Thank you pasusan. :)
Work continues, but progress is slow. Most of this is due to the intensively laborious nature of polishing many small pieces - angles and corners and surfaces of aluminum - oh my! Some is due to other things that tend to pop up in a body's life (Spring!), and at least a little is due to the effects of an age-related fear of dying before this is done! (Did you know that this forum's spell-check doesn't suggest dying when you type dieing? I actually had to open a new tab and go to dictionary.com. That's amazing, or maybe what's amazing is how we become so dependent on tech.)
When doing something new, there is always the fear that "you are doing it wrong", and that moving forward is "just going to get you more lost". So you sit down and wait for the rescuers. But they never come. And you realize that once - when they asked you where you were going - you lied, and told them another place. And they KNEW you lied, because you had spoken of THIS place so many times before. So nobody's coming!
And then you remember why you lied. Because they kept telling you DON'T go there - or step here, not there - or make sure and apply sunscreen! DON'T DRINK THAT WATER! And they meant well.
But you didn't want to be limited. You wanted discovery! And you didn't want to find out that stepping THERE might actually be the wrong spot to step and you might have ended up lion bait! No - that step was actually shale-rock, and you would have been buried in the resulting avalanche! And granted, you missed those views that THEY had seen. You missed the "must see" destination - that has been written about - when you took the other fork. But you got some NEW views, and you found three additional destinations that NOBODY else had ever found!
It turned out best that you stepped where you were guided by your heart, by that sense that comes over you. And there were some detours, and there was some extra and unnecessary discovery. But it now belongs to you, and helps to make up the whole of who you are. You chose to go your own way. And that is experience - and that my friends is life!
It's really weird where your mind can go during hours and hours of quiet time on your own, working hard and listening to the same classic rock songs, day in and day out. And I bet there's something about chemical fumes too, when the job isn't up to requiring the mask for EVERY task.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm no longer afraid of sand-paper when polishing aluminum, done right, with the right grit. I YouTubed it.
After the first window, I stepped into the next two small windows and took them both apart at the same time, keeping parts separate so as to not affect the aluminum siding hole alignment for mounting. And I tried the solvent-tank approach as the polishing lubricant/cleaner. But I didn't want to fill the tank with steel wool filings, so that was more cumbersome than it was worth, as was the assembly-line process of two windows at once. I went back to lesser amounts of Naptha, mostly elbow grease and one window at a time.
I also ran over to another hardware store and got some better screw choices. Ends up I needed #6 instead of the #8 I got after trying to visually size though the plastic packaging. And I replaced most screws with new, including what had been used on the first window.
Shorter 1/2" screws were used in places like this where the depth required non-interference. (Originals used where length was even shorter - like the framing around the glass.)
And the longer 1" screws were used elsewhere.
I also used some auto-parts store "flowable silicon" in the corners of the glass where the gasket is originally cut to fit the channels. There had been evidence of this method from the factory.
Before.
After.
And then a dab in each exterior corner to flow into the angle seams, where it was then wiped clear on the outer surfaces.
Each of the three small windows were done this way, including the first which had to be removed and reassembled. Although that is the fast and easy part.
So the three small ones were done.
Well - except for the metal corners seal that needs attention. I bought this stuff, which as it turns out is perhaps less "self-leveling" and darker gray than I expected, for use in the corners that have original evidence of a metal sort of caulking. I haven't yet decided on final application.
Then I took apart the cab window. Cleaned, polished, re-sealed, new screws, re-assembled, temporary install for placement of the interior frame into new-wood "screw holes". That one took for-ever to polish. I still hadn't touched sand-paper, just elbow grease and 0000 steel wool.
It was about this time when I began that whole "fear of untimely death" thing. And thought, 'there's got to be a better way". With bloodied fingers that night, in front of the TV, I multi-tasked on the smart phone to learn how one fella gives mirror finish to his semi-truck aluminum fuel tanks. The next day I tried some 600 grit wet-dry I had on hand, and the 1000 grit. Wow, awesome.
Then decided to try the otherwise finest I had in the 220 non-wet for the starting point, then the 600 for finish. It worked fine! Time slowed down and I no longer felt I had been abducted. Finalizing after the sand paper with the steel wool and some fine automotive rubbing compound I had on the shelf. That was okay, but I'm not sure it was necessary. This whole thing is an exercise in experimentation - you know - new views and such.
And I didn't disassemble this frame. I did it with the window pane in place, just being careful to not scratch the glass.
Compare the polished window.
To the unpolished.
But this next window now - well, somebody had done work on it before (the glass pane is backwards evidenced by the stamp) so I wanted to take it apart. The other side had gotten work too, but re-assembled correctly. Both windows had their gaskets glued into the channel from that previous work. And both gaskets are in poorer condition due to heavier UV attacks.
That story to come. But we also went into town to attend the GS's "you're the special dude this week" event in his first grade class, and while there, we picked up some new materials and tools for the upcoming work.
