I'm a tinkerer. One of my latest projects has been to modify ("skeletonize") an old wiebe offset reel seat. My finished product is exactly how I wanted it, but finish on the areas that I trimmed and sanded are dull from the sanding. I am also considering tinkering with a conventional Fuji casting real seat which will involve a modest amount of fileing/sanding but I'm not sure I'll be happy with the resulting dull finish. My question is whether or not there are any polishing techniques that will darken/shine the sanded areas od these (presumably) graphite real seats so that they blend with the original finish? Any suggestions will be appreciated.

David

maybe paint or flock the whole seat.

David,
Really simple.
Use a buffing wheel with fine buffing compound and you will get the perfect finish.

I generally use the white buffing compound when working with plastic or nylon to get the nice buffed shine look on the item.

If you don't have a buffer motor and buffing wheel, you can purchase an inexpensive one that will fit onto the end of your drill.

These are not as nice as bench mounted motor, but they will work.

For example:

[www.harborfreight.com]

You will get two different buffing wheels. Also, two different sticks of buffing compound. Use the red for metal or the white for stainless or nylon or plastic.
Use a different wheel for each compound so that you don't mix the buffing compounds.

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If you are going to be doing much buffing, it is nice to have a bench mounted buffing motor with extended arbors to let you get work in around ends without hitting the motor.
[www.harborfreight.com]

Then, it is nice to have an assortment of buffing wheels:
[www.harborfreight.com]

Notice, that when you purchase a buffing wheel with a tight spiral thread binding in the wheel, you get a relatively stiff wheel, which is excellent when doing rough buffing on metal and similar materials with coarse buffing compounds for quick cutting.

Then, you can get buffing wheels with a wider spiral thread binding which is a good intermediate wheel to go to a finer buffing compound and to buff away any marks from the coarser compound and the harder wheel.

Finally, you can get a couple of different soft wheels which are more or less - "flap" wheels which really excell for the final polish using a very fine - like the white polishing compound.

But, if you get into buffing, you can get over a dozen different compounds that will work for various kinds of metal and various kinds of synthetic compounds.

Take care

Roger,

I appreciate your excellent advice! Just what I was hoping for.

David