Whre do I buy crocus cloth?

A

Adam

New member
I need to polish the gas piston in my M1A and have been told to use a crocus (sp?) cloth. I have checked hardware stores, craft stores and hobby stores and no one has even heard of crocus cloth. Can someone help me on this? Thank you.
 
Ain't it amazin' how many blank stares you can see in this ol' world?

Check with a machine shop, where there are a bunch of lathe operators. Since the stuff commonly comes in 1" or 2" rolls of 100' or more, you might be able to scrounge a couple of feet. Or, they can tell you their source.

Machine-tool supply houses, the places with elaborate selections of lathe tools, carbide drill bits, etc. are good places to phone. I have found it as letter-sized, cloth-backed sheets.

Hope this helps,

Art

PS: Otherwise, the proverbial Dremel tool, with a felt wheel and jeweler's rouge...
 
Wow! Everyone down here knows what that is, but I guess its cause it seems like everyone down here works in the oilfield, but anyway if you do not want to buy a whold roll of it they have the "black" sandpaper in the 8X10 sheets (usually) at most hardware stores or lumberyards. Get some in 600 grit and its a great polisher that is fine enough where you do not have to worry about removing too much metal. The only difference between that and crocus cloth is the 8X10 sheets are paper backed instead of cloth.
 
Hmmm. What I've always called "crocus cloth" is a heckuva lot finer than 600. It's more like jeweler's rouge for smoothness. No feel of any grit, even to my dishpan-softened delicate fingers. :)

Damfino, Art
 
I believe it is rouge or some rare-earth oxide. 600 would probably do what Adam wants to do, but it is many times coarser than crocus cloth. Having ground a few telescope mirrors, I know what a single grain of 600 will do to the surface when you're in the polishing phase with rouge.
 
Crocus cloth is either 1200 or 2400 grit, isn't it?

ART,

You're kidding, they don't have it in the autobody refinishing section?

I got some at Trak Auto here in Northern Virginia about a year ago in the abrasives aisle.

It's absolutely perfect for doing the final feather-in/polish on a chip repair.
 
I used the stuff for polishing crankshaft journals years ago. Machine shops should have it, if they don't even know what it is I'd not use that shop.
 
Mike, not only am I not kidding, my goats ain't even pregnant! The places I mentioned, I asked for "crocus cloth" and got as blank a look as ever I've seen this side of a government office.

SFAIK, cc is somewhere around 2,000. For metal polished this way, 100X or 200X magnification lets you see the grain structure, after a mild acid-etch.

Art
 
They have it here:

http://www.mcmaster.com

McMaster-Carr is a big industrial supply outfit, if they don't have it you probably don't need it! I'm not sure what you need to do to set up an account. Do a search there for crocus cloth, they have sheets and strip.

Bri
 
We used to order rolls of it in different grits from 140 up to 1200. If we were working on a high pressure valve we would use the finer grit to polish the gate and seat to get a good seal without having to knock out the pressed seats and replace them. If we were doing other things where smoothness did not matter we used the coarser grits. You could always find at least 7 or 8 100' rolls in the tool shed. We always used to say that the oilfield cannot run without tie wraps, a BIG hammer and crocus cloth. :D
 
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