Anyone familiar with an aluminum wash that cleans up anodized aluminum that has minor corrosion and pitting.My t top is almost 20 years old now and looks pretty rough in some areas. I’ve tried all kinds of wax and rubbing compound nothing seems to get it looking too good for any extended period of time.A buddy of mine told me he was pretty sure there was an acid wash but you could wipe off and then rinse off immediately afterwards it would help restore the aluminum and then you can wax afterwards to seal it. I’ve considered powder coating it or painting with a two part epoxy just not sure I am quite there yet. Any ideas?
If you are going to paint it, I would use rustoleum acrylic fire hydrant enamel paint. Stuff is really resistant to sun and salt abrasion.
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To powder coat it would have to come out of the boat. Used to get some stuff called Mr Speedy at Bike Rallys worked well on aluminum. You rubbed it on till it turned black then rinsed off.
I’ve seen some done with linex, pretty good looking and durable.
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If the pitting isn’t to deep,it can be cut out with high speed polishing. When done right it will look better than new.
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http://www.superkleendirect.com/zepa-lume.aspx
This stuff works well, just not sure how it’ll react with the rest of your boat… We used it to clean tubes on pontoons when was in the boat business. We would spray it on with a pump up garden sprayer, wait a minute, brush it over with a deck brush and then rinse off.
It will clean aluminum by removing a thin layer on top and did a great job. It will probably not play well with wax or other deck finishes, though.
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Marine 31 makes a cleaner for aluminum that is suppose to restore the finish. They advertise on Ship Shape tv.
Thanks for the input, I am pretty sure the Zepp product tigerfin mentioned is the wash I had heard about, but it says you should not use anodized surface. Funny thing is the Marine 31 product dirty recommended says the exact same thing but it shows the product caked on an anodized aluminum top in the ad. I might try the wash in a test spot to see what it does. I don’t think I will be powder coating due to the fact there is no good way to touch it up if it scratches. I will have to remove top if I decide to paint it, and will most likely go with a two part epoxy and spray it.
I have used the can spray linex by duplicolor on my Jon boat poling platform and it has been very durable especially considering it sits in full sun and salt air 365 days a year. That option is still out there but that limits me to black. If I paint it was considering going gloss white.