Help polishing inside tight areas

[luke1990]

I'm a bit stuck polishing a piece i've made. It's a monogram pendant with the initials set inside a ring. I used CAD then had it cast so the surface was a bit rough.

It's pretty tiny at about 15mm by 15mm so there are some real tight spots in between the lettering! From certain angles you can see the dull surface of the cast silver which I think detracts from the look of it.

Any pro tips on how to combat this? I've got a micro motor if that helps?

cheers

[edward soye]

Best I find to brighten those tiny areas and burnish the surface a bit is a magnetic tumbler with steel pins
Alternatively you can polish the tip of a Dull ball bur removing the teeth and sharp spots then use to gently hand burnish the lines

If you have an appropriate sized graver you can polish it and use it to burnish I will remove any rough mill lines with very light passes and then to polish drag it backwards until it looks good

Sometimes I use rotary brushes to polish or silicone wheels but these are more difficult to control and they can distort you letters quickly
Also you can use sand paper folded on itself if it is tight space and folded over a Barrett type file.
Patience and being careful is key you will get faster over time
Sometimes if you are very careful you can lightly drag a ball bur through the line and it will look better.

[josef1]

magnetic pin polisher is good for this type of thing but if the gaps are really small they wont get in fully, you can also burnish the parts with a very small highly polished burnisher make sure you clean any polishing compounds off the finished part as well,these stick and make it look bad,if you can post a picture I maybe able to offer more advise depending on the depth of the letters

[Goldsmith]

It's a help if you can post a photo showing your pendant and polishing problem.

[luke1990]

thanks guys. Here's the culprit.



It's about 3mm in thickness.

I don't have a magnetic polisher unfortunately only a rotary one & it didn't get in there when I tried.

[ps_bond]

If it's the inside edges, then thrumming is likely to help.

[mizgeorge]

You beat me to it Peter!

[luke1990]

What material would you recommend for thrumming?

[Goldsmith]

I use a strip of soft leather gripped in a vice about the same size a a shoe lace, I have an old car washing leather that I cut into strips, I use different strips for each polishing compound.

[luke1990]

thanks for all the tips.

I'll start with burnishing it with an old ball burr then move onto strumming with the leather.