Re: [VACList] polishing products by airstream

["James Greene" <drgreene@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> 1.  Walbernize       cleaner and glaze

Jerry, this is like a liquid auto polish. pretty mild and a lot of work.
Won't do much for the haze on your ' 70 Tradewind

> 2.   Met-All            aluminum polish

This stuff is 1960s technology. I have a can and never use it as there are
much better products. The product of choice now for polishing an Airstream
is the Nuvite line of polishes. Polishing is a major job and requires the
clear coat to be stripped off first. Commercial firms that polish Airstreams
(only a few) charge $100 per linear foot of your trailer plus up charges for
removing awnings, etc. Go to the archives  -- www.tompatterson.com -- and do
a search on polishing. There's tons of information there. Also,
www.perfectpolish.com has a good overview of the process and is a source for
the best materials to use.

> have anyone used these two products that airstream recommends ????????

The Walbernize is used once it's polished or if you just want something like
a liquid wax job on a car finish.

> are there better products to use ??????

ABSOLUTELY!
>
> and when ordered the product was told that if the airstream had any haze
in
> the finsh it could NOT be removed and my 1970 tradewind does have a little
haze
> mostly on top
>
> is there anything that can be done about this haze  ????

The only way is to strip it off.  I'm not sure if the Airstream factory
offers polishing and re-clear coating or not. There are 2-3 companies that
offer this service. The clear coat is a special product that is supposed to
not craze from repeated heating and cooling and expansion of the aluminum
skin. Airstream has used different formulations over the years -- some more
successful than others. The factory now uses aluminum panels that are
pre-"painted" with clear coat and can not be polished to a mirror finish.
The earlier trailers -- like yours and mine -- can be polished to a mirror
finish. Later models can not because the aluminum is a different alloy.