Well window work continues, but slowly. There's been the waiting on the rubber-channel shipment (but Fedex tracking says it will be delivered today!). There's the very tedious nature of polishing aluminum pieces; I've tried several methods and will discuss some of that today. There's this whole spring thing!
The past two days I've been tilling and removing rocks. All these years and we've only borrowed or rented tillers - or used a hand shovel. Finally bought a rear-tine tiller. Really it's a breeze, but even so, after many hours both of the past two days, I can't wait to get back to some relaxing elbow grease in the form of window polishing. But DW gets her squashes and pumpkin patch this year! Freeing up the fenced garden for more vegetables. I try to make her happy :)
But GOOD NEWS! Snow is on the way! That means I have a built in excuse to work in the garage! And today is a Red Flag Alert. In our neck of the woods (high plains actually) that means strong wind, low humidity, and high fire danger.
These next pictures are several days old. There's been some additional work too that isn't captured here. Mostly because I didn't take pictures. For a time I was thinking, "surely people are as tired of seeing window-work pictures as I am of doing it", but then I got thinking - if I have to suffer through the tediousness, then why not you too! And I did give you six days off - so quit yer whining!
This photo is framing on one of the front vee-nose windows. I tried some different process here with a new wet-sandpaper purchase. The far shot is untreated. The next is after 220 grit dry, the next closest is after 320 wet, and the closest is after 600 grit wet. No steel wool at all.
Then I bought and used a buffing wheel and polishing compound and experimented with it on the bench grinder. The close frame is buffed compared to the rear three which are not.
And how it compares to the "steel-wool" only frame around the glass pane.
Next was to take apart the smaller back wall galley window.
And this rear wall window didn't have any of that metal-like caulking in corners, like the front edges had for the side windows. I think maybe those caulking areas were PO added.
Since this, I've also disassembled the large side-galley window. Work on THOSE aluminum pieces included...
-Scraping it of the caulking stuff with pocket knife, steel scraper and a new technique nylon bristled 150 grit abrasive wheel mounted on my drill press.
-220 grit power and hand sanding.
-320 grit wet sanding.
There was also...
-Scrubbing, cleaning, nylon hand brush, steel wool work on all the other pieces.
-Steel wool and Windex work on the glass panes.
So what remains with the dis-assembled windows are the buffing with brown and then white compounds on the bench grinder mounted buffing wheels. I'll show and discuss that next time. Then it is to assemble three windows with new rubber (assuming it's the right stuff).
Finally, after all that, I'll tackle the large dinette window! These windows have been a tremendous amount of work! But it will be the last one.
