remove the bumper every few months to clean it up or is it not worth it to you?