Engine cleanup

[coulter]

I was wondering what is the best product and way to shine up the aluminum on case and motor,drive shaft. Over winter would like to clean  mine up to look sparkly like some of the others I've seen.

[ProfessorRex]

Polish, Rag, RUB RUB RUB RUB

[Rick G]

Ya right!   first you need to get the laquer coating , or whats left of it off  the cases. Use a good paint stripper, apply it with a dispossable paint brush . After 10 or 15 min. use a nylon pot scrubber to remove  the disolved coating , some times several coats are required. I usually have the small TV set up so that I can watch a game,  as this process can be boring and a little slow.
After all the coating is remover I use a synthetic sheeps wool  pad   on an electric drill , with some Mothers aluminum polish . Wear old clothes as this can be a trifle messy. Some people recoat the cases , but after going through all that work , I'm not even interested . I rebuff all the exposed aluminum one a year , every spring  and it stays very nice . You can see my bike in the gallery.

[Superfly]

Mothers Aluminum polish, a must have!!

[h2olawyer]

A dremel tool with the polishing kit helps get into those tough to reach areas too.

H2O

[Josh M]

After removing any of the original annodizing on the cases, I used Wenol brown rouge on a high speed wheel, followed by white rouge on a high speed wheel, followed by metal polish on a rag.  It came out awesome!! until my petcock started leaking all over my freshly polished engine cover. >:(

This technique also works well on the footpeg brackets and forks(but the coating is REALLY tough to get off the forks.  I think I ended up using scotch-brite to sand off the coating)

[Rick G]

Josh , get abetter paint stripper , mine makes  the coating pucker up almost in a few min.