Flame polishing vid

[robm]

I just did a really quick vid to show that flame polishing it not that hard or scary.

I am in no way experienced, but thought i'd try with a small butane soldering iron, with the torch attachment - this way the flame is small and it heats a smaller area, and also allows you to get into the corners.

To do this really well, you would get in and spend a heap of time with 1500 or 2000 wet and dry to get all the ball trails out.  I wasn't that concerned as i was mainly mucking around with subway ramps.  The difference is amazing - you can see on the 1st couple its almost like painting with a brush - the plastic just goes all smooth and glossy almost instantly.

The part on the whitewater was really just a quick demo - as i mentioned on the vid, to do it properly you would take the ramp off and do both sides.

I also did the gumball machine on twilight zone and it took some quite deep scratches out.

I have made a few bubbles in one or two places, but normally its easy enough to notice when this is about to happen - the gloss seems to start to get dull - when this happens, move the flame in a hurry! Once these bubble are present, i understand you need to sand them right back, but this may not be possible.

Anyway, just wanted to put it out there to encourage others to have a go as its good fun with instant results.

[ddstoys]

The link for the Vid isnt there?   Looking forward to seeing this i have some ramps waiting to trial but just havnt had time

[robm]

Hmmm i can see it in my browser...

Try this 

[ajlaird]

Great video!

It was great to see just how quick (virtually instant) and easy this really is.

And the results are just outstanding.

[ddstoys]

Thanks for that its not that scary is it it might have a go with my soldering iron first as my bug butane torch shoots out a 20cm flame LOL

[MrMaloo]

Thanks for posting the vid link Rob . I've read plenty about flame polishing but never actually seen it done .

[ktm450]

Not trying to take anything at all away from your vid Rob, but I did a thread on flame polishing awhile back
http://aussiepinball.com/index.php?topic=1568.0
and need to mention, for those that are considering doing this, you absolutely must clean the ball track out of the ramp before polishing. It needs to be spotless, no dirt at all, just your sanding marks, otherwise you will bake all of the dirt into your ramp and will not be able to get it out again, it melts down into the plastic.
Just a bit of info to prevent people wrecking good ramps.
Good vid tho, shows how quick it all happens, even quicker with a big torch 

[Strangeways]

Well done - I'm yet to attempt this kind of work (not many ramps on EMs  ) - Thanks for posting  - looks to be very straight forward.

[robm]

Not trying to take anything at all away from your vid Rob, but I did a thread on flame polishing awhile back
http://aussiepinball.com/index.php?topic=1568.0
and need to mention, for those that are considering doing this, you absolutely must clean the ball track out of the ramp before polishing. It needs to be spotless, no dirt at all, just your sanding marks, otherwise you will bake all of the dirt into your ramp and will not be able to get it out again, it melts down into the plastic.
Just a bit of info to prevent people wrecking good ramps.
Good vid tho, shows how quick it all happens, even quicker with a big torch 

Yep i agree - i really just wanted to quickly demonstrate that its not rocket science, and trying on subway ramps 1st is probably the best bet

[Extra Ball]

I wonder if this process could render the ramps more brittle?

[pinnies4me]

I hung onto some old ramps that were replaced with some of the excellent new ones you can get from www.rtbb.com.au to learn this but haven't actually tried the polishing yet. I guess once I have one I can't replace I'll test on some of the old ones, but that video sure makes it look easy. Thanks for posting.