Megalextoria
Retro computing and gaming, sci-fi books, tv and movies and other geeky stuff.

Home » Digital Archaeology » Computer Arcana » Apple » Vintage Macs Group » Re: How to buff plastic and remove scratches?
Show: Today's Messages :: Show Polls :: Message Navigator
E-mail to friend 
Switch to threaded view of this topic Create a new topic Submit Reply
Re: How to buff plastic and remove scratches? [message #338355] Fri, 24 February 2017 14:14 Go to next message
Christian Evans is currently offline  Christian Evans
Messages: 1
Registered: February 2017
Karma: 0
Junior Member
HEAT GUN
For the shallow scratches, like the type and size of those left by
sandpaper, those should self-mend with heat..............at long distance,
maybe have a spotter to study the scratches with a magnifying
glass/spotlight so you don't get to close and can see it is working.

If you end up morphing or soft gashing the shell, you might wanna go the
route of automotive textured plastic
< http://removeandreplace.com/2014/08/20/how-to-fix-scratched- car-interior-plastic/>
to salvage the shell and hide your mistakes.
If you end up burning it, sand it, paint it.



On Thursday, May 3, 2012 at 3:26:30 PM UTC-4, Matthew Gill wrote:
>
> I just posted a separate subject on an iMac G3...
>
> Anyway, I'd like to clean it up. I think some of the scuffs and scratches
> are a little too deep for basic polishing using a product called 'Ice
> Cream' by Radtech. That being said, does anybody know what I could use to
> buff out scratches and scuffs on this plastic? What's the best technique? I
> was thinking along the lines of very fine grit sandpaper, possibly steel
> wool, etc... I don't know where to start exactly, though. I *DON'T* want
> to scratch up the case. It's a very old and very beat-up iMac that I would
> be proud to restore to 'like new' condition, if possible.
>
> Anybody with experience, I need your two cents.
>
> Thanks!
>

--
--
-----
You received this message because you are a member of the Vintage Macs group.
The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml
To post to this group, send email to vintage-macs@googlegroups.com
To leave this group, send email to vintage-macs+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/vintage-macs

Support for older Macs: http://lowendmac.com/services/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Vintage Macs" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to vintage-macs+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

Re: How to buff plastic and remove scratches? [message #338397 is a reply to message #338355] Sat, 25 February 2017 02:24 Go to previous messageGo to next message
vintage-macs is currently offline  vintage-macs
Messages: 425
Registered: April 2014
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Meguiar's Plast-X and one of their red cone foam buffs for aluminum wheels. You'll need an electric drill to run the buff and some way to hold the iMac housing while you use the buff on it.

If it has deeper than real light scratches you'll want to carefully wet sand it. Go to an automotive paint supply store for wet sanding paper. You'll want to get some 400 or 500 grit and some finer grits, as high as they go. That will be 1500 or 2000. Also get a 3000 grit sanding pad.
If there's scratches you can catch a fingernail in, you'll need 320 grit to start with on them. Keep the sanding with that as localized as you can to the deeper scratches. You have to get those smoothed out completely before going to finer grits.
I had one of those early iMacs where the white plastic frame for the CRT support was crumbling. Paid $10 for it at a yard sale. Pushed the CUDA button and it was able to boot. Bought an Airport card for it, installed a larger, faster hard drive and maxed the RAM. Couldn't find a good use for it, too slow even with the latest OS X it could take. So I put it on Craigslist for free. It went buh-bye real fast.
Kind of surprising that no 3rd party ever made PSK2 capable replacements for the AirPort cards in those and the clamshell iBooks.

--
--
-----
You received this message because you are a member of the Vintage Macs group.
The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml
To post to this group, send email to vintage-macs@googlegroups.com
To leave this group, send email to vintage-macs+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/vintage-macs

Support for older Macs: http://lowendmac.com/services/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Vintage Macs" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to vintage-macs+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

Re: How to buff plastic and remove scratches? [message #338421 is a reply to message #338397] Sat, 25 February 2017 12:12 Go to previous message
Kevin Dady is currently offline  Kevin Dady
Messages: 55
Registered: April 2015
Karma: 0
Member
if they are not super deep plastic polish will get some out

otherwise sandpaper working your way up to 2000 then buff the crap out of
it using rubbing compound (you dont HAVE to wet sand, it just goes faster)

a pack of multiple grit sandpaper might be 5-6 buck, and a lifetime supply
of rubbing compound is like 2-3 bucks, look in the automotive section of a
big box or go to a car store, might take you a dedicated afternoon (not
counting taking it apart and putting it back together)

--
--
-----
You received this message because you are a member of the Vintage Macs group.
The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml
To post to this group, send email to vintage-macs@googlegroups.com
To leave this group, send email to vintage-macs+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/vintage-macs

Support for older Macs: http://lowendmac.com/services/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Vintage Macs" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to vintage-macs+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

  Switch to threaded view of this topic Create a new topic Submit Reply
Previous Topic: Mac OS system disk and software download links
Next Topic: SCSI2SD
Goto Forum:
  

-=] Back to Top [=-
[ Syndicate this forum (XML) ] [ RSS ] [ PDF ]

Current Time: Thu Mar 28 21:52:37 EDT 2024

Total time taken to generate the page: 0.00273 seconds