Along the lines of the vintage mountain bike thread I've got an old Haro Extreme which I bead-blasted to bare aluminum a while ago. It looks OK and I like the look of raw aluminum but the porous bead blasted texture is kind of boring and attracts a lot of grime. Ideally I'd like to get back to a brushed finish or even better a burnished finished like some of the old GT mountain bikes came with back in the early 90s. I've played with a scotchbrite pad and sandpaper but the idea of doing my whole frame just seems a Sisyphean task.

Does anyone know how I'd go about finding a shop that might be able to put a finish like this on a bare Al frame? Any idea what it costs? A while back on one of those motorcycle build shows they had an aluminum plated frame (flame sprayed I think) which they had burnished in a giant tank of ceramic beads. It looked great but I can't remember the details. I suspect a big vibratory finish machine might be able to get similar results.

Any ideas?

Ray

If it was me, I would take it to a custom plating shop and have them hot jet coat it.
the same coating the use on headers for hot rods. I had a set of buckhorn 'Vette manifolds done up and it has exactly the finish your looking for!

But you should let them semi polish it first!