Anybody here heard of or used Shark Hide Metal Protector? Sounds like it might be good for using on polished Aluminum.

Heard of it, I think it is used to cover fuel tanks to protect them from rocks etc.

From what i have seen/heard it is to protect from corrosion not impact.

If you will google shark skin metal pertection there is lots of info. Tom

Yup, i did that, just wanted to know if anybody here had used it.

Should have googled before jumping to conclusions. Bill h seems to know the stuff, see under "HWH" (dated 12-1). Never seen it at a truck show even they always marketing a whole lot of products to shine your ride.

I don't have any personal experience with Shark Hide, but I've tried about a dozen or so sealants over the years. Far and away the best I've found so far is Glare:

http://glare.com/ecart/proddet...%2Dglr%2D001%3A%3A01

Awful pricey, but ya only live once, right?

Bare metal w/ continuous touch-up vs. sealing the surface is always a controversy among polishers. Two things going against sealing are:

1) ANY sealant will compromise the final luster - some more than others. If "Nice-N-Shiney" is good enough, sealing certainly reduces maintance time. But if a "Brilliant Luster" is the goal, better to leave surface raw and plan on periodic touch-ups (& the smoother the surface, the less frequent the need to touch-up).

2) Obviously, any sealant degrades with time & exposure, usually measured in months/years. Before a touch-up
restoration, it's necessary to strip all residual sealer, lest you end up with a greasy mess. Usually not a
big deal, but it does add another step to touch-up efforts.

If ya try Shark Hide, I'd be interested in your results.........

It all makes sense Lee.

I was at Roar & Soar in Lakeland, Fl this year and there was an all aluminum Cobra there polished to the hilt. What was so cool though was the way he did the traditional hood/trunk stripe, it was glass beaded so that it was quite apparent (the stripe) but still only bare aluminum. He did clear it, but it was a nice job.

Just a thought for your Barth, glass bead stripes!!!

I've always been into boats with all there varnished mahogony... The varnish after time will deteriorate but you can just touch uo those spots after it does.... If you were to clear coat it (like a Honda motorcycle) the only way to touch it up would be to strip everything back down to bare... I think clear-coat in the longrun would be even more time consuming...Just my opinion...

Wow Corey, I LIKE that idea!....Gonna have to give it some thought....Maybe some Fleetwood style whoop-dee-doo graphics

I'd imagine the attack angle of the nozzle would have to be pretty tighly controlled to achieve a consistent glass bead finish, plus lots of tape-off time to protect the edge when polishing the smooth sections, but what the heck, committed polishers don't have a life anyway

Ya didn't happen to take any pics of the Cobra did ya?......

http://www.telovation.com/photos/aluminum-cobra.jpg
Not sure how to make the photo bucket work so here it is from its web site.

Tom seems to have the car, or one just like it. I didn't get pictures as I was too busy gawking around.

quote:

The varnish after time will deteriorate but you can just touch uo those spots after it does.... If you were to clear coat it (like a Honda motorcycle)

Ever since they took lead out of automotive paint, almost every car on the road is clear coated over a base color coat. The new paints hold up very well, but the real question is how do you primer coat for clear only? I'll need to ask my paint guru about that one.

My paint guru says no good way to paint polished aluminum. It would need to be scuffed up which would ruin the shine. He thinks some day the clear plastic wraps could get sophisticated enough to adhere over things like rivets, but for now you must put in elbow grease to get that look. Sorry Lee, I was hoping to spare you!

I tried to polish my bumpers... all I got was something akin to a Nickle Finish. How come?