Polishing

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TRFfan

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How do you polish a rocket? According to open rocket the "polished" setting gets a lot more altitude than the regular paint setting.
 
It's a process of sanding that involves finer and finer grits of sandpaper. Then polishing compounds.

Eventually you will wind up with a surface finish that is like a mirror.

But a smooth finish is the result of good surface prep at the primer stage.

It's as much an art as a science, and only those with extreme patience can pull it off.

Greg
 
As Greg mentioned its a science. Make when you paint your rocket to to have plenty of paint on it. Usually 2-3 light coats followed by 3 medium coats and one final wet coat. You also need several coats of clear but lighter coats to build up the finish. Depending on the finish and imperfection you can start with 800 wet dry and work your way down to 2000. Usually 800, 1000, 1500 and 2000 will get you a silky smooth dull finish. From there you use a medium compound from Meguiars and rub it out the direction aka length of rocket and follow by a finer polish then wax. Also when you wet sand go the length of your rocket and do NOT sand in a circular motion. You will never get the scratches out.
 
Nathan's the best bet around here on how to get those kinds of finishes...

Here's one of his in action...

mmpp44.jpg


Though I have managed to get a pretty reflective surface w/o all the layers of paint...

11510849673_cb3f30038d_b.jpg
 
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You really don't need all those steps. I get pretty good results just wet sanding the clear coat with 2000 grit sandpaper and then polish with medium polish followed by finishing polish. But for that to work well you first need to get the paint on very smooth, without orange peel.
 
PITA, I've done it and no matter what you do, the rocket is going to get dinged up. Keep it in mind 'cause that finish is going to look ratty after 3 or more flights. Kurt
 
3M makes a number of car 'finishing systems'. You can simply purchase what you need online as part of an integrated finishing system.
 
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